We cannot change what we refuse to examine – Karyn McCluskey
This week, I read that nine of the ten bestselling fiction paperbacks involved the murder of a woman. I understand the fascination – heck, I’m also interested in human behaviour, just in a different way. I’ve spent decades examining crimes, the behaviour of those who commit them, their lifestyles and the circumstances around their offending. Police colleagues have built databases of murders to identify links and patterns, particularly where one person may be responsible for several deaths.
That work matters because we cannot change what we refuse to examine. When someone dies by suicide, families spend months, sometimes years, asking: ‘What if I’d known? What if I’d acted?’ We tell them, rightly, what they know now, they did not know then. But when an investigation uncovers missed opportunities or knowledge that was never shared, that learning must prompt change in services involved.
Professionals have analysed cases in this way for years. We’ve seen the headlines: the ignored pleas for help, the information that didn’t reach the right person, the risk that was underestimated. Yet many deaths never make the front pages – often women, and more rarely men, killed by a partner or ex-partner, and people whose suicide is connected to the domestic abuse they endured.
These are complex cases. What’s visible is often only the tip of an iceberg of coercive control, stalking, threats and violence, much of it never reported to police. Police Scotland recorded more than 60,000 domestic abuse incidents in a recent year.
This is an epidemic, requiring the highest levels of skill from those supporting victims and building cases.
Until this year, Scotland was the only part of the UK without a domestic homicide review model. The Criminal Justice Modernisation and Abusive Domestic Behaviour Reviews (Scotland) Act 2025 changed that, with Domestic Homicide and Suicide Reviews beginning in April.
Where someone dies and domestic abuse was known or suspected, the Review Oversight Committee decides whether a review should take place. An independent panel can then bring together expertise from policing, health, social work, the third sector and elsewhere.
The purpose isn’t to determine guilt or apportion blame – it’s to learn and prevent another death.
My sister is a pilot. The black box in the aircraft she flies gathers information so that, God forbid, if there’s a crash, investigators can understand what happened and stop it happening again. That commitment to continuous learning has helped make flying one of the safest ways to travel.
In fatal domestic abuse cases, there is rarely one single missed opportunity. Often there’s a chain of contributing factors.
We already know many of the flashpoints when danger escalates: leaving an abusive relationship, strangulation, stalking, coercive control, access to weapons or the arrival of a new partner.
Scotland now has a mechanism to examine these deaths properly. But the review itself is only the beginning. Its value will be measured by what happens after: lessons shared, recommendations acted upon and lives saved.
Changing systems, culture and practices requires a great deal: accountability and leadership to name only two key factors. We owe that to those whose lives were taken, and to families left asking questions. And of course, the ultimate success of these reviews will be that one day, fewer of them are needed.