Filicide

Ivan the Terrible and His Son Ivan on November 16th, 1581., a painting of the filicide by Ilya Yefimovich Repin.

Filicide is the deliberate act of a parent killing their own child. The word filicide derives from the Latin words filius meaning "son" or filia meaning daughter and the suffix -cide meaning to kill, murder, or cause death. "A filicide" may refer to the parent who killed his or her child as well as to the criminal act that the parent committed.

History

A 1999 U.S. Department of Justice study concluded that between 1976 and 1997 in the United States, mothers were responsible for a higher share of children killed during infancy, while fathers were more likely to have been responsible for the murders of children age 8 or older.^[1] Furthermore, 52% of the children killed by their mothers (maternal filicide) were male, while 57% of the children killed by their fathers (paternal filicide) were male. Parents were responsible for 61% of child murders under the age of five.^[2] Sometimes, there is a combination of murder and suicide in filicide cases. On average, according to FBI statistics, 450 children are murdered by their parents each year in the US.^[3]

Children at Risk

In the United States, homicide is in the top five causes of deaths of children. A direct correlation has been identified between child abuse rates and child homicide rates. Research suggests children who are murdered by their parent(s) were physical abuse victims prior to death. This is often seen as an indicator of the larger issue being domestic violence.^[4]

See also

• Honor killing
• Lists of people by cause of death
• Suicide, the killing of one's self
• Murder–suicide

Familial killing terms:

• Parricide, the killing of one's parents or another close relative
• Matricide, the killing of one's mother
• Patricide, the killing of one's father
• Uxoricide, the killing of one's wife
• Mariticide, the killing of one's husband
• Sororicide, the killing of one's sister
• Fratricide, the killing of one's brother
• Prolicide, is the killing of one's offspring
• Avunculicide, the killing of one's uncle
• Nepoticide, the killing of one's nephew

Non-familial killing terms from the same root:

• Deicide is the killing of a god
• Feticide is the killing of a fetus
• Genocide is the killing of a large group of people, usually a specific and entire ethnic, racial, religious or national group
• Homicide is the killing of any human
• Infanticide, the killing of an infant from birth to 12 months
• Regicide is the killing of a monarch (king or ruler)
• Tyrannicide is the killing of a tyrant

Also consider filial cruelty (cruelty toward one's own child), child cruelty (cruelty toward an unrelated child), and child murder (the murder of a child in general).

References

External links

• Classifications and Descriptions of Parents Who Commit Filicide (PDF)