ABSTRACT
Belying their minimizing and braggadocio, perpetrators of intimate partner homicides unwittingly provide useful information about the interconnections between sex and violence within the context of an abusive relationship. Their expectations about sex, and how they go about meeting these, provide retrospective insight into when and why sexual assaults unfold over time, and how they contribute to homicide. Sexual assault is a known risk factor for intimate partner homicide, but little is known about the specific ways that it intermeshes with other risk factors – such as threats to kill, estrangement, stalking, and extreme jealousy – that would appear to provide more straightforward pathways to murder (Campbell, Webster, Koziol-McLain, & McFarlane, 2003; Dobash & Dobash, 2015). Do sexual assaults provide a motive for killing? Or are they simply one additional element of the abuser’s repertoire of abuse? Are sexual assaults more about sexual obsession or possession? What role do sexual assaults play in the abuser’s attempts to control his partner? Moreover, how specifically do sexual assaults work as tactics of control? And are they effective?
