Today marks the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and the start of the 16 days of Activism for No Violence against Women and Children Campaign. This year the UK witnessed an increase of 6% of recorded domestic abuse crimes and accounting to 18% of all offences recorded by the police in the year ending March 2021[1].
In a harrowing article by Karen Ingala Smith, co-founder of the Femicide Census, she counts at least 81 women have been killed by men in the 28 weeks after the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving officer on 3rdMarch 2021. Six months after, the country was shocked by news of the killing of Sabina Nessa, a teacher, when on her way to meet some friends. She was murdered by a stranger in Cator Park on a five-minute walk to the Depot Pub. Prosecutor Alison Morgan QC told the court it was a “premeditated and predatory” stranger attack[2]. According to Counting Dead Women, a project that tracks femicide in the UK, there are at least 127 cases of women who have been killed by men (or where a man is the principal suspect) so far this year (as of November 2021).
Moving on from outlining statistics I wanted to share a project called Disappearing Women by the artist Henny Beaumont who painted the women killed by men in 2020 in the UK, putting faces to names and statistics. To view the portraits, visit Women killed by men – portraits of victims | Society | The Guardian.
[1] Statistics at Domestic abuse prevalence and trends, England and Wales – Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk)
[2] See Sabina Nessa: Man accused of ‘predatory’ murder of teacher – BBC News