Domestic Homicide Reviews: evidence briefing

2. The purpose of a Domestic Homicide Review (DHR)

Key findings:

The overall aim of a DHR is similar across the 17 jurisdictions covered in this briefing, which is to understand the system's response to domestic abuse to learn from and prevent domestic homicide deaths. To reach this overarching goal jurisdictions conduct a multi-agency review to understand patterns and trends, identify learnings and provide recommendations for improving policy and services.

The evidence suggests that there is , however, a lack of awareness on some of the assumptions underlying DHRs. Differences in understanding of the purpose of a DHR can affect the kind of learning and recommendations produced. To ensure a shared understanding of the purpose of the DHR, the literature recommends to articulate a Theory of Change to underpin the DHR model.

Although there are different approaches to DHRs internationally, the purpose is generally the same: to understand the system's response to domestic abuse and prevent and/or reduce domestic homicide deaths in the future. A description of the aims of DHRs in each jurisdiction is given in table 1 in Annex 1.

One of the overaching goals of the Australian Domestic and Family Violence Death Review Network includes: "identifying practice and system changes that may improve outcomes for people affected by domestic and family violence and reduce these types of deaths"

Source: Australian Domestic and Family Violence Death Review Network Data Report – Intimate partner violence homicides 2010-2018

The Domestic Violence Fatality Review of Washington (US) states its purpose as: "To understand how systems and communities are or are not effective in responding to domestic violence victims and abusers. Through deeply examining one individual victim's experience, review teams bring to light how systems respond to all survivors and abusers."

Source: Washington State Domestic Violence Fatality Review

The purpose of the DHR in England is defined as:

a) "to establish lessons to be learned (..) for the way local professionals and organisations can work individually and together to safeguard victims;

b) identify lessons both within and between agencies, how and within what timescales they will be acted on, and what is expected to change as a result;

c) apply these lessons to improve service responses;

d) prevent domestic violence homicide and improve service responses (…) by developing a co-ordinated multi-agency approach (…);

e) contribute to a better understanding of the nature of domestic violence and abuse;

f) highlight good practice."

Source: Multi-agency Statutory Guidance for the Conduct of Domestic Homicide Reviews, UK Government

Although often not specifically mentioned in the legislation or DHR guidance, one underlying reason for establishing a DHR is to give victims (and their families) a voice. Some reports for example start with an "in memoriam", remembering the victims of domestic homicide.

A DHR allows for multi-agency communication and in-depth understanding of the (events leading up to the) incident. The literature points out, however, that there can be a lack of awareness of some of the assumptions underlying DHRs. Reviewing the DHR process in England, Rowlands (2020a) concluded that it is for example not clear "how the narrative of a homicide is generated during the DHR process and then represented in the final published documents". (p. 25). Rowlands (2021) examined UK Government policy documents to understand the justifications for the implementation of DHRs. In his analysis, Rowlands points out that DHRs were rendered as common-sense and "a taken-for-granted good". This might mean that "the risks and opportunities of DHRs are left unrecognized" (Rowlands 2021 p. 13), for example in understanding how panels operate and make sense of the deaths that are reviewed.

Rowlands' (2021) analysis also suggests that while victims were viewed as the object of concern, they were presented "as the "Other" and, for the most part, rendered silent and denuded of subjectivity and agency" (Rowlands 2021 p. 7). Yet, one of the aims of the DHR across several of the 17 jurisdictions, is that the victim's story is central, and that the DHR can offer an alternative narrative to the forensic one (Rowlands 2020). Rowlands (2021) argues that if the main aim is to increase understanding of victim and perpetrator characteristics and to improve system responses, then the focus of a DHR can be on agency and professional learning. However, he points out that if there is also the aim to challenge the forensic narrative of domestic homicide, the DHR will need to take a more victim-centred approach (Rowlands 2021).

Differences in understanding of the purpose of a DHR can affect the kind of learning and recommendations produced. To ensure that there is a shared understanding, Rowlands (2020) recommends that a Theory of Change^[9] is developed to underpin the DHR process. A clearly articulated Theory of Change would "require interrogation so that how and why an intervention work can be clearly articulated" (Rowlands and Cook 2022, p. 560).