Femicide is a criminological term first introduced by feminist criminologist Diana H. Russell in a 1992 article to refer to the killing of women by men for being women.
The term has spread in Europe only since the early years of the twenty-first century thanks to the events in Ciudad Juárez. In many Latin American countries institutions have introduced the category of femicide into criminal legislation, starting a debate that is anything but linear on the meaning of this word. Feminicides/feminicides are therefore extreme acts of violence that underlie a complex reality of oppression, inequality and abuse.