Assessment of homicidal deaths among females in Ethiopia- Prospective Cross-Sectional Analysis

Abstract

Abstract Background: Violence against women is global dimension makes it very unique as an international crime. The roots of violence against women lie in historically unequal power relations between men and women, and persistent discrimination against women. Violent deaths of women indicate the absence of social and mental wellbeing of a society. It can usually be attributed to their long-term deprivation of socio-economic and human rights, thereby reflecting a negative image of the society they belonged. Studying the profile of violent deaths of women is of extreme importance to a country particularly in Ethiopia especially to draw policy in preventive strategies. Objective: The objective of the study is to provide a comprehensive report on thorough investigation of homicidal death among females. Methods and Materials: A Prospective cross-sectional study of was conducted from January 1, 2021 – October 31, 2021 in the department of forensic medicine and toxicology, Saint Paul’s Hospital and Millennium Medical College in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. All cases of violent homicidal deaths of females aged 15 years and above presented to the mortuary of SPHMMC for medico legal autopsy was included using non-probability convenience sampling method. Data was entered and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 24. Result: A total of 57 (13%) alleged female homicidal cases aged 15 years and above were included in this study which were selected from 488(18.6%) females deaths from a total of 2616 autopsy cases. There were around 40 cases of alleged female homicide case under 15 years of age which is not included in this study. The mean age of victims was 33.16 years. About 50.9% victims were from rural region. 50.9% the victims were married. About 75.4% did not receive any medical care after the fatal incidence. Most of the perpetrators were in the age group 31-40 years (36.8%). Most of perpetrators were farmers. Most of victim had less than 5 year’s duration of relationship. More than half of incidence was due to quarrel. Most of the women were mostly killed by their marital partners (42.1%). Majority of the incidence occur in private residences/home in (70.2%, n=40) and during the night time in about 68.4%. About 24.6% of the perpetrators have used alcohol before the incident. Most of the fatal injuries were blunt trauma in 7 56.1%. The most frequent area wounded by fatal trauma was the head. The most common cause of death was head injury with blunt trauma 33.3% (n=19). Conclusion: In this study most of the alleged homicide is due to intimate partner violence. Most of them are young adult women and are unemployed. So violence against women’s has direct relationship with socio-demographic characteristics of the victim as well as perpetrator. Therefore, effective interventions need to be targeted at men in order to address the underlying discriminatory social norms that legitimize male power, control and use of violence. Key words: Homicide, Femicide, Female, Ethiopia