If my husband said he was going to kill himself if I left I would say in all honesty “that’s your decision.” Look I am not a domestic violence doesn’t exist person. I have a low tolerance for manipulative behavior just like everyone. I just haven’t read anything that says this was pervasive. I read Suzanne’s list of grievances like everyone and I read the snippets of what LE picked for the AA when questioning Barry. But I said 2 years ago I thought this was a weak case to try as a national case to advocate for better Colorado laws on DV or worse yet for prosecution to go after the sitting judge Lama on some notion he perpetrated domestic violence in his marriage.
Holding a gun to his head, threatening to jump out of a moving vehicle, texting suicidal threats to Suzanne; it's all about context. What was he trying to accomplish here?
Control via coercion, which is in fact a form of psychological abuse. She was trying to leave him, and he was threatening suicide in order to keep her from doing so. This context is incredibly important in painting the overall picture of what was going on not only in their marriage, but in the days preceding Suzanne's murder.
This tactic had worked like a charm every time, shutting down the divorce conversation. He tried it one final time, and it failed, as Suzanne showed no reaction to his latest suicide threat. He could no longer control her, and their marriage was over.
In most of the cases I've followed in which a threat of suicide has occurred in a relationship, it ended in a murder suicide. Here, it just ended in a murder, because Barry is selfish like that.
Yes, to the untrained eye this could look like some sort of innocent, childish manipulation. But here it was not only a pattern, but a sign of what was to come. Suzanne's murder was the most extreme example of domestic abuse. It shouldn't be difficult to see all the behavior leading up to it as abuse as well. These things don't come out of nowhere, and they didn't here.
