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StöcklH, etal. BMJ Paediatrics Open 2017;1:e000112. doi:10.1136/bmjpo-2017-000112
BMJ
Paediatrics
Open
ABSTRACT
Objective This study aims to describe child homicide
perpetrators and estimate their global and regional
proportion to inform prevention strategies to reduce child
homicide mortality worldwide.
Design A systematic review of 9431 studies derived
from 18 databases led to the inclusion of 126 studies
after double screening. All included studies reported a
number or proportion of child homicides perpetrators. 169
countries and homicide experts were surveyed in addition.
The median proportion for each perpetrator category was
calculated by region and overall and by age groups and
sex.
Results Data were obtained for 44 countries. Overall,
parents committed 56.5% (IQR 23.7–69.6) of child
homicides, 58.4% (0.0–66.7) of female and 46.8% (14.1–
63.8) of male child homicides. Acquaintances committed
12.6% (5.9–31.3) of child homicides. Almost a tenth (9.2%
(IQR 0.0–21.9) of child homicides had missing information
on the perpetrator. The largest proportion of parental
homicides of children was found in high-income countries
(64.2%; 44.7–71.8) and East Asia and Pacic Region
(61.7%; 46.7–78.6). Parents committed the majority
(77.8% (61.5–100.0)) of homicides of children under the
age of 1 year. For adolescents, acquaintances were the
main group of homicide perpetrators (36.9%, 6.6–51.8).
There is a notable lack of studies from low-income and
middle-income countries and children above the age of 1
year.
Conclusion Children face the highest risk of homicide
by parents and someone they know. Increased investment
into the compilation of routine data on child homicide,
and the perpetrators of this homicide is imperative for
understanding and ultimately reducing child homicide
mortality worldwide.
Trial registration number PROSPERO registration
number: CRD42015030125.
INTRODUCTION
Child homicide is the most extreme form
of violence against children and a tragic
event with serious effects on families and the
community. Approximately 95 000 child are
murdered each year globally,1 and the risk
of being murdered in childhood is strongly
associated with age, gender and geography.
The distribution of child homicides by age is
U-shaped and skewed towards adolescence.
Children aged 15–19 years constitute 57% of
the global child homicides, followed by chil-
dren under the age of 5 years (20%).1 The
majority of child homicide victims (90%) live
in low-income and middle-income countries,
with the highest child homicide rates found
in Latin America.1 The risk of homicide is
particularly high for boys, who account for
70% of all child homicides and for whom
homicide rates dramatically increase in late
adolescence.1 Evidence beyond the mere
prevalence of child homicide, the sex and age
of the victims however remains sparse.
In general, homicides are likely to be
under-reported, particularly in countries with
poor monitoring systems and suffering from
conflict. In many settings, homicide data is
often incomplete, and information on the
victim–perpetrator relationship is lacking,
seriously limiting the evidence base needed
for devising effective prevention strategies.
Existing studies on child homicide perpetra-
tors often focus on a particular age group or
What this study hopes to add?
►Children face the highest risk of homicide by parents,
followed by acquaintance.
►The limited availability of data on victim perpetrator
relationships of child homicides in many regions,
even within countries with well-established
homicide monitoring systems, is concerning.
Open Access
Child homicide perpetrators worldwide:
a systematic review
Heidi Stöckl,1 Bianca Dekel,2 Alison Morris-Gehring,1 Charlotte Watts,1
Naeemah Abrahams2
To cite: StöcklH, DekelB,
Morris-GehringA, etal.
Child homicide perpetrators
worldwide: a systematic
review. BMJ Paediatrics Open
2017;1:e000112. doi:10.1136/
bmjpo-2017-000112
►Additional material is
published online only. To view
please visit the journal online
(http:// dx. doi. org/ 10. 1136/
bmjpo- 2017- 000112).
