Exploring adversities among parents convicted of killing their children

Abstract

Experiencing adversities has been associated with the use of violence but this has not been explored with filicide offenders in South Africa. Individual, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 parents/stepparents/caregivers convicted of child homicide in South Africa, resulting in 49 in-depth interviews. Data were analyzed by means of grounded theory. Using an ecological framework, this study alludes to the widespread and cumulative nature of violence and trauma experiences within multiple domains of the participants’ lives. The study highlighted the absence of support in the aftermath of experiencing trauma, possibly resulting in these parents lacking resources to mitigate the sequelae of adverse experiences. This study calls for trauma related, mental health components to be integrated into violence interventions and for these to address the impact of trauma at the individual, family, and societal levels, to prevent the transition from victim to offender.

Adverse childhood experiences and potential pathways to filicide perpetration: A systematic search and review

“…Twenty-four research designs were case series, two were case studies and one an epidemiological study. Three articles were about the same study -Dekel et al (2018-Dekel et al ( , 2019-Dekel et al ( , 2020 and another two also involved the same study -Cavanagh et al (2005-Cavanagh et al ( , 2007. The largest F I G U R E 1 Flow chart of the screening and selection of studies number (N = 11) of the included articles drew upon data from the United States; three from Finland and from South Africa; two from England, and England, Scotland and Wales as a group, and from Italy; one from Austria and Finland as a group; and finally, there were also single papers from Australia, Canada and New Zealand.…”

“…A further strategy employed in this search process, as recommended by Greenhalgh and Peacock (2005), involved hand searching reference lists in filicide articles already identified to determine if there were any other relevant articles. This resulted in the inclusion of three additional articles by Simpson and Stanton (2000), Kunst (2002) and Dekel et al (2020), which met all inclusion criteria but were not identified in the databases search.…”

“…An additional potential pathway from ACEs involves experiences of interpersonal violence in adulthood. There were many findings of intimate partner violence among perpetrators (Cavanagh et al, 2005, 2007; Dekel et al, 2018, 2019, 2020; Eriksson et al, 2016; Friedman et al, 2005; Kauppi et al, 2010; Smithey, 1997; Stroud, 2008; Wilczynski, 1995). Among the reviewed articles, Stroud (2008) reported that intimate partner violence was a feature in 49 per cent (33) of the cases in her study, either previously or at the time of the filicide, with Wilczynski (1995, p. 212) finding that in 18.8 per cent (nine) of her cases there had been an ‘impulse or attempt’ to injure another person at the time of the filicide, usually a partner.…”

Multifaceted Offenders and Minimization of Victims: U.S. National News Media Coverage of Offenders and Victims in Coverage of Filicide

“…They found experiences of poor parenting in childhood and/or adolescence were detrimental for offenders to attain healthy attachment to their children, perpetuating an intergenerational cycle of abuse (Dekel et al, 2018). Using the same sample, Dekel et al (2020) focused on adversities across four levels: individual (i.e., adverse parenting experiences, substance abuse), family/relationship (i.e., intimate partner violence, sexual violence), community (i.e., gang involvement), and societal (i.e., political experiences of violence) with their findings suggesting child murderers were victims of violence or adversities themselves.…”

Offence, offender, and victim characteristics in South Korean filicides, 1948–1962: A descriptive study

“…Moreover, filicide studies tend to be clinical case descriptions and case reports prepared by psychotherapists, often from a handful of subjects (Lattanzi et al., 2020). Studies that draw from psychiatric populations report that subjects suffer from mental illness; samples from prisons find that offenders are single, poor and have a history of previous victimisation (Dekel et al., 2020). Consequently, a much broader, non‐biased sample is necessary.…”