Women who commit murder : the public intellectual versus the court of public opinion

Abstract

Throughout history, women are often observed as being the victims of crime rather than the offender. Therefore, when women are the offenders of violent crimes, they tend to be observed as being abnormal, evil, bad or sad women. These perceptions often tend to cause tension between the public intellectual (an individual who is considered to be an expert in their field) and the court of public opinion due to the influence media has on public perception. The study aims to investigate the interaction between the public intellectual and the court of public opinion regarding the development and nature of labels used to describe women who commit murder as well as the tension between the two entities. The research that was conducted was qualitative research based on the subjectivism paradigm. Since there is a lack of study on the phenomenon, basic, exploratory research was conducted. Because the study made use of lived experiences and events, case studies were selected as the main research design. Two sets of participants, namely, female offenders and public intellectuals, were identified by making use of purposive, snowball and referral sampling. The online commentary was identified by selecting well-known South African murder cases where the offenders were women. Personal interviews were conducted in person, by email or via videocalls depending on the availability of the participants. Content and thematic analysis were used to analyse written data. A classification scheme was used to assist in the analysis of online data. The main findings of the study were that the public intellectual and the court of public opinion tend to have conflicting opinions as the public tends to be misinformed about female criminality, specifically women who commit murder. The main reason is that the public tends to be directly influenced by the media. Furthermore, negative media labels and perceptions tend to develop due to gendered expectations which directly influence the development of public perceptions. It is easier for the public to accept labels than it is for them to understand female criminality. It was also determined that women who commit murder often take on a celebrity role due to the sensationalism of female offenders. It is therefore evident that the media creates tension between the public sphere and the public intellectual regarding women who commit murder due to sensationalism, the need to sell their media and the media misinforming the public. The media is further responsible for developing and shaping public opinion on women who commit murder as the media tends to blur the line between fact and fiction of female offending. There is a need for more research on female offending as the public lacks knowledge regarding the phenomenon, which further accounts for the tension between the public and the public intellectual.