Received 29 May 2017
Revised 26 June 2017
Accepted 29 June 2017
1London School of Hygiene and
Tropical Medicine, London, UK
2South African Medical Research
Council, Cape Town, South Africa
Correspondence to
Dr Heidi Stöckl; heidi. stoeckl@
lshtm. ac. uk
Original article
What is already known on this topic?
►Child homicide is the most extreme form of violence
against children and a tragic event with serious
effects on families and the community.
►Approximately 95 000 child are murdered each
year globally (UNICEF 2014), and being murdered
in childhood is strongly associated with age, gender
and geography.
►In many settings, homicide data are incomplete, and
information on the victim–perpetratorrelationship is
lacking, seriously limiting the evidence base needed
for devising effective prevention strategies.
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2StöcklH, etal. BMJ Paediatrics Open 2017;1:e000112. doi:10.1136/bmjpo-2017-000112
Open Access
Box 1 Detailed search terms
►(‘perpetrators’ or ‘perpetrator’ or ‘offender’ or ‘offenders’ or
‘aggressor’ or ‘aggressors’ or ‘father’ or ‘fathers’ or ‘mother’ or
‘mothers’ or ‘parent’ or ‘parents’ or ‘brother’ or ‘brothers’ or ‘sister’
or ‘sisters’ or ‘aunt’ or ‘aunts’ or ‘uncle’ or ‘uncles’ or ‘grandmother’
or ‘grandmothers’ or ‘grandfather’ or ‘grandfathers’ or ‘grandparent’
or ‘grandparents’ or ‘stranger’ or ‘strangers’ or ‘acquaintance’ or
‘acquaintances’ or ‘friends’ or ‘friend’ or ‘partner’ or ‘partners’ or
‘victim-offender relationship’ or ‘victim offender relationship’ or
‘victim-offender relationships’ or ‘victim offender relationships’ or
‘ex-partners’ or ‘ex-partner’ or ‘husband’ or ‘husbands’ or ‘wife’
or ‘wives’ or ‘couple’ or ‘couples’ or ‘boyfriend’ or ‘girlfriend’ or
‘spouse’ or ‘spouses’ or ‘lover’ or ‘spousal’ or ‘boyfriends’ or
‘girlfriends’ or ‘relative’ or ‘relatives’ or ‘family member’ or ‘family
members’ or ‘maternal’ or ‘parental’)
►AND (‘siblicide’ or ‘neonaticide’ or ‘Infanticide’ or ‘fratricide’ or
‘victim-perpetrator relationship’ or ‘victim perpetrator relationship’
or ‘sororicide’ or ‘family homicide’ or ‘familicide’ or ‘licide’ or
‘fratricides’ or ‘family murder’ or ‘family homicide suicide’ or
‘familicy’ or ‘family suicide’ or ‘fatal child abuse’ or ‘infant baby
dumping’ or ‘child abuse murders’ or ‘child abuse fatalities’ or
‘child abuse fatality’ or ‘parental homicide’ or ‘parental homicides’
or ‘parents who kill’ or ‘mothers who kill’ or ‘fathers who kill’ or
‘grandparents who kill’ or ‘uncles who kill’ or ‘siblings who kill’ or
‘aunts who kill’ or ‘brothers who kill’ or ‘sisters who kill’ or ‘family
murder’ or ‘family killing’ or ‘adolescent homicide’ or ‘adolescence
homicide’ or ‘adolescent murder’ or ‘adolescence murder’ or
‘adolescent killing’ or ‘adolescence killing’ or ‘child murder’ or ‘child
homicide’ or ‘child killing’ or ‘children murder’ or ‘children killing’ or
‘children homicide’ or ‘sibling murder’ or ‘sibling killing’ or ‘sibling
homicide’ or ‘infant murder’ or ‘infant killing’ or ‘infant homicide’ or
‘toddler killing’ or ‘toddler murder’ or ‘toddler homicide’ or ‘young
adult murder’ or ‘young adult killing’ or ‘young adult homicide’
or ‘sister murder’ or ‘sister killing’ or ‘sister homicide’ or ‘brother
murder’ or ‘brother homicide’ or ‘brother killing’ or ‘boy murder’
or ‘boy killing’ or ‘boy homicide’ or ‘girl murder’ or ‘girl killing’ or
‘girl homicide’ or ‘child abandonment’ or ‘infant abandonment’ or
‘toddler abandonment’ or ‘girl abandonment’ or ‘baby abandonment’
or ‘homicide death rates in childhood’ or ‘unnatural sudden infant
death’ or ‘unnatural sudden infant deaths’ or ‘childhood homicide’
or ‘childhood homicides’ or ‘child killers’ or ‘fatal maltreatment’)
type of homicide, for example, filicide or neonaticides;
are restricted to high income countries; or rely on small
sample sizes or outdated data.2–5 This systematic review
presents a synthesis of existing global data to describe
child homicide perpetrators and to estimate their global
and regional proportion.
