Bulletin

Issue: November/December 2007

News

Friends of murder victim speak of regrets

Friends can play a major role in monitoring the potential for family violence, says La Trobe University researcher Dr Patricia McNamara.

The social worker has done the first known study of a friendship group of a victim of partner homicide – and her remarks are drawn from their heartfelt responses to the murder.

‘The women witnessed bruising in their friend and did not explore it with her,’ Dr McNamara says. ‘They did not want to intrude and ask questions. They have enormous regrets because she was murdered not long after.’

The women were members of a hobby group. Casual groups such as these can be very important in the lives of abused women, says Dr McNamara, because territorial men tend to isolate their partners, carefully choosing and vetting friends for them.

The victim, whose name has been suppressed to protect the identity of her friends, eventually opened up to the group and said that she got strength from her relationship with them. This gave her the courage to leave her partner.

Unfortunately, says Dr McNamara, the period after leaving the marital home is the most dangerous in a violent, territorial relationship. The woman was killed six weeks after she left.

Dr McNamara set up the focus group at La Trobe so the five women could talk about the impact of the murder on their lives.

‘One woman now carries cards for a women’s self-help organisation. If she witnesses any inappropriate imbalance of power or aggressive talk within a partnership she separates the woman from the group and asks her about it.’

Not everyone chooses to intervene to this extent, Dr McNamara says, but all of the friends have become hyper-vigilant.

‘They now have strong views about the socialisation of children regarding relationships. One has started early and is vigilant about how her children relate to their friends. Any expression of violence is not tolerated.’

Parenting issues such as raised voices, verbal aggression and fathers that ‘bellow like bulls’ have also been addressed by the women.

‘It’s the anger and the physical threat behind the voice that is frightening for a child,’ Dr McNamara says.

The women themselves also report feeling extremely threatened by verbal aggression since the death of their friend. This is the case even when the aggression is not directed at them.

Dr McNamara’s findings are supported by quantitative research into domestic homicides.

‘The further you get from a metropolitan area the higher chance there is of a woman being killed in domestic violence,’ Dr McNamara says. ‘In remote areas injuries are not noticed and it is not easy to reach out for support. It is also much harder to leave.’

Dr McNamara’s study has been used in New Zealand and Australia to publicise the international effort by policy-makers and child and family welfare specialists to contain the problem.

Researchers from Australia, the US, the UK and Italy presented a range of child and family research findings at a Round Table discussion in late August, cohosted by La Trobe’s School of Social Work and Social Policy and the Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare.

The researchers are members of the International Association for Outcome-based Evaluation and Research in Family and Children’s Services.

The forum gave Australian practitioners new insights into a diversity of contemporary approaches to child welfare internationally, including prevention, intervention, reunion and rehabilitation of families in which children have been neglected or abused.