US child killings have risen rapidly – why are more states pushing for joint custody laws?

A study found nationally, child homicide rates have increased every year by an average of 4.3% during the last decade, ‘with a precipitous rise from 2019 to 2020 [of] 27.7%’. Photograph: Robert C Paulson/Alamy

Early one day last year, Kellie Elliott stopped by her estranged husband Shane’s house outside Camden in western Ohio. Her 13-year-old son, Caleb, and 10-year-old daughter, Gracie, had spent the weekend there, but they hadn’t turned up for school that snowy morning of 25 January 2022.

Elliott didn’t dare approach the front door because she was fearful of Shane, whom she was divorcing. He had subjected her and her children to violent outbursts for years, behavior which she had reported to authorities without meaningful effect.