METHODS
Our systematic review was conducted in accordance with
PRISMA guidelines6 and registered at PROSPERO (Regis-
tration number: CRD42015030125) on 9 December
2015. To obtain representative data on the victim–
offender relationship of child homicides, we searched
the following databases and electronic resources from
first record to the 25 April 2017: Medline, Global Health,
Embase, PsycINFO, Social Policy, Popline, Pubmed, Web
of Science, LILACS, Medcarib, ADOLEC, Cumulative
Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Biosis
Citation index, KCI-Korean Journal Database, SciELO
citation Index, Western Pacific Region Index Medicus,
Index Medicus for the WHO Eastern Mediterranean
Region and International Bibliography of Social Sciences
IBSS. Controlled vocabulary terms specific to each
database were used. For each database, terms included
those designed to capture ‘child homicide’ and, where
possible, terms to capture perpetrators and to exclude
non-relevant article types, such as commentaries. The
search strategy is displayed in box 1.
Studies were eligible for inclusion if they stated a number
or proportion of children murdered by distinctly stated
perpetrator(s). The definition of homicide followed the
definitions used in the individual papers or official statis-
tics. The sample could be based on a country, province
or town and be derived from national databases, national
representative studies, police, court, mortuary or prison
data. Studies were excluded if they only reported data
collected from newspaper reports or did not differentiate
between attempted and completed homicides. Estimates
that combined child homicides with adult homicides
were excluded. The citations of included articles were
also searched. Two authors (HS and AM-G) screened
the 6096 abstracts, and the resulting 563 full texts inde-
pendently and resolved any disagreements by discussion.
One hundred twenty-three studies were finally included
(see flow chart in figure 1). HS extracted the data and BD
verified each data extraction point for accuracy.
In addition to the systematic review, we surveyed
country statistics offices, ministries of justice, home offices
or police headquarters of 169 WHO-listed countries to
further identify country-level data for child homicide
perpetrators and victim–perpetrator relationships. We
received responses from 90 countries. Additionally, we
made contact with homicide research experts to ask for
unpublished data on child homicide perpetrators in
their studies. In total, this lead to an additional inclusion
of data for 24 countries.
The analysis consisted of two main steps—the selec-
tion of one estimate per country year and the calculation
of the proportion of child homicides committed by
different perpetrator categories for different age groups
and by gender separately.
