Hunting weapons in the wardrobe: the silent threat in hobby hunter households

In Switzerland, every two weeks a woman is killed by her partner or ex-partner.

What almost never appears in these reports: whether the perpetrator was a hobby hunter. Whether a hunting weapon stood in the wardrobe. Whether the law helped to enable the death.

No safe, no problem

Swiss weapons law stipulates that weapons must be stored «carefully». However, the law does not as such require a lockable gun cabinet for long guns – nor are any official inspection visits carried out. For safe storage, a locked gun cabinet is recommended, official information sheets state. A recommendation, not an obligation. For the woman who lives with a hobby hunter, the difference is anything but theoretical.

There is a weapon in one in three households in Switzerland. In many cases of domestic violence, the firearm is used by men as a means of intimidation.

30,000 hobby hunters, at least twice as many weapons

The number of hobby hunters in Switzerland is estimated at around 30,000. Anyone who engages in hobby hunting generally owns several weapons: a rifle for cloven-hoofed game, a shotgun for feathered game, and often a pistol as well. Conservatively estimated, hobby hunter households alone account for 60,000 to 100,000 hunting weapons stored in Swiss homes – most of them without any mandatory security.

This fundamentally distinguishes the hobby hunter household from a civilian household where a forgotten army weapon lies somewhere in the attic. Since 2010, army personnel have been able to voluntarily deposit their service weapon at the arsenal. Across Switzerland, just 789 people make use of this. So the army weapon also stays at home – but it lies unused in a case. The hobby hunter's hunting rifle is regularly cleaned, loaded and used.

Killing daily – that is the practice

The Swiss soldier never goes to war. Neutral Switzerland conducts no combat missions. The weapon in the military household is an artefact, a symbol of a militia obligation. The hobby hunter, by contrast, kills routinely. He knows his weapon as a killing tool from daily practice. He knows how it works, how it feels, what it can do. This is no minor aspect – it is the core of a structural threat situation.

The mere presence of the weapon in the living space takes over the communication. No spoken word is needed. The woman knows where the weapon is. The man knows that she knows.

The perpetrator profile fits

The average age of perpetrators in domestic firearm killings is 63 years, around 86 percent are Swiss. Exclusively male suspects use a weapon. This is exactly the demographic profile that matches the typical Swiss hobby hunter: older Swiss man, anchored in a rural tradition, weapon a self-evident part of the household for decades.

In international comparison, firearms are used in femicides in Switzerland at an above-average rate. More than half of all homicides occur in the family or partnership context – in over 90 percent of cases the victims are women. In Switzerland, over the last 30 years, firearms have most frequently been used as the means in partner femicides.

The women's shelters do not know – and are not asked

The umbrella organisation of women's shelters in Switzerland and Liechtenstein (DAO) compiles annual statistics on the women taken in: nationality, forms of violence, length of stay. About the perpetrators, however, hardly anything is recorded systematically. No occupation, no leisure activities, no weapon ownership. The women's shelters care for the victims – the perpetrator is not their client. A question such as «Does your partner have a hunting licence?» is not asked today and, if it is, is evaluated nowhere.

This is not a failing of the women's shelters. It is a structural failure of the entire system. The passing on of perpetrator and victim data to counselling or contact points is regulated differently from canton to canton – in some cantons it does not happen at all. Even if a women's shelter wanted to, it could not compile complete information on perpetrators.

Anyone who never asks whether the perpetrator was a hobby hunter never has to make the answer public. The data gap is no accident – it is politically convenient.

The system's silence

Depending on the canton, whether a murder weapon was legal, where it came from or whether the perpetrator was already known for threats or violence is documented differently or not at all. No one asks whether the perpetrator was a hobby hunter. No one evaluates how many femicides took place in households where hunting weapons were stored legally and without supervision.

The gun lobby and the hunting lobby overlap considerably in Switzerland. Both have successfully prevented storage requirements from being tightened. Left-wing and green politicians have tried several times to abolish the practice of keeping weapons at home – but always failed in the face of conservative resistance.

What should be demanded

A certified, lockable gun cabinet as a legal requirement for every household with hunting weapons. A systematic recording of whether perpetrators of domestic violence had hunting weapons in the household. The possibility for threatened partners to apply for the official confiscation of hunting weapons – without having to file a report themselves. And a uniform obligation for women's shelters and police to record and evaluate the perpetrator's weapon ownership.

As long as the wardrobe counts as a gun cabinet and no one asks whether the perpetrator was a hobby hunter, the threatening backdrop in the hobby hunter household is legally safeguarded – and statistically invisible.

More on this topic: Crime & hunting | Hunting act | Psychology & hunting