This research investigated cases of femicide in Great Britain where perpetrators claimed that victims died in “sex games gone wrong.” Forty-three femicides that resulted in a conviction for murder, manslaughter, or culpable homicide were examined in relation to victim–perpetrator sociodemographic characteristics, victim–perpetrator relationship, homicide details, and criminal justice outcomes. Key patterns within the data were identified. The research highlights that the “sex game gone wrong” narrative has gained traction against a cultural backdrop of normalized bondage, domination, and sadomasochism (BDSM) within neoliberal political economy.
BourdieuP. (1973). Cultural reproduction and social reproduction. Tavistock.
4.
BrookmanF. (2005). Understanding homicide. Sage.
5.
BumillerK. (2008). In an Abusive State: How neoliberalism appropriated the feminist movement against sexual violence. Duke University Press.
6.
BusbyK. (2012). Every breath you take: Erotic asphyxiation, vengeful wives, and other enduring myths in spousal sexual assault prosecutions. Canadian Journal of Women and the Law, 24(2), 328–358. https://doi.org/10.3138/cjwl.24.2.328
7.
CampbellJ. C.GlassN.SharpsP. W.LaughonK.BloomT. (2007). Intimate partner homicide review and implications of research and policy. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 8(3), 246–269. https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838007303505
8.
CarterA. (1979). The Sadeian woman. Virago.
9.
ChristieN. (1986). The ideal victim. In FattahE. A. (Ed.), From crime policy to victim policy: Reorienting the justice system (pp. 17–30). Macmillan.
10.
DobashR. E.DobashR. P. (2009). Out of the blue: Men who murder an intimate partner. Feminist Criminology, 4(3), 194–225. https://doi.org/10.1177/1557085109332668
11.
DobashR. E.DobashR. P. (2015). When men murder women. Oxford University Press.
DymockA. (2018). A doubling of the offence? “Extreme” pornography and cultural harm. In BoukliA.KotzeJ. (Eds.), Critical Criminological Perspectives (pp. 165–182). Palgrave Macmillan.
14.
EdwardsS. S. M. (2015). The strangulation of female partners. Criminal Law Review, 12, 949–966.
15.
EdwardsS. S. M. (2017). Assault, strangulation and murder—Challenging the sexual libido consent defence narrative. In ReedA.BohlanderM. (Eds.), Consent: Domestic and comparative perspectives (pp. 88–103). Routledge.
16.
EllisA. (2016). Men, masculinities and violence. Routledge.
17.
FraserN. (2013). Fortunes of feminism: From state managed capitalism to neoliberal crisis. Verso.
18.
GlassN.LaughonK.CampbellJ.BlockC. R.HansonG.SharpsP. W.TaliaferroE. (2008). Non-fatal strangulation is an important risk factor for homicide of women. Journal of Emergency Medicine, 35(3), 329–335. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jemermed.2007.02.065
19.
GreerC. (2007). News media, victims and crime. In DaviesP.FrancisP.GreerC. (Eds.), Victims, crime and society (pp. 20–49). Sage.
HorderJ.Fitz-GibbonK. (2015). When sexual infidelity triggers murder: Examining the impact of homicide law reform on judicial attitudes in sentencing. Cambridge Law Journal, 74(2), 307–328. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008197315000318
22.
Ingala-SmithK. (2018). Femicide. In LombardN. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of gender based violence (pp. 158–170). Routledge.
23.
JewkesY. (2015). Media and crime (3rd ed.). Sage.
24.
LeesS. (1997). Ruling passions: Sexual violence, reputation and the law. Open University Press.
25.
Monckton-SmithJ. (2012). Murder, gender and the media: Narratives of dangerous love. Palgrave Macmillan.
26.
Monckton-SmithJ. (2019). Intimate partner femicide: Using Foucauldian analysis to track an eight stage progression to homicide. Violence Against Women, 26, 1267–1285. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077801219863876
27.
Monckton-SmithJ.WilliamsA.MullaneF. (2014). Domestic abuse, homicide and gender: Strategies for policy and practice. Palgrave Macmillan.
PainR. (2014). Everyday terrorism: Connecting domestic violence and global terrorism. Progress in Human Geography, 38(4), 531–550. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132513512231
34.
PolkK. (1994). When men kill: Scenarios of masculine violence. Cambridge University Press.
StarkE. (2007). Coercive control: How men entrap women in personal life. Oxford University Press.
37.
TudorK. (2018). Toxic sovereignty: Understanding fraud as the expression of special liberty within late-capitalism. Journal of Extreme Anthropology, 2(2), 7–21. https://doi.org/10.5617/jea.6476
38.
Van WijkJ. (2013). Who is the “little old lady” of international crimes? Nils Christie’s concept of the ideal victim reinterpreted. International Review of Victimology, 19(2), 159–179. https://doi.org/10.1177/0143034312472770