As several countries had more than one estimate avail-
able, an algorithm was used to develop a single estimate
per country for each of the types of homicide and age
group or gender analysed, to avoid potential double
counting and to ensure to use the best quality estimates
available. Where possible, comparable, non-overlapping
data were combined. Otherwise, we chose an estimate
according to the following hierarchical order: (1) nation-
ally representative estimates were preferred to provincial
estimates, which in turn were prioritised over estimates
representing a single town or mortuary, as national studies
or larger regional samples would be more generalisable
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Open Access
Figure 1 Flow chart of the systematic review.
to a country and even out local differences across regions
or towns; (2) we chose estimates with more detailed infor-
mation on the victim–perpetrator relationship, estimates
that captured children of varied age groups as this would
allow us to group them in a way that would allow compar-
isons with data from countries that had few perpetrator
categories and age groupings; (3) studies that were more
recent as it is unknown whether child homicide perpe-
tration trends changed over time across the world; (4)
estimates directly from statistics offices were preferred as
we assumed that they would have received more checks
than data from other sources; and (5) we preferred esti-
mates that covered more years to estimates based on a
few years as we assumed they would also be more general-
isable and not be influenced by single events.
Approximately two-thirds of the studies only reported
combined estimates for up to 20 years on the propor-
tions of child homicide perpetrators, starting with 1970
onwards. The included estimates yielded 51 different
victim–perpetrator categories. To facilitate comparisons
across countries, we grouped the perpetrators of child
homicide into distinct, broad categories: parents, other
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family members, acquaintances (meaning someone they
knew), strangers (capturing people they had no prior
contact with) and unknown (not documented perpetra-
tors). As countries used different age categories, countries
that only considered children up to age 12 years are also
included, if no age category up to 18 years was available.
To calculate the percentage of child homicide perpetra-
tors by country, we divided the total number of homicides
in each perpetrator category by the total number of
child homicides in that country. To establish the global
and regional estimates, the relevant available national
percentages were added and divided by the number
of countries with available data. For the regional esti-
mates, we grouped countries as per the six WHO regions
(Africa, Americas, Eastern Mediterranean, low-income
and middle-income Europe, Southeast Asia and Western
Pacific). A seventh region was made of the high-income
countries from all regions.
After conducting the primary descriptive analysis,
secondary analyses investigated parental homicides sepa-
rately to explore how many children murdered by parents
were murdered by their mother or father. Additional
analyses investigated the child homicide perpetrators of
children below the age of 1 year, neonaticides, adoles-
cents and by gender.
Data were analysed with Stata V.12. Traditional
meta-analysis techniques could not be used because
nearly all studies were representative of the whole popu-
lation and not restricted to population samples. Details
on individual studies are reported in the supplement
(see online supplementary file 1). Because the percent-
ages were skewed, we report the median percentage and
the IQR.
RESULTS
Overall, 9431 abstracts and 565 full texts were screened,
and 126 studies were included into the study (see flow
chart). In addition to information received from statis-
tical offices and experts, 1031 estimates on perpetrators
of child homicides across 44 countries informed our
estimates, 22 countries in the high-income countries, 6
countries in the Western Pacific region, 5 countries in
the low-income and middle-income European region,
4 countries in the African region and the Americas
and 3 countries in the Mediterranean region. No data
were found for the South Asia region. Information on
perpetrators of all child homicides of children under 18
years was available for 35 countries, compiling data for
73 242 homicides. Data on parental homicides, distin-
guishing between mothers and fathers, were available
for 33 countries, for children under 1 year including
neonaticides for 20 countries and for adolescents for 10
countries only. Few data were available for the Americas,
the Eastern Mediterranean and the African region. Most
data outside high-income countries came from cities or
individual mortuaries and were therefore based on small
numbers of child homicides.
Across all 35 countries with data on homicide perpe-
trators for all children under the age of 18 years, we
found that more than half (median percentage 56.5,
IQR 23.7–69.6) were murdered by a parent, 3.0% (IQR
0.0–7.1) by another family member, 12.6% (5.–31.3) by
an acquaintance, for example, a neighbour or friends,
2.1% (0.0–11.1) by a stranger and perpetrator remained
unknown for 9.2% (0.0–21.9). The percentage of girls
murdered by their parents was 58.4 (IQR 0.0–66.7)
versus 46.8 for boys (IQR 14.1–63.8), while the median
percentage for boys murdered by strangers was 9.2 (IQR
4.2–38.6) versus 6.5 (IQR 3.6–6.7) for girls. The total
number of child homicides reported and the prevalence
by perpetrator categories across region is reported in table
1. The largest proportion of parental homicides among
all child homicides was found in high-income countries
(64.2%; 44.7–71.8) and the East Asia and Pacific region
(61.7%; 46.7–78.6).
