Prof. Myrna Dawson, director of U of G’s Centre for the Study of Social and Legal Responses to Violence and the Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability, co-wrote a commentary that appeared in The Globe and Mail on the Halifax shooting massacre.

Dawson and her three co-authors note that the killings were preceded by an act of violence against the killer’s partner — an important detail that they say matters as the search continues for answers into what sparked the tragedy.

“Research has already found links between mass killings and domestic violence,” they write, noting that men seeking to assert dominance are at the core of both male violence against women and mass murder.

A Canada Research Chair in Public Policy in Criminal Justice, Dawson studies trends in and social and legal responses to violence, particularly violence against women and femicide.