Domestic Violence Epidemic

[Kurve]

Thread here on COERCIVE CONTROL

 

[faible]

Going to put this out there for thought

In my opinion The defence lawyer who argued for bail for her client whom the professionals had warned was a high risk threat and later went on to kill his ex partner , should be held accountable for manslaughter.
There was no good reason the guy should been released and the argument that the lawyer was just doing their job doesn’t cut it with me .

On the contrary , if they were doing their job they would have considered the professional advice and not appealed for bail .

And I guess it’s not just relevant to DV but to all defence lawyers

System needs to be overhauled.

eh I don't think it's on the defence lawyer, if you're going to change it so defence lawyers are liable for doing exactly what their job is - all lawyers are bound to act in the best intests of their client - then that's a pretty major change to our entire justice system.

The defence lawyer is there to act on behalf of their client, nothing more, nothing less.

The system itself provides the limitations on the options available, both for the defence and the prosecution.

 

[Madas]

eh I don't think it's on the defence lawyer, if you're going to change it so defence lawyers are liable for doing exactly what their job is - all lawyers are bound to act in the best intests of their client - then that's a pretty major change to our entire justice system.

The defence lawyer is there to act on behalf of their client, nothing more, nothing less.

The system itself provides the limitations on the options available, both for the defence and the prosecution.

Oh yeh I get it and it’s become the out clause for humanity “ oh I was just doing my job “

My argument again is “ no you weren’t, yiu didn’t look at this objectively and put other people’s lives in danger through your own self gratification in winning your argument “

Agree with Toump Ass that the registrar could have thrown it out .
My point is if ever there was a case and a time in history to have a review on this broken system it’s this case and right now ..

My wife has worked as a DV councillor for 20 years and she is nearly done with the system

No matter how hard they work these pricks keep getting lenient sentences and access to their threatened families and don’t even get her started on the family court and child protection agency

 

[jason_recliner]

Oh yeh I get it and it’s become the out clause for humanity “ oh I was just doing my job “

My argument again is “ no you weren’t, yiu didn’t look at this objectively and put other people’s lives in danger through your own self gratification in winning your argument “

Agree with Toump Ass that the registrar could have thrown it out .
My point is if ever there was a case and a time in history to have a review on this broken system it’s this case and right now ..

My wife has worked as a DV councillor for 20 years and she is nearly done with the system

No matter how hard they work these pricks keep getting lenient sentences and access to their threatened families and don’t even get her started on the family court and child protection agency

The blame sits with the registrar, not the defence lawyer. I don't know how defence lawyers sleep at night but they are literally doing the job they are paid to do. More holistically, the justice system needs to be revised to presume against bail for violent and otherwise dangerous offenders.

 

[faible]

Oh yeh I get it and it’s become the out clause for humanity “ oh I was just doing my job “

My argument again is “ no you weren’t, yiu didn’t look at this objectively and put other people’s lives in danger through your own self gratification in winning your argument “

Agree with Toump Ass that the registrar could have thrown it out .
My point is if ever there was a case and a time in history to have a review on this broken system it’s this case and right now ..

My wife has worked as a DV councillor for 20 years and she is nearly done with the system

No matter how hard they work these pricks keep getting lenient sentences and access to their threatened families and don’t even get her started on the family court and child protection agency

Disagree. It's not an 'out' clause by any means, that's a really strange position to take.

A lawyers job is to act in the best interests of their client. That's all.

The system provides the limitations on what can and can't be done.

If you want lawyers to stop acting in the best interests of their clients then that is a monumental change to our entire legal system.

If the system has a problem, fix the system, don't suddenly demand that lawyers stop acting in the best interest of their client and act in the best interest of <someone else> because the unintended consequences of that are almost certainly going to be to the detriment of the poor and powerless.

 

[Festerz]

Sad that it's happened but good that people are reaching out for help, services like Lifeline are incredibly important.

Yep.

I volunteered for a short time as a telephone support counsellor for LifeLine in the 90s and back then you had to pay to do the required training course run by the service prior to participating - that's how dependent the service was on receiving external grant, community and self funding to continue providing a service.

I assume that it now receives a consistent and permanent source of funding from government. But with every media program listing the Lifeline service number after a potentially triggering incident report, interview , article or program I imagine the demand for their support services have grown exponentially in rent years.

I could only work on the phones for a relatively short time as I found it to be affecting me personally. Finding people not just with the willingness to act as crisis support workers on a volunteer basis but with the emotional resilience and capacity to do it long term is a big issue for crisis support services.