Data from 33 countries distinguishing the perpetra-
tors of parental homicides of children under the age of
18 years showed that mothers committed just over half
of all parental homicides (median 54.7%, IQR 36.7–
68.8); in high-income countries, the median percentage
was 44.4% (IQR 36.7–66.7), in the East Asia and Pacific
region, 64.6% (IQR 59.0–69.3), in the Americas, 15.4%
(IQR 13.3–17.4), in Africa, 88.6% (IQR 71.1–100.0), in
low-income and middle-income Europe, 60.4% (IQR
45.8–75.0) and in the Mediterranean region, 7.4% (IQR
0.0–14.8). Only 12 countries had available data on how
many parental homicides were committed by step-par-
ents, with 7.2% (IQR: 5.7–14.5) of parental homicides
committed by step-parents. Out of them, nine studies
reported a breakdown, with the median percentage of
stepmothers committing homicides among parental
homicides being 1.0% (IQR: 0.7–3.3) and for stepfathers
7.4% (IQR: 3.1–17.4).
Only 14 countries have data on homicide perpetra-
tors of children under 1 year of age, excluding studies
investigating neonaticides only. These show that parents
are the most common perpetrators of homicides of chil-
dren under 1 year (77.8, IQR: 61.5–100), followed by
unknown perpetrators with 7.5% (IQR: 0.0–24.0). The
12 countries with detailed data on parent as perpetrators
showed mothers commit the majority of parental homi-
cides of children under 1 year (71.7% (IQR: 50.2–75.7)).
Seven studies investigated perpetrators of neonaticides
(defined as the murder of an infant within 24 hours of
giving birth with the exception of a study in France and
Denmark, which extended it to 1 month after birth),
without considering the mother as the default perpe-
trator. They found that parents committed 100% of
neonaticides (IQR 62.0–100.0). If studies only consid-
ering parents were examined, 13 countries had data
and the vast majority of neonaticides are committed by
mothers (100%, IQR 92.9–100). Fathers committed very
few neonaticides (0.00%, IQR: 0.0–6.7).
Data on homicide perpetrators of adolescents, aged
10–17 years, was only available for 10 countries, with only
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table 1 Distribution of child homicide perpetrator proportions by perpetrator and region
Total
homicides Parents
Family no
parents Acquaintances Stranger Unknown
All children<18(n=35) 75 496 59.7 3.0 12.6
(5.9–31.3)
2.1
(0.0–11.1)
9.2
(0.0–21.9)
High-income
countries(n=19)
73 242 64.2
(56.2–71.8)
2.4
(0.0–7.0)
10.3
(5.4–13.7)
2.0
(0.0–10.6)
8.7(0.0–17.7)
East Asia and
Pacic(n=5)
559 61.7
(46.7–78.6)
5.9
(3.3–7.1)
14.3
(10.0–26.9)
8.3
(0.0–13.1)
1.6
(0.0–11.9)
Americas(n=3) 121 27.6
(25.0–30.3)
21.7
(0.0–43.4)
44.4
(26.3–62.5)
6.3
(0.0–12.5)
31.1
(0.0–43.4)
LMIC Europe(n=3) 71 16.7
(14.3–69.6)
0.0
(0.0–4.4)
14.3
(0.0–44.4)
8.7
(0.0–27.8)
15.2
(11.1–71.4)
Africa(n=3) 1042 23.6
(8.3–38.8)
3.9
(0.0–7.8)
19.1
(0.0–38.1)
8.2
(3.8–12.5)
11.5
(0.0–79.2)
Mediterranean(n=2) 461 17.8
(10.5–25.0)
25.6
(1.1–50.0)
69.7
(64.3–75.0)
0.4
(0.0–0.9)
4.4
(0.0–8.8)
Girls(n=9) 21 800 58.4
(0.0–66.7)
5.3
(0.0–6.5)
15.5
(0.0–24.4)
6.5
(3.6–6.7)
8.8
(0.0–9.8)
Boys(n=8) 44 714 46.8
(14.1–63.8)
5.8
(3.1–8.0)
11.2
(3.6–28.3)
9.2
(4.2–38.6)
11.4
(4.8–16.8)
