Mothers are dying at the hands of sons - but warnings of violence are being missed

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Yet, mothers who report being terrorised by their own children are still being failed by the systems meant to protect them, with campaigners against femicide calling for safeguarding measures to identify and monitor child-to-parent abuse before it escalates into matricide - the killing of a mother by her own child.

LBC has heard how parents reporting weapon threats, assaults, coercive control and financial exploitation can fall between children’s safeguarding, domestic abuse, policing and mental-health services, with no clear agency taking responsibility - particularly where the child is under 16, and there is no legal definition of child-to-parent abuse.

Even serious violence may fail to trigger multi-agency safeguarding support because domestic-abuse risk assessments were designed around intimate partner abuse, not a parent living with the child abusing them.

In the most extreme cases, the consequences are fatal.

Read more: Primary schools to be forced to identify children at risk of future unemployment

Read more: ‘Crisis’ as children’s mental health referrals top a million in a year

Karen Ingala Smith, co-founder of the Femicide Census, said matricide remains one of the most overlooked forms of male violence against women.

Her organisation’s data includes 220 women killed by their sons, or where a son is the suspect, alongside 29 grandmothers killed by grandsons and four stepmothers, from a dataset of 2,347 women.

“If we look over the last 15 or 16 years, comparing the women killed by sons to women killed by strangers, it’s almost exactly the same number,” she said.

“And we’re only looking at women with adult sons - and not every woman has an adult son. So, the proportionality of risk is shocking.”

Ingala Smith said mothers can be left living in fear long before a death occurs.

“For every woman killed, there are hundreds, if not thousands, living in misery that don’t end up dead,” she said.

She said many men who kill their mothers are adults with severe mental ill health, problematic substance use, or histories of violence and instability - and may return to live with their mothers after a relationship breakdown, job loss or housing problems.

“Mothers don’t usually want to see their adult children homeless, so they will take them in,” she said. “And then they can be living in absolute misery.”

The critical failure, she said, comes when mothers’ warnings are not heard or acted upon.

“If a mother is desperately contacting mental health services saying that she’s worried about her son, she’s often written off as a mad old fussy woman,” she said.

“She’s not listened to seriously.”

A legal gap - and a protection gap

Michelle John MBE, founding director of parental-support organisation PEGS, said parents are routinely left “falling through the cracks”.

PEGS, launched in March 2020, has supported more than 14,000 parental figures across the UK and received more than 4,000 referrals last year.

John said the organisation is seeing high-risk cases involving physical, emotional, sexual, financial and digital abuse - including weapon threats, poisoning, control of bank accounts or property, and threats to post intimate images online.

In PEGS’ latest report, 36% of parents said their child had harmed or tortured a pet, while 9% said a pet had been killed in front of them or used as a threat.

“We are seeing really high-risk cases of child-to-parent abuse,” she said. “Parents have lost sight in an eye or eyes because of violence. They have lifelong physical disabilities.”

Under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, behaviour is defined as domestic abuse only where both people are aged 16 or over and personally connected.

“Because there’s no legal definition for under-16s for child-to-parent abuse, nobody has a responsibility to respond,” John said.

PEGS says 57% of parents it supports have been threatened with abandonment prosecution after telling local authorities they could no longer keep their household safe and needed their child accommodated elsewhere.

“They’re saying, ‘We’re there for you’, but then when you’re met with such a negative response, you’re not going to pick up the phone again.”

Mothers cannot simply walk away

Amanda Holt, Professor of Criminology at the University of Roehampton, said child-to-parent abuse cannot be treated as simply another form of intimate-partner domestic abuse.

“While one could argue that it represents a form of violence against women and girls, and there are some similarities with intimate partner abuse, the nature of the relationship between parent and child is very different,” she said.

“It is unusual for parents to want to terminate their relationship with their child. They just want the violence to stop.”

Holt said adult sons using violence are often living at home and may have “a range of complex needs”, including poor mental health, substance misuse and unemployment.

She said sons tend to be more physically abusive than daughters, while cases reaching the criminal justice system mostly involve sons and mothers.

For some mothers, leaving means risking their child becoming homeless - or involving police against a son they still love.

John said the main risk process used in domestic abuse can also exclude parents facing serious violence.

The DASH checklist - Domestic Abuse, Stalking and Harassment - is used by professionals to assess risk.

