If you are a victim of abuse or domestic violence and need help, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or you can chat with an advocate on their website. Tarrant County’s SafeHaven Crisis Hotline is 1-877-701-7233, and resources are available at their website.

Six Tarrant County women died at the hands of their intimate partners in 2023, the lowest number since 2016, according to a new report.

The annual report comes from the Tarrant County Adult Intimate Partner Violence Death Review Team, a partnership between the Tarrant County Prosecutor’s Office and Safe haventhe county’s domestic violence service provider.

SafeHaven President and CEO Kathryn Jacob helped present the report at a Tarrant County Commissioners Court meeting Tuesday. In an interview, she acknowledged the progress made, but said there was still work to be done.

“We need that number to be zero. It must be zero over a period of 12 months. And that’s the goal,” she said. “While we are grateful that the number is six, that represents six families devastated by something that should never happen.”

The report defines intimate partner homicides as killings resulting from a “continuing pattern of abusive behavior that may include physical violence, sexual violence, stalking, or psychological assault.” The perpetrators of these homicides may be former or current partners of the victim.

The ages of the victims in 2023 ranged between 36 and 58 years old. killed with gunshots. None had filed a protective order or contacted SafeHaven before they died, according to the report.

Four out of six victims died in a “completed or attempted” murder-suicide. Advocates tend to view suicide threats as a manipulative tactic aimed at keeping the victim in a relationship, according to the report.

Murder-suicides make up a larger proportion of homicides, meaning advocates need to approach the problem in a new way, Jacob said.

“We’re in a research process right now, and I think once we figure out the best way, the best course of action, we’ll probably apply for funding to support that kind of work, and then we’ll take action ” she said.

The year 2016 was “astronomically bad” for intimate partner homicides in Tarrant County, Jacob said. The death review team was formed, in part, in response to 16 homicides that year.

The following year, SafeHaven formed a high-risk team to identify the county’s most vulnerable victims and offenders most likely to reoffend.

The Tarrant County Prosecutor’s Office also reviews every domestic violence case filed as a misdemeanor, said Emily Kirby, chief of the prosecutor’s intimate partner violence unit.

“We’re really looking to law enforcement and prosecution to say: This is a serious thing, and we need to treat this seriously from the beginning so people don’t fall through the cracks,” he said. she declared. .

The prosecutor’s office also trains law enforcement on domestic violence cases, so patrol officers and detectives can identify trends and challenges the county needs to be aware of, Kirby said.

Jacob and Kirby credit these and other efforts for the decline in homicides in Tarrant County since 2016.

Since then, this number has tended to decrease, except in 2020, which saw a sharp increase in intimate partner homicides.

That year, 17 people died in Tarrant County.

The COVID-19 pandemic has not caused domestic violence, Jacob said. This made it possible to isolate people from their attackers.

“The first homicides we saw were in March 2020, and we actually went six months without a homicide,” Jacob said.

The Texas Council on Domestic Violence also tracks domestic violence deaths each year, with a different definition than the Tarrant County Death Review Team. The Council’s report counts people killed by intimate partners or abusers.

By their metric, Tarrant County has seen eight such homicides in 202312 in 2022 and 11 in 2021.

Tarrant generally experiences fewer intimate partner homicides than counties of comparable size, according to Council reports. In 2023, Dallas County recorded 26 homicides and Bexar County recorded 14.

At Tuesday’s meeting, County Commissioner Manny Ramirez highlighted the fact that none of the victims in 2023 had an order of protection against their abuser and the importance of making sure people seek protection. help.

Jacob agreed.

“It’s actually quite common: When people reach out, they end up surviving,” she said.

Do you have any advice? Email Miranda Suarez at [email protected]. You can follow Miranda on X @MirandaRSuarez.

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