Under 1year(n=12) 5529 77.8
(61.5–100.0)
0.0
(0.0–13.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
7.3
(0.0–24.0)
High-income
countries(n=10)
5131 77.9
(61.5–100.0)
1.8
(0.0–7.3)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
3.6
(0.0–13.4)
East Asia and
Pacic(n=2)
40 96.3
(92.7–100.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
4.0
(0.0–7.9)
Americas(n=0) – – – – –
LMIC Europe(n=0) – – – – –
Africa(n=2) 358 40.7(9.5–71.8) 1.5
(0.0–3.0)
0.6
(0.0–1.9)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
57.3
(24.0–90.5)
Mediterranean(n=0) – – – – –
Adolescents(n=12) 34 599 11.0
(0.0–33.3)
1.5
(0.0–6.1)
36.9
(6.6–51.8)
6.6
(0.0–25.0)
9.6
(1.0–32.8)
High-income
countries(n=6)
34 280 19.0
(0.0–40.0)
2.1
(0.0–7.9)
34.7
(0.0–37.6)
14.5
(0.0–20.8)
17.4
(5.6–37.9)
East Asia and
Pacic(n=2)
50 3.1
(0.0–6.3)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
80.2
(60.4–100.0)
14.6
(0.0–29.2)
1.0
(0.0–2.1)
Americas(n=1) 68 0.0
(0.0–0.0)
4.41
(4.1–4.4)
13.2
(13.2–13.2)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
13.2
(13.2–13.2)
LMIC Europe(n=0) – – – – –
Africa(n=1) 195 0.0
(0.0–0.0)
3.1
(3.1–3.1)
43.1
(43.1–43.1)
41.5
(41.5–41.5)
12.3
(12.3–12.3)
Mediterranean(n=2) 6 16.7
(0.0–33.3)
16.7
(0.0–33.3)
33.3
(0.0–66.7)
0.0
(0.0–0.0)
33.3
(0.0–66.7)
Data are number of homicides or median (IQR).
n=number of countries with existing data.
*The high-income countries (classied by the World Bank15) included Australia, Austria, Canada, Chile, Denmark, England and Wales, Estonia,
Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Isle of Man, Japan, Korea Rep., Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Scotland,
Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the USA.
LMIC,low-income and middle-income countries.
three presenting data for the whole age group of 10–18.
The most common perpetrators among adolescent
homicides were acquaintances (36.9%, IQR 6.6–51.8),
followed by family members (17.5%, IQR 4.3–33.3) and
strangers (6.6%, IQR 0.0–25.0). A percentage of 9.6 (IQR
1.0–32.8) of perpetrators of adolescents were unknown.
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This trend was supported by one study each in Latin
America or Africa, the two areas with the highest preva-
lence of male adolescent homicides worldwide.
DISCUSSION
This systematic review and survey of statistical offices
found that contrary to media portrayal and therefore
public perception, children face the highest risk of
homicide by parents. The limited availability of data on
victim–perpetrator relationships of child homicides in
many regions, even within countries with well-established
homicide monitoring systems, is concerning. The poor
state of data is of particular concern in regions that have
among the highest child homicide rates and the highest
rate of homicides among adolescents. Where countries
collect data on the perpetrator, often this is not disaggre-
gated by sex and age. This is an important omission, as
studies suggest that child abuse-related homicides have a
distinct gender pattern.7 8 Lack of disaggregation by age
and varying age ranges also prevented a meaningful anal-
ysis of perpetrators of murdered children aged between
1 and 10 years.