Those assessed as high risk can be referred to a MARAC - a Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference - where police, social services, health teams and specialist services draw up a safety plan.

But DASH was designed principally around abuse by a current or former partner.

Questions about post-separation contact arrangements, for example, do not reflect the reality of a parent living with, and often responsible for, the child abusing them.

“That can leave parents below the threshold for a MARAC referral, even where they report serious physical assaults, weapon threats or coercive control,” John said.

“Some of the questions don’t apply where child-to-parent abuse is occurring. The number that you need to meet is never met, or very rarely met.”

Warning signs missed before violence escalates

Child-to-parent abuse can start with insults, intimidation and threats, then escalate into smashed property, coercion, financial abuse and physical violence.

Holt said research on adult sons who become violent towards their mothers identifies recurring risk factors: poor mental health, substance misuse, previous offending, domestic abuse incidents and childhood trauma.

“The pattern reflects what we see in all forms of family homicide: it is predominantly male violence against women,” she said.

But she cautioned there is no single explanation, saying misogynistic attitudes and patriarchal norms can sit alongside individual and family factors.

Cathy Press, a psychotherapist and trainer specialising in child-to-parent abuse, said parents commonly report abuse beginning after a child is told “no”, then escalating from verbal aggression to property damage, assaults and threats.

“Once that pattern of placation starts, it continues,” she said.

Holt said children may be calm at school or with relatives while using abusive behaviour at home, leaving parents disbelieved when they disclose it.

Analyses of Domestic Homicide Reviews show repeated opportunities for earlier intervention, she said.

“There needs to be a better understanding across all services about what child-to-parent abuse is, what the contributory risks are, and how to intervene effectively at an earlier stage.”

She identified schools, police and child and adolescent mental health services as key intervention points.

‘My house was like a prison’

For some parents, the violence begins years before adulthood.

Tina, a 34-year-old mother of three and qualified social worker, said her eldest daughter’s abusive behaviour began when she was around seven. LBC has changed her name to protect her identity.

What began with verbal abuse escalated into physical intimidation, pulling, pushing and hitting. Fearing she would not be believed, Tina installed cameras in her home and kept knives and medication locked in a bedroom cupboard.

“My house was like a prison,” she told LBC. “When she would kick off, me and my youngest two would lock ourselves in my room.”

Tina said the impact was both physical and emotional. “Every day I was waking up dreading even being alive,” she said. “I was waking up with a dry mouth, headaches, feeling sick and exhausted. My whole body just didn’t want to do the day.”

She said the behaviour was largely invisible outside the home, where her daughter appeared “perfect” at school.

Tina said the violence only worsened: her daughter punched her in the stomach and, on one occasion, took a knife from a drawer and threatened to stab herself.

When Tina suggested taking her to A&E for help, she said her daughter threatened to falsely accuse her of stabbing her if she took her.

She also said her daughter threatened to make an allegation about Tina’s partner to her school. “I was so glad I got those conversations on video,” Tina said. “I was thinking: what if she did that? How would I be able to prove she was lying?”

Tina said she eventually called police after her daughter pulled her arm and blocked her from leaving a room.

“I just had no fight left in me,” she said. “I said: ‘You need to take her. I can’t have her here anymore. I can’t do this anymore.’”

She said the responding officer told her he was facing similar difficulties at home.

“It felt like such a relief to know I was believed, and that someone could relate to what I was experiencing,” she said.

“But it should not take personal experience for someone to offer sympathy or help. Every police officer should have the understanding through education and training.”

Despite being a qualified social worker, Tina said she had received no training on child-to-parent abuse.

“In social care, you are trained to see the child as the vulnerable one,” she said. “The parent is the one under scrutiny.”

Government response

The Home Office said its Freedom from Violence and Abuse strategy will introduce a statutory definition of child-to-parent and caregiver abuse, update guidance for frontline professionals and launch a helpline for young people concerned about their behaviour.

It said the measures would “improve identification, strengthen responses and ensure families get the support they need”.

However, campaigners say a definition alone will not protect a mother reporting violence at home.

They are calling for a clear safeguarding framework, specialist pathways and training for frontline staff.

As Ingala Smith puts it: “Social services, housing, health and substance-use services all need to play their part - alongside the law and policing.

“But when it comes to matricide, it’s the steps before the law that are the most important change needed.”