In a special three-part series spotlighting violence against women, Niamh Devereux delves into hidden traumas. In this instalment, the focus is on coercive control
Jacqueline Connolly was not aware of coercive control prior to the horrifying murders of her sister Clodagh Hawe and nephews Liam (13), Niall (11) and Ryan (6). She now knows it as a contributing factor to the killings that shook our nation.
Alan Hawe had been lauded in the media as a “pillar of the community who snapped” when news first broke of the murder-suicide in Co Cavan in 2016. An inquest the following year suggested that a psychotic episode led to his twisted actions.
However, in her book, Deadly Silence, Jacqueline lifts the curtain on this “wolf in sheep’s clothing who fooled us all”. Disturbing detail and premeditation emerged in a serious crime review – which she and her mother, Mary Coll, tirelessly fought for over eight years, and eventually gained some access to last year.
The review revealed that Clodagh had been living under such control, she would forward each text she received from her sister on to her husband.
“He obviously felt threatened and it was his way of controlling our relationship,” Jacqueline says. “In hindsight, Clodagh had no real circle of friends. We never went for coffee or shopping, just the two of us. Even bridesmaid dress shopping for her wedding, he insisted on being there. For every conversation we had, he was always in the background.”
She continues: “Clodagh would say to me that she’d have to ask Alan for permission to meet me for a coffee, which shows she didn’t see anything wrong with this, or think that she was being controlled or isolated. And I didn’t challenge it because I was afraid. Given what I know now, I wouldn’t even give it a second thought.
“We all see those red flags now; we see that he love-bombed her into making her feel safe and secure, something that Clodagh craved. Everything was so fast; the marriage, the house, the kids. She married at 22 and had Liam at 23. They didn’t even have separate social circles. We weren’t educated on all of this then, so you can’t victim-blame anyone. Only he is to be blamed for what he did; how because of his insecurities, he felt the need to control everyone around him.
“By virtue of that control, he saw Clodagh and the boys as an extension of himself, and felt it was his right to murder them.”
Gradual abuse
Jacqueline wants there to be more widespread awareness about this form of abuse: “People expect abuse to be obvious and physical but it can be invisible, and build gradually by chipping away and testing boundaries. It can be dismissed as jealousy, or protectiveness, or love – in Clodagh and Alan’s case, they presented as a traditional family – without seeing that it is about slowly taking away another person’s freedom.
“People may think that if there are no bruises, it isn’t serious. But coercive control can be just as damaging. It erodes your sense of self, your confidence, your reality, your ability to make decisions. It makes your world smaller and smaller and it creates fear, dependency and constant pressure to comply with the other person and not rock the boat. Their whole world system is about their abuser.
This, Jacqueline explains, is why the common question of “why didn’t she just leave?” is so misguided. “Coercive control has you in a state of fog; it’s a hijack of your nervous system. You want the love, you want to keep the peace, and it’s all about the abuser. It’s never about you. That’s why it’s so hard to see it, because you don’t have the time or space to until you get out of it.”
It can begin in an incredibly subtle way, she says. “A partner may insist on knowing where you are ‘to keep you safe’, with multiple calls and texts, or they may want you to text them when you get from A to B. They start making small decisions for you, or discourage you from seeing certain friends or family.
“Over time, these behaviours grow into patterns: controlling finances, monitoring your phone like Alan did with Clodagh’s and their joint email account – she didn’t even have one of her own – or undermining your confidence, so the victim begins to doubt themselves and feels increasingly isolated.”
She continues: “In families, coercive control can look like one parent consistently belittling the other in front of the children, controlling how money is spent or manipulating the children to take sides.
“It can be a certain ‘look’; only you and the perpetrator know what it means. It’s the side chats in rooms away from loved ones to give you a telling off for doing something wrong, that you weren’t even aware was wrong.
“Recognising these patterns early is vital because coercive control is about power, control and not love, and it can have a devastating long-term psychological and emotional impact on both adults and children.”
Ongoing legacy
For Jacqueline, nine years on from the devastating deaths of Clodagh and her boys, it is imperative that Irish society learns more about the patterns and behaviours in this case, as it could help identify warning signs and ultimately save lives. When the Gardai and Serious Crime Review Team was contacted by Irish Country Magazine, they said reviews “are not published for operational reasons” and “in general, findings and recommendations are incorporated into senior investigative training”.
Jacqueline’s frustration that the report has not been published for the public is palpable: “Taxpayers’ money was used for these investigations but the findings are sitting there and nobody is looking at them. Redact names or situations, but share the findings in such a way that we can put them in a programme where people – like Gardaí in rural areas, for example – can be educated, and services can strategise to protect women and children.
“I need the country to get behind me on this; I need politicians to fight for it and I need people to demand answers. If you don’t learn from the past, how do you prevent it happening in the future?”
