Alicia Little's mother has put her daughter's case to an inquiry into Victoria's justice system as an example of its failures.
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Alicia, 41, was killed in 2017 when her fiance - who is now out of jail - pinned her to a water tank with his car.
Lee Little wrote in her submission "the offender was initially charged with murder and this was eventually plea-bargained down to the offence of dangerous driving causing death and failing to render assistance after a motor vehicle accident".
"Her life was taken by her partner through domestic violence, I believe, and the justice system didn't bring the domestic violence into it at all," Mrs Little told MPs gathered in Wangaratta.
"When I asked the prosecutors, I was told that murder is greater than domestic violence.
"I don't know how many times he tried to strangle my daughter; she ended up in hospital, and all of that was recorded.
"(But) when we went to the meeting with prosecutors ... they'd already decided what they were going to do before we even walked into the room."
Mrs Little has 86,000 signatures supporting a national domestic violence register and wants family violence records to be automatically considered when an intimate partner dies.
"I've got to tell Alicia's story - she was here for a purpose," she said.
Alicia was one of those victim-survivors who had been wrongly identified by police as an aggressor at a point in her relationship, an issue touched on by Centre Against Violence chief executive Kerry Burns.
"We think that there needs to be a great deal more education ... we don't like to see language such as ... 'setting him off'," she said.
"There needs to be a much stronger understanding of coercive control.
"We need to better equip the Department of Justice to manage breaches of community corrections orders."
Committee chair Fiona Patten asked Ms Burns about Alicia Little's case, which CAV was aware of.
"I know in her case, she would describe the injuries without attributing it to the perpetrator," Ms Burns said.
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"Our records ought to be consulted and regarded as a primary form of evidence.
"We were definitely calling Alicia into safety planning and options.
"It's the nature of an intimate relationship; there's a lot of power in it.
"We've just got to do better at recognising that coercive control ... we're still relying a lot on victims-survivors to make moves."
