She threatened to leave him. He stabbed her to death. Where is the outrage? | Editorial

Emicherline Etienne’s name didn’t become a hashtag, attract displays of solidarity from across the nation or unleash a media frenzy.

Etienne, who lived in North Miami-Dade, is a statistic: another woman who police say was killed by her partner. Another woman punished with death for rejecting a romantic advance, trying to end a relationship — or whatever infuriated their boyfriends, husbands, relatives or acquaintances.

She’s another woman whom police could have protected. Her ex-boyfriend and alleged killer, previously arrested on domestic-violence charges, was released from jail before police say he killed her, the Herald reported.

There likely won’t be any vigils or foundations named after Etienne. She was Black and an immigrant from Haiti. As we learned from the media circus surrounding the disappearance and death of Gabby Petito, a white, blond middle-class social media influencer, women like Etienne are often forgotten. They are a footnote that hides the cruel reality that women are still murdered for being in relationships with men who feel entitled to decide when their lives should end.

Killed by partners

More than half of female homicide victims in the country are killed in connection to intimate partner violence, according to a 2017 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that looked at data from 2003 to 2014. The vast majority of those killings were carried by a male partner and, in 10% of those cases, violence shortly before the killing might have provided an opportunity for intervention, the CDC found. Black and indigenous women are killed at higher rates than women of other races.

The lead-up to Etienne’s murder comes right out of the playbook researchers and advocates have warned us about. It appears to have started with domestic violence years ago. Her then-boyfriend punched and slapped her in the face on more than one occasion, to the point of doctors telling her she would have “permanent scars and disfigurement to her face,” according to what she previously told Miami-Dade police. On June 1, when the couple got into an argument and she threatened to leave him, he pointed a 9mm gun at her. He was arrested and told by a judge to stay away from her.

He was released from jail with a GPS ankle monitor and ordered to stay inside his North Miami-Dade home to await trial, the Herald reported.

Last Wednesday, police say he broke off his ankle monitor, traveled to the trailer community where Etienne lived and stabbed her as she lay on a mattress, in front of her sister and niece. He told the sister he murdered his ex-girlfriend “because she cheated on him,” according to an arrest warrant.

Body found

Etienne’s murder happened just as authorities searched for 19-year-old Miya Marcano, a South Florida college student living in Orlando reported missing after she didn’t make a flight on Sept. 24. Her body was discovered in a wooded area in Orange County over the weekend. The prime suspect in her death was a maintenance worker at her apartment complex who used a master key to enter her apartment the day she disappeared, investigators said. He was later found dead from what law enforcement believes was a suicide.

Marcano’s apparent reason for dying? She repeatedly rebuffed her alleged killer’s romantic advances.

Misogyny, unfortunately, is still alive and well among us. Worse, it’s deadly.

This story was originally published October 6, 2021 at 6:00 AM.