Officers claimed they feared being violently attacked, say reports, but campaigners accuse force of ‘trampling all over human rights’
Attenders at Sarah Everard’s vigil were arrested by police officers who feared the event had become an “anti-police protest”, according to reports.
Officers claimed in witness statements first reported by the Evening Standard that they were branded “murderers” by those in attendance.
Continue reading...Calls grow for repeal of statute of limitations and widening of definition of rape after former model makes allegations on TikTok
A young woman’s account on TikTok of being drugged, raped and then blackmailed by a beauty pageant organiser when she was 16 years old has provoked outrage in Nepal and prompted calls to reform the country’s “grossly inadequate” rape laws.
In one of a series of videos, which together have been viewed millions of times, the former model and child actor broke down in tears as she talked about Nepal’s statute of limitations that dictates survivors must report cases of rape within one year of the offence being committed.
Continue reading...Amnesty International calls for restoring full tribal control over crimes on Native land to improve enforcement
Amnesty International has called on the US government to fully restore tribal jurisdiction over crimes on Native lands in the face of staggeringly high rates of sexual violence against Native women, according to a report released on Tuesday.
Nearly one in three American Indian and Alaska Native women have been raped – more than twice the average for white women and probably an undercount given gaps in data collection, according to the report.
Continue reading...Babis Anagnostopoulos spent 10 chilling hours in an Athens courts calmly describing the murder of his wife
Last week, Greek helicopter pilot Babis Anagnostopoulos stood in the dock of an Athens court and related the circumstances that led him to suffocate his British wife. Over the course of 10 hours he barely paused. Coolly and calmly, from 10am to 8pm, he addressed the tribunal.
He recalled the dream life he had shared with the woman whom he would go on to asphyxiate; his decision to choke her beloved puppy, Roxy, hanging the pet dog from the banister of the couple’s maisonette; his love for his baby daughter, whom he would place next to her dead mother’s body; and his determination in a moment “of chaos” to cover up the killing as a robbery gone terribly wrong.
Continue reading...Osinachi Nwachukwu’s family and friends allege that she was a victim of domestic abuse
On most Sunday mornings, the searing voice of Osinachi Nwachukwu, one of Nigeria’s best-known gospel singers, filled the vast 100,000-seat auditorium of her church in Abuja.
Footage from one of the last times she led the choir at the Dunamis International Gospel Centre showed her singing the 2017 gospel hit Ekwueme, her eyes pressed closed and hand outstretched in prayer.
Continue reading...Victims’ commissioner calls goal of returning prosecution levels to pre-2017 levels ‘a pipe dream’
Sex crimes logged by police in England and Wales have reached a record high amid warnings from the victims’ commissioner that the government’s aim to boost prosecutions to levels last seen five years ago is “a pipe dream”.
Police-recorded sexual offences increased to their highest level over a 12-month period, with 183,587 in the year to December 2021, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
Continue reading...Forensic specialists carrying out autopsies north of Kyiv say they ‘still have hundreds of bodies to examine’
Forensic doctors carrying out postmortem examinations on bodies in mass graves north of Kyiv say they have found evidence some women were raped before being killed by Russian forces.
“We already have a few cases which suggest that these women had been raped before being shot to death,” said Vladyslav Pirovskyi, a Ukrainian forensic doctor who with a team of coroners has carried out dozens of autopsies on residents from Bucha, Irpin and Borodianka who died during Russia’s month-long occupation of the area.
Continue reading...Rate of abuse against parents is highest among 19- to 25-year-olds and most perpetrators are male
At least 40% of child-to-parent violence and abuse incidents are unreported to police, according to research.
The study into the “hidden harm” commissioned by the London mayor’s Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) found that the rate of violence and abuse against parents and carers was highest among those aged 19-25, and 81% of perpetrators were male.
Continue reading...Koci Selamaj did not attend sentencing for murder of 28-year-old primary school teacher in London
Sabina Nessa’s family called her killer a “coward” when he refused to come to court to be sentenced for her murder on Thursday.
Koci Selamaj, 36, drove to London from his home in Eastbourne on the south coast to carry out a premeditated attack on a woman after being spurned by his estranged wife.
Continue reading...Some behavioral themes identified include concerning online content, a history of being bullied and financial instability
A new US Secret Service report details a rising threat from men who identify as “involuntary celibates” or “incels”, due to their inability to form intimate relationships with women.
The report released on Tuesday and prepared by the National Threat Assessment Center (NTAC) highlights behavioral threat assessment themes identified in years of research examining targeted violence.
