Homicide-Suicide: Key Facts and Trends

Homicide followed by suicide is a rare event, mostly occurring in families: Mothers killing their children, fathers murdering their family members, and subsequently taking their own lives. Homicide-suicides lead to shock and incomprehension, leaving people questioning what could lead to such a tragic event. 

Expanding on prior research, we assessed all homicide-suicides that took place nationwide between 1992 and 2014. Here's what we found. 

Key Facts

Methods

For this 1992-2014 overview, we expanded our specifically constructed database on homicide-suicide in the Netherlands. This database consists of several sources:

• Incidents for the period 1992-2006 are based on newspaper accounts, police reports, and judicial information. Click here for details. 
• Incidents for the period 2007-2014 stem from Elsevier magazine’s annual compilations of homicides nationwide, combined with a thorough newspaper search for each homicide-suicide incident.

Trends

It has been suggested that a homicide-suicide can lead to more homicide-suicides, especially when media reporting on such events is excessive. Such a copycat effect has long been established among suicides. Extensive, glorifying media reporting on suicide can lead to more suicides. Read more on whether this has any effect on the occurrence of homicide-suicides.