– Husbands and fathers topped the perpetrators of crimes within family, according to a report issued by the Ministry of Labor and Social Development. The report, based on a study and published by Makkah daily on Sunday, said the ministry received as many as 1,380 complaints about family crimes in 2014. According to the study, conducted by Prince Naif Arab University for Security Sciences, husbands represented about 30 percent of the family crimes, followed by fathers at 28 percent. The study said the victims of the family crimes were mostly daughters, sons and wives. It said the family crimes were not linked to any special concepts such as wealth or poverty, education or illiteracy, race or origin and were mostly happened for trivial reasons, which could have been avoided and which should not have led to any crime in the first place. The university interviewed a number of male inmates in Al-Malaz prison and a number of women who were detained at the social protection unit in Riyadh. The interviewees gave conflicting reasons for the domestic crimes. While the women believed that they were caused by the harsh upbringing, the men attributed them to a lack of faith. The women called for codifying deterrent laws to confront family violence while the men called for spreading the culture of dialogue among family members. Among others, the domestic violence included verbal abuse, physical beating, kicking out of home, sexual harassment, rape, drugs and alcohol. In addition to the daughters, sons and wives, the victims also included the old, stepchildren and the in-laws.