Continue reading...Working group led by Helena Kennedy QC recommends law to crack down on daily abuses that ‘absolutely degrade women’s lives’
A misogyny act for Scotland, created exclusively for women to crack down on street harassment, organised online hate and an onslaught of rape and disfigurement threats, has been recommended to the Scottish government by Helena Kennedy.
Set up in February 2021 to consider the creation of a standalone offence of misogynist hate crime, Lady Kennedy’s working group has returned a far more ambitious report that recommends naming explicitly the daily abuses that “absolutely degrade women’s lives”.
Continue reading...‘We miss her all the time,’ say relatives of woman killed by serving Met police officer Wayne Couzens
The family of Sarah Everard have paid tribute to her on the first anniversary of her murder by a police officer, saying she was “wonderful and we miss her all the time” and that they “live with the sadness of our loss”.
Everard, 33 was abducted, raped and killed by serving Met officer Wayne Couzens as she walked home in south London on 3 March last year.
Continue reading...Zahir Jaffer tortured and beheaded Noor Mukadam, in July last year, in case that sparked outrage over violence against women
A court in Islamabad has sentenced to death the tycoon’s son who raped and murdered Noor Mukadam, a case that sparked outrage in Pakistan.
Mukadam, 27, the daughter of a former Pakistani diplomat, was held captive, tortured and beheaded in July last year by Zahir Jaffer, a member of a well-known industrialist family.
Continue reading...Friends of Doski Azad said the 23-year-old makeup artist had received repeated death threats from male family members
The Kurdish transgender woman Doski Azad shot dead by her brother last month, had been living in hiding from her family after repeated death threats, friends have said.
According to friends, Azad had had to move home regularly after several death threats by male members of her family.
Continue reading...Lawyer says refugees, who were protesting against Turkey leaving Istanbul convention on violence against women, are at risk in Iran
Three Iranian refugees are facing deportation from Turkey after taking part in a demonstration against Ankara’s withdrawal from the Istanbul convention on violence against women.
Lily Faraji, Zeinab Sahafi and Ismail Fattahi were arrested after attending a protest in the southern Turkish city of Denizli last March. A fourth Iranian national, Mohammad Pourakbari, was detained with the others, despite not attending the protests, according to Buse Bergamalı, their lawyer.
Continue reading...Charing Cross station case shows old problems were allowed to fester on social media thanks to culture of fear
Case by case, the idea that the police’s problems with women is the result of a few bad apples rather than a misogynistic culture gets harder to maintain.
The revelations about the hate-filled messages among officers sent via WhatsApp and Facebook at Charing Cross station in central London are exceptionally sickening in their nature.
Continue reading...Fahima fears she is being targeted because of the role she had, which included recruiting other women
*Fahima was the most senior policewoman in her province. Since the Taliban took over, women who worked in the police force have been targeted for assassination and beatings. She believes Taliban officials are particularly focused on tracking her down because of both her seniority and her role recruiting other women.
I fled to another city just two days after the country fell to the Taliban, because I knew they were looking for me in my home province. They found my address, and have been to my house and asked my family about me.
Continue reading...One woman reportedly taken to hospital after protest calling for right to work and education is stopped
Taliban forces have fired pepper spray at a group of women protesting in Afghanistan’s capital to demand rights to work and education.
Since seizing control of the country by force in August, the Taliban authorities have imposed creeping restrictions on Afghans, especially on women.
Continue reading...Gul Bano and Karima’s former offices are in the hands of the Taliban – and they fear for their lives
Gul Bano* and Karima* are activists who ran provincial branches of the ministry of women’s affairs in two different parts of Afghanistan. Their former offices have been taken over by the Taliban’s feared enforcers, the ministry for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice. They are now in hiding, afraid of the men they helped put in prison for domestic violence and other abuses, many of them in the Taliban or with family links to the militants.
In the UK, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123 and the domestic abuse helpline is 0808 2000 247. In the US, the suicide prevention lifeline is 1-800-273-8255 and the domestic violence hotline is 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14 and the national family violence counselling service is on 1800 737 732. Other international helplines can be found via www.befrienders.org
Continue reading...Killing of the 23-year-old while out running reignites debate about violence against women
Hundreds of people gathered in London on Saturday for a vigil to remember Ashling Murphy, a primary school teacher murdered while she was on an afternoon run in Ireland last week, and call for an end to violence against women.
Murphy, a talented amateur musician and athlete, was attacked on the banks of the Grand Canal in Tullamore, County Offaly. The area is known as Fiona’s Way, in memory of another local woman who disappeared 25 years ago, while seven months pregnant. Her death has renewed debate about women’s safety, in Ireland and beyond.
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