Clare’s Law is named after Clare Wood, a 36-year old woman from Yorkshire who was murdered by her ex-boyfriend George Appleton in 2009.

She met him on Facebook, unaware that he had a criminal history when he befriended her.

The pair began a 6-month relationship, which Clare finally ended after it turned coercive. However Appleton refused to move on, subjecting her to consistently abusive behaviour such as harassment, damage to property, threats of violence and attempted assault.

Though Clare made a police statement and got a restraining order, Appleton’s behaviour continued unchecked.

It finally ended with him taking Clare’s life, followed by his own days after. Investigations later revealed that he had a history of violent and abusive behaviour, particularly towards women, which Greater Manchester Police were aware of but had not disclosed to Clare.

At the time, data protection laws had created a legal loophole which meant that former abusers were able to keep their criminal records confidential.

This meant potential targets like Clare had no way to check or ask police whether their partner had been similarly abusive in the past.

Following her Clare’s death, her father Michael Brown began a campaign to challenge this law.

He believed that Clare would not have lost her life if she had been aware of Appleton’s violent past. After 5 years of campaigning, Michael eventually managed to change the law to allow police to both disclose and proactively inform people of their partners’ criminal records and relevant past convictions. Clare’s Law was finally introduced in England and Wales in 2014 under the official title of the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (DVDS).