While much of the misconduct surrounding violence against women is afforded adequate recognition – the exorbitant physical and emotional cost symptomatic of such violence should rightly face a degree of punishment proportionate to its heinous nature. Equally however, it’s the purportedly ‘mild’ cases that belie the darkest violence and the greatest fatality rate. The ones that hide themselves from even the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. Worse again, the source of much of the injustice in this regard finds its source in poor organisational response and a dire lack of enthusiasm to intervene on the part of the NPCC (National Police Chiefs' Council).
Legal measures in place at present; non-molestation orders and bail to name but a few, are those which the police have failed to use appropriately or indeed often enough according to the Centre for Women’s Justice. Worse again, Domestic Violence Protection Notices and restraining orders among other protective mechanisms are gathering dust on the figurative shelf of NPCC authority. Combining this with the blatant lack of enthusiasm on the part of the NPCC forms a nasty concoction responsible for the fatalities we read about in the press.
Weak, ill-timed, and loosely enforced, intervention is consistently overlooked on account of a case not looking ‘bad enough’ , ultimately amounting to an outright abandonment of basic safeguarding measures for the vulnerable women affected by violence of this nature.
Even worse again, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 is a chief antagonist for the underestimation of much of the violence women are met with. The code of practice states a lawful arrest requires ‘reasonable grounds’ for believing that the person liable for arrest is necessary. This is something entirely at the discretion of the police; a constitutional body that has, on a number of counts, failed so many. UK Victim Support discovered that 53% of all respondents reported an instance of domestic abuse at least twice before they felt appropriate action was taken by the police. This alarming figure connotes a need for greater police intervention, bolstered by a prompt reform in legislation capable of imposing stronger obligation upon the NPCC to act upon the earliest incidence of abuse, thus tackling the femicide that plagues 21st century society and addressing previous despondency over that which is too often branded as a relationship- oriented feud.
Ensuring greater legal enforcement as a means of catching incidents of domestic abuse earlier wouldn’t just provide a broader spectrum of scenarios in which to intervene but it has the potential to catalyse a higher recorded rate of abuse. Many women are scared to come forward and face the consequences of vocalising their victimhood.
The more legally enforceable means of police intervention, the greater chance of reducing the incidence rate before more lives are lost to seemingly banal domestic feuds.
Data from Victim Support’s National Homicide Service which supports the families of all murder and manslaughter victims in England and Wales noted that 30% of cases concerned domestic homicides. While support lines for victims are readily available, the resources for women post-incidence is not what we lack, it is the support from authorities and their failure to impose enough domestic violence protection orders that is.
The murder of Mary Ward, found dead at her home on Melrose Street in Belfast city on the 1st of October last year is one of countless sobering testaments to how poorly the threat of violence is addressed by our police force. The 22 year old’s body was found at her home with neck wounds a distressing two weeks post-incidence. While the Police Service of Northern Ireland purported to have had correspondence on a number of occasions before her death, records don’t account for the restraining order Ms. Ward had against her murderer or her persistent attempts to report the harassment she’d suffered at the hands of her abuser. An investigation is now underway to address police response to the deceased’s murder and the negligence at large; the report she issued mere weeks prior to her death that she had “been the victim of a violent crime” had very obviously fallen on deaf ears.
Poor organisational responses casts cold light over a dire lack of appropriate intervention and exposes a deeply unsettling pattern of negligence on the part of the NPCC.
The independent office for Police Conduct, in their remarks upon the statutory duty to protect as updated in June 2022, said the level of confidence in the police among females is ‘worryingly low’ with almost 49% of those affected by sexual assault, rape or penetration falling victim more than once. It is in consideration of the aforementioned murder that this comes at little shock. Such woeful statistics are nothing if not a decisive explanation for the meagre one in six that will report assault and serves as an ugly reflection of the legislative overhaul required to rectify this.
Going forward, increasing the institutional legitimacy of the NPCC by means of greater, more specific legislation, coupled with a focus on a bottom up approach- implementing Women’s police stations with an eye to embedding access and support mechanisms within communities in recognition of the epidemic that inhibits upon the lives of all women, not just those already victimised by this issue, could redress the aforementioned crises of inaction.
It is time for legal intervention, time to act before more women are thrust into the role of sacrificial lamb against their will in the fight for recognition. Victims like Mary Ward have been reduced to little more than an example among hundreds, lost in a fog of the same exhausted narrative. Patterns must start to gain the attention of our police force and encourage them to model their solution to how lives can be saved, rather than relying on one murder more tragic than the next as a means of encouraging legislature to provide a remedy. Tangible change to the nature of police response, to this breed of violence and indeed to the implementation of legislation is possible, and the first step is to prevent these cases from falling on deaf ears. While an attempt to embed power within broader law enforcement will not guarantee change if appropriate support and response mechanisms within the police force are available, it could be a step in the right direction to legally enforced change and encourage the NPCC to reevaluate their meaning of intervention and how quick they are to award a case its recognition. The Government's new ‘tackling violence against women and girls’ strategy commits to reducing the prevalence of this epidemic and it serves as a beacon of hope in this pressing issue.
However, change is contingent upon addressing a problem’s source, not mere token-gesture gap filling exercises. This initiative is a step in the right direction, but a greater emphasis upon what is and should be, within the remit of police power and a review of the legal framework that allows them to take action is what remains most important.
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