Women Who Kill: Causes, Consequences, and Controversial Legal Issues in the U.S.

• In Event: Gender and Violence: Examining International Contexts

Abstract

The main issues of inequality related to females charged and/or convicted of killing to be discussed in this presentation include the following: the social, economic and psychological causes of female perpetrated homicides; the patriarchal definition of “self-defense,” which arguably does not apply well to many cases with female perpetrators; and the controversy over the legal defense tactic of battered woman’s syndrome (BWS) for abused women who kill an intimate partner. Using data from a Public Defender’s Office in a large city on the East Coast, this research examines these issues with an analysis of the female homicide defense cases handled by this office over a 15 year period of time.

Author

• Carolyn Field, Edgewood College