Children Killed in the Context of Domestic Violence: International Perspectives from Death Review Committees

  • Peter Jaffe
  • Marcie Campbell
  • Katherine Reif
  • Jordan Fairbairn
  • Randal David
Chapter
First Online:

Abstract

Child homicides are a significant concern around the world and call for enhanced prevention efforts. In 2012, 36,000 children under the age of 15 were victims of homicide representing 8% of all global homicide victims (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime 2014). In Western societies, children are most likely to be killed by parents or step-parents, acts usually referred to as filicides (Dawson 2015; Friedman and Resnik 2007; Office for National Statistics 2014). Extensive reviews of official records find that fathers are 57% of Canadian filicide perpetrators (Dawson 2015) and 55% of American filicide perpetrators (Dixon et al. 2014). Fathers appear more likely to kill children as an act of revenge, in the context of separation, and following a prior history of domestic violence (Dawson 2015; Ewing 1997; Lawrence 2004).

Keywords

Domestic Violence Intimate Partner Child Protection Risk Assessment Tool Child Protection Service 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© The Author(s) 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  • Peter Jaffe
    • 1
  • Marcie Campbell
    • 2
  • Katherine Reif
    • 1
  • Jordan Fairbairn
    • 3
  • Randal David
    • 1
  1. 1.Faculty of EducationWestern UniversityLondonCanada
  2. 2.Counselling PsychologyWestern UniversityLondonCanada
  3. 3.Centre for Research and Education on Violence Against Women and Children (CREVAWC)Western UniversityLondonCanada

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