Between 2015 and 2020, thirty adults and four children were victim of domestic homicide in Saskatchewan. Twenty-five of the adult victims were female and five were male. There were also four suicides after a domestic homicide. These statistics come from a Domestic Violence Death Review Report, released today (Thurs).

Half of the deaths happened in rural areas, 32 per cent in urban communities, ten per cent in the far north and eight per cent on a First Nation. Fifty-seven per cent of adult victims were Indigenous, 37 per cent Caucasian, three per cent Indo-Canadian and in three per cent of the cases the victim’s ethnicity was unknown.

Recommendations from the report urge for action around education and awareness, intervention, victim-centred approaches, legislation and policy, services in rural and northern areas and infrastructure development. That means expanding cell and internet services in remote areas, creating emergency transportation solutions, and increasing the availability of specialized courts in rural and remote areas.

The report says the risk factors for those who committed these crimes include a history of violence, childhood history, perpetrator and victim relationships status, and the perpetrator’s socio-economic and mental status. In almost all cases reviewed, at 91 per cent, there was a pattern of escalating violence by the perpetrator. More than half were victims of abuse or maltreatment and/or exposed to family violence as children.

The province’s first Domestic Violence Death Review Report was released in 2018. One of the actions from that report was Clare’s Law, a domestic violence disclosure process, where police could disclose information about previous violent behaviour by a potentially violent individual to their partners.

Click here for the full report.