My lovely young NDN was with a horrible man who gaslighted her constantly, at times he'd pretend she didn't exist and walked through the house saying things like "I swear I can hear something?" when she spoke, he took her money and accused her of cheating when she barely left the house and he demanded he look through her phone daily.
She always had perfect makeup and lovely clothes and was so smiley and on the ball, she was doing so well at college and her darling little girl was always happy and bounding around chirping away to herself. In a matter of months, we stopped hearing from her and seeing her, when we did see her as she was popping the bins out she looked a mess, no makeup, sallow, withdrawn, stopped going to school. She wore baggy clothes and her daughter became very quiet. We'd often hear shouting from him and crying from her, and one day he tried to break into her house. Poor thing was terrified of him but she wouldn't leave. She was an intelligent, confident girl, she was just ground down gradually by this man. We eventually phoned the police, who went round and put a stop to it. He'd never hit her, she kept saying. In her head, she wasn't a victim, he'd not hurt her physically. She was told quite frankly by the police that this would only escalate, and she was putting her DD at risk by staying. So within a week she'd got legal aid, been to court and he'd been served an 18 month (longer than usual) non-molestation order without notice. It was the only way she could break free of his control. It's been a while since that and she's a lot better, but I can see how some just snap and say enough.
Some people seem to believe manslaughter is an acquittal of murder, but it is a charge that carries a sentence. It requires the act of murder, both mental and physical actions, and a partial defence. This isn't really anything new exactly, the case of Ahluwalia saw a woman who set fire to her abusive husband so that he could not chase after her as she fled charged with manslaughter after an appeal. I'm not on social media much, but I've seen a few people irate over this because they believe manslaughter to mean an accidental death, which isn't the case.