Abstract
AbstractA filicide death, meaning the killing of a child by their parent or equivalent guardian, is a tragic event. Sadly, a UK study suggests Australia has the fourth highest rate of filicide among similar developed nations. Since Australian research studies on the incidence of filicide, or indeed on any other aspect of the problem, are limited, it is impossible to know if this finding is correct or not. However, in the last several years more research on filicide has emerged in Australia and by reviewing the recent research in detail, this article develops an integrated analysis of Australian filicide research and contributes to the knowledge bank on Australian filicide that can be used by professionals undertaking practice and research in intervention and prevention. Analysis of the studies shows one child dies at the hands of a parent every fortnight and that this number has not changed for many years. The analysis identifies the profiles of victims and perpetrators. The constellation of circumstances and stressors associated with each of the parental perpetrator groups is discussed, including the perpetrators’ contact with, and mostly unsuccessful use of, services. Based on the analysis, a way forward to prevention is proposed.
Highlights
Australia has been depicted as a nation with a high incidence of filicide (Pritchard et al, 2013)
The research to be reviewed is composed of studies from two major groups, the first group being large-scale studies, like the 10 year plus retrospective studies of filicide deaths in NSW (Butler & Buxton, 2013), Victoria (Brown et al, 2014) and Australia (Brown et al, 2019), and the second group being smaller scale studies examining sub-categories of filicide deaths, like neonaticide (De Bortoli et al, 2013a), maternal infanticide (De Bortoli et al, 2013b) and familicide (Johnson, 2005, 2008) and issues such as the role of parental separation in filicide (Brown et al, 2014; Kirkwood, 2012) and case studies of perpetrators’ characteristics, backgrounds and personality (Eriksson et al, 2016; Eriksson et al, 2019)
What is the incidence of filicide deaths in Australia and how does this incidence compare with other similar countries?
Summary
Cite this article: Brown T, Tyson D, and Fernandez Arias P (2020).
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