Thirteen women slain in Erie and Niagara counties since November have one thing in common: The men they once loved are accused of killing them.

Several of the women were repeatedly shot or stabbed by their boyfriends, husbands or exes. Others were strangled, their throats were slashed, or they were drugged until their hearts stopped.

This seven-month period is the worst that abuse victim advocates can recall since the early 1990s — before the proliferation of special domestic violence courts, police and prosecution bureaus.

And advocates don’t know what is behind it.

“I wish I had the answer, I truly do,” said Suzanne Tomkins, who heads the Women, Children and Social Justice law clinic at the University at Buffalo. “In the past six, seven years, the numbers [of killings] have been very light. In some years, I don’t think there have been any.”

But roughly every two weeks since Nov. 1, a woman has been killed.

Children have lost their mothers and, in many cases, their fathers, who were either arrested for the murders or killed themselves, as well. Family members still grapple with the violent loss of life.

“Even when I heard the gunshots, I didn’t think he shot my sister,” said Racquel Jansma, whose 27-year-old sister, Amy Holliday, was killed by her husband Nov. 1, the first in the bloody string of deaths. “I never thought it would have come to that. Never.”

Jansma and her mother are left to raise Holliday’s two children, ages 4 and 8. The youngsters now spend their Sundays visiting their mother’s grave.

Even though domestic violence is an underreported crime, police in Erie and Niagara counties documented 10,450 domestic violence incidents last year. That figure includes violence against children and adults.

The number of reported abuse cases in Niagara County has declined slightly in recent years, but according to Erie County’s Central Police Services, reported domestic incidents in Erie County have climbed by more than 1,200 cases since 2006.

More troubling is the severity of the abuse.

Ahkenya Johnson of Lockport was stabbed 41 times. Her husband is charged with murder.

Chisha Hawkins and her boyfriend, Vernard Millner, were shot dead in her bedroom by an ex-boyfriend who hid and waited for them in a Buffalo house before setting it on fire.

Aasiya Zubair Hassan was stabbed and decapitated, allegedly by her husband in their Orchard Park TV studio.

Constance Shepherd was found dead — her throat slit — in her Town of Tonawanda home. Her husband is charged with her killing.

“I have noticed a significant difference between the types of cases we are getting now than the types of cases we were getting two years ago,” said Kristin St. Mary, chief of the Domestic Violence Bureau in the Erie County district attorney’s office. “What I’m seeing now are more injuries, more acts of violence.”

Preliminary figures for all of upstate New York list 38 intimate-partner homicides for 2008, up 27 percent from 2007, according to the state Office of Criminal Justice Services.

Some have questioned whether the recession is to blame for adding more stress to families and creating more time for out-of-work adults to interact with and abuse their partners.

But local domestic victim advocates are reluctant to embrace that notion.

“There are people who want to immediately tie it to the economy, but I don’t want to do that,” said Linda Ray, executive director of the Family Justice Center in Erie County. “If we’re the third poorest city in the country, a poor economy is not a new thing to Buffalo.”

She and other domestic violence experts say these kinds of outside stresses do not turn people into abusers. But they can make an already abusive situation worse.

Finding the links

There is no single factor that links all 13 of the cases in which area women have been killed by their husbands or boyfriends.

At least three had had some prior contact with police, but many appear to have had none at all. And most did not participate in extensive domestic violence counseling or programs, according to local advocates.

Holliday moved out of her house with her two children last summer, a week after her husband tried to choke her. He also broke the windows of their home in front of their children, 7- year-old Mykia and 4-year-old Charles Jr.

Holliday moved into her sister’s home two blocks away, obtained an order of protection and immersed herself in studying to become a nurse.

In September, after the couple had split up, Charles Holliday had a two-hour standoff with police in his 87th Street home. He threatened to kill himself, and even fired a gun.

But Amy Holliday didn’t want to rob her children of a father, so she lifted the order of protection against him.

And she continued to turn to her estranged husband when she needed help.

On Nov. 1, Holliday went with her husband to get new tires for her car. But something went wrong. She came home without the tires.

Her cell phone kept ringing, but she wouldn’t answer. She finally pulled the battery from the phone and settled down to study. She was six months away from becoming a nurse.

“I think he realized he couldn’t control her anymore,” Jansma said.

At about 3:30 p. m., Charles Holliday walked up the porch of his wife’s home. He stood in the living room, aimed a gun at his wife and shot her three times, once in the head. He took his own life two days later.

“She wanted to be away from him but still wanted to have her children have a father,” Jansma said. “But I honestly don’t think, in a domestic violence situation, that’s possible.”

Of the 13 women who died, at least five had children with the men accused of killing them. That’s one reason abuse victims find it difficult to leave a relationship or prosecute their abusers.

Why they stay

Unlike other crime victims, those who suffer from domestic violence often have long and complicated relationships with their abusers.

They may love them, have children with them, need them financially or be isolated from those who could help.

They also may fear that if they try to leave, they’ll wind up dead. Domestic violence experts acknowledge that an abuse victim is in greatest danger of being killed when she or he attempts to end the relationship.

In five of the recent killings, it appears the women had either recently left their abusers or were on the verge of doing so.

“Ultimately, what happens is, when she tries to leave him and tries to make steps in leaving, he’s lost control, and when he loses that control, that’s when he becomes violent,” said Lisa Baehre, head prosecutor for domestic violence cases in Niagara County.

Advocates say this shouldn’t stop victims from trying to leave a violent relationship. To permanently separate from an abuser represents the ultimate safety. But taking that step requires smart safety planning.

“You need to get out, and you need to go get the assistance of agencies that specialize in domestic violence issues,” said Mary Brennan-Taylor, vice president of programs at YWCA Niagara, one of three domestic violence service providers in Niagara County. “Victims should never attempt to do this by themselves. They should never feel they’re safe if they just leave their home and go to their mother’s home or their sister’s home, where the abuser knows where to find them.”

Many local agencies work with victims both in person and over the phone to develop safety plans tailored to their situations.

But victims aren’t the only ones who need to take action, say domestic violence experts.

Improved enforcement

Many advocates contend that law enforcement agencies need to devote more resources and training to help curb the upward spiral of violence.

Several noted that the Buffalo Police Department in recent years has dramatically scaled back the number of detectives assigned to handling domestic violence cases and pulled its investigators from the Family Justice Center, a one-stop agency devoted to linking victims with assistance and resources.

Helen Juarbe said her aunt, Myrtle Frances Sauriol, might still be alive if the police had done more to help.

Sauriol had lived with Inocencio Perez for 50 years. Their relationship was always stormy, Juarbe said, and only got worse toward the end. Perez kept guns in their Buffalo house and threatened to use them.

Sauriol and others had taken the weapons away on more than one occasion, she said. But Perez called the police, who made Sauriol give the guns back because they were legally registered to him, Juarbe said.

Shortly before Sauriol was slain in March, a neighbor had urged her to call the police. But, Juarbe said, Sauriol had no faith left in the cops. She was shot to death later that day by Perez in a murder-suicide.

“My advice to anybody is to get out when you can,” Juarbe said, “before it’s too late.”

Erie County District Attorney Frank A. Sedita III said he is increasing the number of assistant DAs trained in domestic violence prosecution so that they can better identify life-threatening cases. He also is being more aggressive in gaining abuser convictions, he said.

The Domestic Violence Bureau is nicknamed the “Homicide Prevention Bureau” for a reason, he said.

“A lot of these people need help and counseling,” he said. “I get that. But you know something? A lot of them need to be put in jail, too.”