She adds: “I want their legacy to be more than a headline. Alan Hawe wrote in his letter, ‘how would they survive without me’. Well, I want people to know that Clodagh would have survived brilliantly. I lost my husband to suicide and my son and I have thrived in the best way we possibly can. Liam, Niall and Ryan would have been the same; they would have gone on to live happy, healthy lives.”
Disrupting toxic romance
Clodagh and her boys’ case is an extreme one, but it isn’t isolated. Just this summer, Vanessa Whyte and her young teenage children James and Sara were shot to death in Co Fermanagh by their husband and father. Since 2020, 41 women have been violently killed in the Republic of Ireland, with another 28 women killed in Northern Ireland during that same period, mostly by partners, former partners or family members.
Women’s Aid calls it an “endemic”. Last year, it recorded the highest level of both contacts by victim-survivors and disclosures of domestic abuse in its 50-year history. This included a 15% increase in reports on emotional abuse, ranging from relentless put downs to ongoing surveillance.
“Domestic abuse doesn’t occur in some dark corner; it is in all aspects of our society,” says Sarah Benson, CEO of Women’s Aid.
In an attempt to tackle one element of this complex issue, a project by Women’s Aid, Too Into You, was established in 2022 to teach new generations the difference between healthy and unhealthy relationships. Coercive control can start early and it can be difficult to recognise in young relationships.
“A lot of abusive behaviours are really normalised and they’re just kind of seen as part and parcel of a relationship,” Mary Hayes, Project Lead, explains. “Things like isolation, stalking and emotional abuse have such a massive impact on young women, and how they freely move about the world; especially when it’s their first relationship.”
She continues: “It might be the case that they’ve started in their first job and their partner says, ‘Oh, you don’t need to work, I’ll look after everything, I want to treat you like a princess’. It could be an older, more experienced guy with a younger girl, who starts to complain about her hanging out with her friends and monopolise all her time with him. It could be tracking their location on Snapchat, dressed up as, ‘I’m just worried about you’. This could feel really exciting for her at the time and hard for her to spot it as a red flag.
“We’re trying to disrupt young people’s idea of what romance is because so much of what we see in pop culture and TV shows is this romanticised version of coercive control.
“The reality is that these behaviours are limiting young women’s freedoms; hanging out with their friends, spending time on hobbies or passions. We really need to take it so seriously, because the impact of this abuse is well documented, and as we know, it can be fatal.”
A social problem
When coercive control became a criminal offence in Ireland in 2019, it marked a watershed moment by the state in recognising hidden forms of abuse – but legislation was just the beginning, says Mary McDermott, CEO of Safe Ireland.
“The law is there to defend you and services are there to support you – but we absolutely need greater supports,” she says. “Coercive control is never reducible to poor personal choice. The aim of it is to subordinate a person’s will, something that is very hard to accept in the context of love or a relationship. We must understand that clearly if we are to change it.”
She continues: “We want to make domestic violence something people can speak about with clarity, courage and knowledge. Much like we’ve done with mental health, we need to move away from shame and secrecy.”
“Coercive control is not just a personal problem; it is a systemic, large-scale social problem. It can drive family homelessness, addiction, mental health issues, criminal behaviour, alienation – with an enormous cost to survivors, and to the state,” she says, calling for structural transformation along with cultural change.
“On the one hand, refuge is not the answer to domestic violence,” Mary continues. “Anyone will tell you that; building more military hospitals will not end war. But we absolutely need domestic violence infrastructure across the country where anybody, anywhere can leave an abusive relationship and get the support they need.
“Under the Istanbul Convention, Ireland was found to be lacking in provisional shelter. If there is a requirement by Ireland to build more refuges, we have to make them truly powerful, community-based spaces, with skilled responses to sex, gender and sexuality-based violence.
“When we understand this as a systemic problem, it helps individuals to say, ‘This is not just me’.
Mary adds: “Bullies and perpetrators trigger fear in us, and more often than not, we avert our gaze. Instead, we tend to look at the victim and blame them and think, ‘Why does she stay with them?’. No. We must look at this in the eye. We must recognise the patterns and we must begin to speak about it with confidence and courage.
“We need to look within ourselves, our families, our communities. And, a very important point: we must never confuse the weapon with the war. No matter the tactic, this always comes down to one person who believes in a hierarchy of power and control and believes their desires and needs take priority. As a society, we need to tell them ‘no’.” ICM
Finding help
Visit toointoyou.ie to take its relationship quiz to tell you if your relationship is healthy, unhealthy or potentially abusive
The Women’s Aid 24-hour National Freephone Helpline (1800 341 900) and chat service on womensaid.ie aren’t just for people in crisis – they’re for anyone who’s worried about a relationship, even in early stages, or for a friend or family member
Go to safeireland.ie for information on the 37 domestic abuse services located in towns across Ireland, as well as its comprehensive learning hub