Which gets to the issue of crisis support for those women trying to escape violent situations in their homes. The vast majority of women working in those shelters, crisis centres and providing support are volunteers. What support- both financial and emotional is provided to them? IIMHO this is something that has to sit front and centre of government immediate and long term plans.

This set of twitter posts from a women's shelter volunteer explains what its like working on the front line. Please take the time to read all of the posts and contemplate what it is saying:

 

[Underarrest_]

Oh yeh I get it and it’s become the out clause for humanity “ oh I was just doing my job “

My argument again is “ no you weren’t, yiu didn’t look at this objectively and put other people’s lives in danger through your own self gratification in winning your argument “

Agree with Toump Ass that the registrar could have thrown it out .
My point is if ever there was a case and a time in history to have a review on this broken system it’s this case and right now ..

My wife has worked as a DV councillor for 20 years and she is nearly done with the system

No matter how hard they work these pricks keep getting lenient sentences and access to their threatened families and don’t even get her started on the family court and child protection agency

I commend your wife for the work she does. It’s not an easy role and extremely challenging and I hope sometimes rewarding.
The system needs to be changed. An example of this is when police take out a protection order because they determine a DV situation, the respondent can then seek legal representation and go to a hearing. Why? The police have already identified DV and taken out a protection order.

 

[Toump Ass]

This set of twitter posts from a women's shelter volunteer explains what its like working on the front line. Please take the time to read all of the posts and contemplate what it is saying:

tl;dr Governments waste money on submarines instead of front line services.

No s**t.

It's not just women's shelters that are underfunded. State and federal governments spend billions on pointless s**t at the expense of social welfare.

How much were the commonwealth games? 600 million dollars? Royal Commission into COVID handling cost how much?

 

[Kurve]

I've seen this kind of comment more than a few times over the last week.

Someone I know has a step daughter, who has been with a guy for 10 years who hits her.

Every time they bring up why She is still with him she gets aggressive about it.

What more can you do for someone like that?

We all live and die by our own choices.

You could ask why the step father and mother haven't been around there for a chat and told him they know what he's doing, they're documenting it and they're prepared to move to action.

Give both parties 'help' lines to call and educational material.

Speak to the neighbours.

 

[faible]

You could ask why the step father and mother haven't been around there for a chat and told him they know what he's doing, they're documenting it and they're prepared to move to action.

Give both parties 'help' lines to call and educational material.

Speak to the neighbours.

Could easily result in a drastic escalation. If you're going to intervene, you need an exit strategy ready to go and a person willing to use it.

Plus the potential risk to the parents.

It's not simple.

 

[Kurve]

Could easily result in a drastic escalation. If you're going to intervene, you need an exit strategy ready to go and a person willing to use it.

Plus the potential risk to the parents.

It's not simple.

I agree it's not simple but I can't imagine sitting back and doing nothing if it was one of mine.

 

[faible]

I agree it's not simple but I can't imagine sitting back and doing nothing if it was one of mine.

There's a lot of people that would have very limited exposure to things like mental illness or abusive relationships that end up simply not knowing what or how to deal with something.

If they've repeatedly tried to talk to her and get her to leave, but she's refusing to engage in any way, it might be that they simply don't know what else to do.

 

[Kurve]

There's a lot of people that would have very limited exposure to things like mental illness or abusive relationships that end up simply not knowing what or how to deal with something.

If they've repeatedly tried to talk to her and get her to leave, but she's refusing to engage in any way, it might be that they simply don't know what else to do.

True, they may not know what else to do. Perhaps we can focus on that as well.

 

[jason_recliner]

Is that right? He can bash her and unless she wants to charge him, the police can't arrest him? That's ####ed up.

The law needs to be changed so somebody can be arrested and charged without the victim complaining i.e. arrested on third party referral. There are many reasons why a woman suffering DV may not feel she is able to pursue in court the POS bashing her. That doesn't mean the police and courts should be able to ignore the violence inflicted on her.

 

[faible]

True, they may not know what else to do. Perhaps we can focus on that as well.

I definitely think better education about identifying toxic and abusive relationships before they reach the bleedingly obvious point is a good thing. Young people learning what respectful and disrespectful relationship behaviours look like so that they might see warning signs long before it reaches the point of escalating to emotion and/or physical abuse.

I'm not sure how you get older people to learn about managing things like mental health and abusive behaviours in people around them, or people around their children, since there's no 'common' pathway they're found like we have with kids and the education system.

