Mothers That Kill

Abstract

The first thing we tend to think when we think of a mother killing their child is that there is no punishment significant enough to do justice for her. Why did she do it? What was she thinking? We fail to realize that there may have been signs leading up to the crime that we should have picked up on, or that this mother may be suffering from some major type of mental disorder. Surprisingly, and unfortunately, more children are killed each year than we think. In this essay you will be informed on the five major reasons for maternal filicide, their punishment, and a few prevention techniques.

Mother's That Kill

Our nation tends to be shocked by criminal cases such as mothers killing their children. Unfortunately, these criminal cases are not as rare as we'd like to think. Statistics show that more than 200 women kill their children, in the United States, each year. Studies show that this rate increased with economic stress. This makes homicide one of the leading causes of death of children under the age of four. The US has the highest rates of child homicide (8/100,000 infants, 2.5/100,000 pre-school aged, and 1.5/100,000 school aged children). These homicides are classified into three different categories… (Jindra, 2007)

• Neonaticide

• Infanticide

• Maternal filicide

The term neonaticide refers to the murder of an infant within the first 24 hours of life. The term infanticide refers to the murder of an infant within the first year of life. And the term maternal filicide is used to describe child homicide by mothers in general. Psychologists and psychiatrists have categorized the reasoning for maternal filicide into 5 groups. (Friedman & Resnick, 2007) These groups include, but are not limited to…

• Altruism

• Psychosis

• Maltreatment

• Unwanted children

• Revenge

Five Categories for Maternal Filicide

Altruism usually consists of women who are severely depressed. These mothers truly believe that their children are suffering or are in some type of pain and that they can help them by putting them out of their misery. In the eyes of theses mother's they are doing right by their children, they are "saving" them from any type of pain that could be inflicted onto them. For example, if a mother is intending on committing suicide she wouldn't want to leave her child motherless so she kills the child as well. Psychosis mothers have some sort of psychotic disease. It could be