EXAMINATION OF KNIFE CRIMES AGAINST WOMEN

Abstract

Violence against women is a serious and a widespread social problem in the world. Numerous research studies have examined this phenomenon and its reasons and results. However, knife crimes against women have not been adequately investigated. This particular type of violence is the most serious and the deathly one. For instance, hundreds of women were killed by their husbands or boyfriends in the last decade in Turkey, and the knives are the most preferred crime tool in these cases. This research study examined knife crimes against women. The data were collected from police departments in a middle-sized city, which has a population around 800,000. All of the recorded knife crime cases were collected as data for a ten-year period between 2002 and 2012. The data consist of 3.050 knife crime cases and 12.757 individuals involved in these cases. Of all these cases 514 were committed against women. The demographics of victims, the date, time and location of cases, type of knives, type of wounds, location of wounds, relationship between suspects and victims, and reasons behind use of knives were investigated. It is presumed that findings from the study can help better understand knife crime against women and generate effective solution to minimize the crime rate.