An amendment backed by the Labour MP Harriet Harman and the Conservative MP Mark Garnier is likely to be the focus of efforts to prevent anyone charged with murder escaping justice by alleging that the victim had consented to sex games. Not only does he kill her but he drags her name through the mud.
It causes indescribable trauma for the bereaved family who β¦ see the man who killed her describe luridly what he alleges are her sexual proclivities.
She of course is not there to speak for herself. He kills her and then he defines her. Police and prosecutors are not taking this offending sufficiently seriously. A simple amendment to the domestic abuse bill, making non-fatal strangulation a specific serious offence, could provide a remedy and help reduce femicide.
The bill also contains clauses requiring domestic abusers to take polygraph tests β commonly referred to as lie detector tests β on release, and regulations to ban perpetrators from cross-examining victims during family court proceedings.
The new attorney general, Suella Braverman, told the Commons extra funds were being made available to frontline services dealing with victims of domestic abuse during the coronavirus crisis. MPs were also told that police in London are making arrests a day in relation to domestic abuse cases.
