Domestic violence cases represent one of the most pervasive and underreported categories of violent crime. These cases range from intimate partner violence that escalates to homicide, to familicide events that shock entire communities, to patterns of abuse that are only fully understood in retrospect. CaseSleuth documents these cases with sensitivity and a commitment to factual accuracy, providing detailed timelines that include prior incidents, law enforcement contacts, protective orders, and the events leading up to the crime. Each entry profiles the victims, the perpetrators, and the systemic factors that may have contributed to the outcome. Many domestic violence cases reveal patterns of missed warning signs and failures in protective systems.
9 cases found
Ana Walshe, a 39-year-old mother of three in Cohasset, Massachusetts, was murdered by her husband Brian Walshe on New Year's Day 2023. Brian dismembered her body and disposed of the remains across multiple locations. He was convicted of first-degree murder in July 2024 and sentenced to life without parole.
In September 2021, 22-year-old Gabrielle Petito was reported missing during a cross-country road trip with her fiance Brian Laundrie. Her remains were found in Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming, and her death was ruled a homicide by manual strangulation. Laundrie, who had returned home to Florida alone, was later found dead by suicide; the FBI concluded he was solely responsible for her death.
Jennifer Dulos, a mother of five, vanished from New Canaan, Connecticut in May 2019 during a contentious divorce. Her estranged husband Fotis Dulos was charged with murder but died by suicide before trial in January 2020. Her body has never been found.
In the early hours of August 13, 2018, in Frederick, Colorado, Christopher Lee Watts murdered his pregnant wife Shanann (34) by strangulation, and their two children Bella (4) and Celeste (3) by suffocation. He buried Shanann in a shallow grave near an oil-storage facility, and forced his children's bodies into crude oil tanks, with the opening of the tanks only 8 inches in diameter.
Travis Victor Alexander was an American salesman who was murdered by his ex-girlfriend, Jodi Ann Arias, in his house in Mesa, Arizona while in the shower. Arias was convicted of first-degree murder on May 8, 2013, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole on April 13, 2015.
Former Bolingbrook, Illinois police sergeant Drew Peterson became a national figure after his fourth wife Stacy Peterson disappeared in October 2007. He was subsequently charged and convicted of murdering his third wife Kathleen Savio, whose death had been ruled accidental in 2004.
Scott Peterson was convicted in 2004 of murdering his pregnant wife Laci and their unborn son Conner in Modesto, California. The case drew massive media attention due to Peterson's affair with Amber Frey.
Former NFL star O.J. Simpson was acquitted of the 1994 murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman in one of the most watched criminal trials in history. The case highlighted deep racial divisions in America and raised enduring questions about celebrity, race, and justice.
In 2024, renewed attention to the 1989 Menendez brothers case led to resentencing efforts after new evidence of sexual abuse by their father José emerged, including a letter and a corroborating witness.