There are many reasons for the identified data gaps.
Homicide data are generally collected by the police,
mortuaries or court statistics, and there is a lack of collab-
oration between those institutions. A separate homicide
analysis for homicides involving victims under the age of
18 years is rarely conducted or published in most offi-
cial statistical reports. With increased investment into
administrative data systems, including systems to facili-
tate improved linkage of different data sources, it would
be feasible to address these issues. Internationally agreed
standards of documentation of age and victim–perpe-
trator categories would further facilitate cross-country
comparisons. Future studies on child homicide should
also not be restricted by default to a certain type of
victim–perpetrator relationship, for example, filicide
or homicides by mothers only as our systematic review
found studies showing that other family members might
also be involved in neonaticides.
The regional differences found in this study might
represent real differences in patterns of child homicide9
or be a product of differences in the existence, complete-
ness and quality of data for homicides among countries
and regions. Data on the victim–perpetrator relationship
is often only available if the information is reported.
Some murders will never be resolved, which is strongly
correlated with the quality of police investigations. In
the case of child homicides, in particular, it is estimated
that a significant number of child homicides are not
recognised as homicides and therefore do not appear in
official statistics. Studies on neonaticides, in particular,
show that nearly all of them follow concealed pregnan-
cies and lone births10 and that there often are difficulties
in distinguishing death due to natural disorders from
non-natural causes, especially in cases labelled sudden
infant death syndrome.11 Routine surveillance systems
have a poor record to capture homicides due to omission
of care or deliberate neglect. Abrahams et al, for example,
found in their South African study that a number of
mothers abandoned their babies with the intention that
they would die or with the hope that they would be found
alive. As the motive behind this kind of abandonment is
often not known, official statistics often do not capture
them as homicides.10 There are also other limitations to
this study. Averaging the proportion of perpetrators of
child homicides across years to generate one estimate by
country could have led to an overestimation or underesti-
mation of certain types of perpetrator.10 12 Vast differences
in the definitions of perpetrator categories only allowed
crude comparisons across countries. Categorisation
of perpetrators into parents, other family members,
acquaintances, strangers and unknown did not capture
nuances such as, for example, mothers’ boyfriends, who
were considered as acquaintances as there was a lack of
information on whether they were solid family members
or casual relationships. The restricted availability of data
and age breakdowns also meant that the analysis could
not be done for every age group or by gender.
Our study is the first to provide global evidence on
the perpetrators of child homicide. Our findings high-
light the gaps in data on child homicide that need to be
addressed. Contrary to common perceptions that risk
lies outside the household, the findings underscore that
parents commit a high proportion of child homicides.
The reasons for each are likely to be complex and relate
to broader family, community and cultural contexts.13 14
In all contexts, the murder of children needs to be better
documented, prevented and addressed.
Acknowledgements None of the authors has a conict of interest. This paper was
prepared under the Know Violence in Childhood: Global Learning Initiative ( http ://
www. knowviolencei nchi ldho od. org/). The authors acknowledge the support and
internal review provided by the Initiative and its funders.
Contributors HS and NA conceived the study. HS, BD and AM-G searched the
literature and screened the abstracts and full-texts. HS and BD extracted the data.
HS, NA and CW wrote the nal draft. All authors approved the nal manuscript.
Competing interests None declared.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Open Access This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the
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© Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the
article) 2017. All rights reserved. No commercial use is permitted unless otherwise
expressly granted.
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Child homicide perpetrators worldwide: a
Naeemah Abrahams
Heidi Stöckl, Bianca Dekel, Alison Morris-Gehring, Charlotte Watts and
doi: 10.1136/bmjpo-2017-000112
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