January 2024

 

Happy New Year.

And I’m happy to be able to start the 2024 with some reasonably good news – only 100 women were reported as having been known or suspected to have been killed by men in 2023.

Yay!!

That’s only about 2 every week.

Yay!!

Only one every 3 or 4 days…

Yay!!

That’s 8 less than last year…  let’s all go home and celebrate a job well done!

 

Or is it?

Sadly this number will inevitably increase beyond 100, sadly even in the next few days - there is a lag in the reporting over the Bank Holidays and weekends since then.

And whilst it would be nice to celebrate a nice round number each year – it’s just as important to look at the bigger picture.

The annual average since the end of 2009 is 140 women killed by men every year and that’s an average of two women 5 days.

I want to again credit the source of this data and take a few words from their end-of-year report.

Counting Dead Women monitors the media and collates reports of women suspected to have been killed by men.

They only count women where men have been charged, or deemed responsible for the death of a woman by a statutory agency, for example in cases such as those where men have killed themselves after killing a woman or have been held under the Mental Health Act in relation to a killing. 

In addition, they send a Freedom of Information requests to the 42 UK police forces asking for information on women suspected to have been killed by men in the preceding year. This also reveals cases that have not featured in the media or which we might not have seen.

 

I HAVE TO ASK AGAIN – WHY IS THIS INFORMATION NOT BEING COLLATED CENTRALLY BY A GOVERNMENT BODY RATHER THAN AN UNDERFUNDED CHARITY!!


On average, in the UK 58% of women killed by men are killed by a current or former partner. Often in these cases, the killing of a woman follows months, years or even decades of violence, abuse and coercive control.  Violence against women takes a huge number of different forms but what that statistic shows is how often “domestic abuse” leads to murder.

In addition, the data shows that around 8% of women killed by men, are women who were killed by their own son. Nurturing and raising a son who then kills you – I have no words.

Only around 10% of women are killed by a stranger, which is great news and should make us all feel more secure as we walk home – but should we then fear for our lives when we get home? 90% of women are killed by someone they know.


The killing of women, just because they are women and reflecting unequal relationships between women and men as individuals but also collectively, is known as femicide.

Femicide is a systemic issue.

Whilst individual men must always be held responsible for the actions that they take, femicide is also a product of sex inequality and widely held cultural values. Regardless of her relationship with the man who killed her and the circumstances of her life, each of these women deserves to be remembered by name and as more than just another statistic.

Almost every woman’s death leaves grieving family and friends.

 

Only 5 women have been reported as having lost their lives at the hands of a man since we met here last month. I really hope that is the case and is the final number but I suspect not.

Let’s take a minute to remember them:

 

27 November 2023: An unnamed woman was found dead at a property in Stafford. Dale Crooks, 33, has been charged with murder.

5 December 2023: Lianne Gordon, 42, was shot dead outside a home in Lower Clapton. A man of 20 and a boy of 16 were also wounded in the shooting. A 16-year-old boy has been charged with murder and two counts of attempted murder.

15 December 2023: Kamaljeet Mahey, who was in her 40s, was found stabbed at a home in Wolverhampton. Rajveer Mahey, 39, has been charged with murder.

15 December 2023: Glenna Siviter, 50, was found dead at an address in Middlesborough. Andrew Steven Hall, 46, has been charged with her murder and the attempted murder of a man was seriously assaulted on the same day.

24 December 2023: Kacey Clarke, 22, was stabbed to death at a home in Bermondsey, south London. A 16-year-old boy, who was known to Kacey, has been charged with murder.

 

Two 16-year-olds out of 5 there in case anyone missed that!!

 

So please, please feel safe as you make your way home now. But please, please, please feel empowered to report anything that you suspect is domestic abuse amongst your friends and neighbours.

 

Take care and we’ll look forward to seeing back here on Monday February 5th.  

Thank you for your time this evening.

 

 

  

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