James Rowlands

University of Westminster

In England and Wales, Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) examine domestic abuse (DA)-related deaths. Despite perpetrators being a potentially important albeit difficult source of information, no study has investigated perpetrator involvement in DHRs or that of others like their family. Data is reported from a documentary analysis of 60 DHR reports an...

In England and Wales, domestic homicide reviews (DHRs) seek to build a picture of the circumstances preceding a domestic abuse-related death, identify any learning and make recommendations for change. Drawing on data from document analysis of 60 DHR reports, this article explores how a victim’s real name is routinely taken out of use when a DHR rep...

Purpose In England and Wales, Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) are conducted into domestic abuse-related killings. In 2016, deaths by suicide were brought into the scope of this review system and, to distinguish them from reviews into domestic homicides, we describe these as ‘Suicide Domestic Abuse-Related Death Reviews’ (S-DARDR). To date, S-DARDR...

Purpose Within the context of the big data society, new systems of data collection on domestic violence and abuse (DVA) have emerged. One such system is Domestic Violence Fatality Review (DVFR) which captures the various dimensions of gender, violence, and abuse required to form an evidence base for prevention. However, to date, there has been limi...

Purpose This paper is a commentary on COVID-19’s impact on Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs), the system in England and Wales that enables learning from domestic abuse-related deaths. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on a practitioner–researcher perspective, this paper reflects on how COVID-19 affected the delivery and experience of DHRs, the pl...

This article responds to an article by Hope et al. (2021), in which they reported on an analysis of 22 Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) conducted in England and Wales into the domestic-abuse related deaths of men. While the analysis of DHRs individually and in aggregate is an important part of the process of learning from these tragedies, in this r...

Purpose Family involvement is a key element of Domestic Homicide Review (DHR), the form of Domestic Violence Fatality Review (DVFR) found in England and Wales. Family involvement is framed as having dual purposes: first, as a benefit to DHRs, enabling a fuller picture of victims’ experiences; second, as a benefit to families themselves, notably as...

Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) are a statutory review process to better understand domestic homicide in England and Wales. As a policy intervention, DHRs are intended to build a picture of the circumstances before such deaths and identify gaps in practice, policy and system response. The rationale is that this learning can improve response to dom...

In England and Wales, Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) examine domestic abuse-related deaths to identify lessons to be learned. However, their emergence as a policy initiative has been little considered. To address this gap, a thematic discourse analysis of policy documents to 2011 was undertaken, examining the justification for, and conceptualizat...

Interviewee Transcript Review (ITR), a form of Respondent Validation, is a way to share and check interview transcripts with research participants. To date, the literature has considered how these practices affect data quality, focused on the ability of a participant to correct, add or remove data. Less considered is the extent to which ITR might e...

Rigorous, comprehensive and timely research are the cornerstone of social and transformative change. For researchers responding to femicide, family and intimate partner homicide, there are substantial challenges around accessing robust data that is complete and fully representative of the experiences and social identities of those affected. This ra...

Domestic Homicide Reviews (DHRs) are publicly available and provide an anonymised account of intimate partner or family homicides in England and Wales, largely by describing the circumstances before a victim's death. They aim to reduce the likelihood of future homicides by identifying, learning and using this to improve prevention and intervention...

James Rowlands, a researcher and domestic violence worker from Brighton, travelled to Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA to study ways of improving responses to domestic homicide. He will use his findings to inform how these deaths are reviewed in the UK.

Several models of risk assessment for victims of domestic abuse have emerged in England, Wales, Scotland, Australia and the United States. In the United Kingdom, risk assessment and multi-agency approaches for very high-risk victims are a central part of the government's strategy to reduce domestic violence; therefore, risk assessment and managemen...