What a tragedy. My heart goes out to the family.
Nevertheless, isn't there quite a bit of speculation here? I mean, why don't we just blame the elders for this tragedy? How does anyone know that the elders asked them to "work things out" and prevent her from getting a seperation? Honestly, no one here knows the particulars of the case, at least not the "Witness" side to it.
My mother seperated from my father before they eventually got a divorce. There was no physical abuse at all, but there was some verbal abuse (which, to be frank, was not what some people would even consider "abuse"). Yet, the elders did not prevent her from getting a seperation. Wow. Who'da thunk it?
As for this being a common occurance (as is implied in the title thread) -- the JWs are not that small of a religion. In the US there are about a million members, with many others with quasi-Witness affiliations (sometimes people that say they are JWs are, in fact, not baptised). I'm not a statistician, but it doesn't seem like the JWs experience any more murders/heinous crimes than any other religion.
Bradley