I suppose sport can be a good avenue for education, there's a lot of 'blokes' who watch AFL and don't really understand why Tarryn Thomas' behaviour was so bad if you read the mainboard threads - though I'd say most posters did grasp it.

 

[jason_recliner]

I definitely think better education about identifying toxic and abusive relationships before they reach the bleedingly obvious point is a good thing. Young people learning what respectful and disrespectful relationship behaviours look like so that they might see warning signs long before it reaches the point of escalating to emotion and/or physical abuse.

This is happening now, at least.

 

[Underarrest_]

The law needs to be changed so somebody can be arrested and charged without the victim complaining i.e. arrested on third party referral. There are many reasons why a woman suffering DV may not feel she is able to pursue in court the POS bashing her. That doesn't mean the police and courts should be able to ignore the violence inflicted on her.

There seems to be some misinformation in previous posts. If the police are referred by anyone to attend a DV situation they can charge a respondent with a criminal offence.

 

[Kurve]

There seems to be some misinformation in previous posts. If the police are referred by anyone to attend a DV situation they can charge a respondent with a criminal offence.

They don't need the victim's statement to do that or her cooperation, if it helps the prosecution.

 

[jason_recliner]

There seems to be some misinformation in previous posts. If the police are referred by anyone to attend a DV situation they can charge a respondent with a criminal offence.

Thanks for clarifying that. Reporting the PoS to the police should be the first action for those step-parents, then.

 

[PenfoldsFan]

About 5 years ago the house across the road from us was bought by whoever funds DV safe houses and a Woman and her teenage Son moved in. The Son was nothing but trouble and barely a night passed when he wasn't brought home by the Police.
Just prior to Christmas that year her teenage Daughter came on the scene as she wanted to reunite with her Mother.
Unfortunately she went back and told her Father where his ex was staying and on Christmas night, full of grog and God knows what else charging his emotions he pulls up out the front and begins kicking the door in.
The first we knew was the screaming as this coward rained down punches on his Son who went out to defend the family, Im talking punches as hard and as continuous as I've ever seen, he then went to his ute and grabbed an iron bar as a few of us went out to help.

Mum went to help her Son and he would have had her too if we werent there I reckon.
Police and ambo's were called but took forever to arrive and he was long gone .
The most heartbreaking thing was her wailing in the street for help for her Son as he lay beaten.

It doesn't end when they get away unfortunately, infact it can get much worse.

 

[burge13]

The law needs to be changed so somebody can be arrested and charged without the victim complaining i.e. arrested on third party referral. There are many reasons why a woman suffering DV may not feel she is able to pursue in court the POS bashing her. That doesn't mean the police and courts should be able to ignore the violence inflicted on her.

Stuff does go on behind the scenes here

If a woman presents to the hospital with a black eye once, it won't get a note attached. If she rocks up a few times with it, it gets passed onto cross department agencies to investigate and decide what to do (though limited, it can go to sapol).

If the kids have bruising as well, you might find the Dad apply for a job and it show up on a security check/WWCC etc which gets investigated manually etc

There's only so much that can be done without victim cooperation but it isn't that 'nothing' gets done by police either.

 

[Teagueeee15]

About 5 years ago the house across the road from us was bought by whoever funds DV safe houses and a Woman and her teenage Son moved in. The Son was nothing but trouble and barely a night passed when he wasn't brought home by the Police.
Just prior to Christmas that year her teenage Daughter came on the scene as she wanted to reunite with her Mother.
Unfortunately she went back and told her Father where his ex was staying and on Christmas night, full of grog and God knows what else charging his emotions he pulls up out the front and begins kicking the door in.
The first we knew was the screaming as this coward rained down punches on his Son who went out to defend the family, Im talking punches as hard and as continuous as I've ever seen, he then went to his ute and grabbed an iron bar as a few of us went out to help.

Mum went to help her Son and he would have had her too if we werent there I reckon.
Police and ambo's were called but took forever to arrive and he was long gone .
The most heartbreaking thing was her wailing in the street for help for her Son as he lay beaten.

It doesn't end when they get away unfortunately, infact it can get much worse.

This is why the ankle monitoring device is a good idea. As soon as that grub came within 100 feet of the house, the police should have been notified by the device and been on the way there.

 

[PenfoldsFan]

This is why the ankle monitoring device is a good idea. As soon as that grub came within 100 feet of the house, the police should have been notified by the device and been on the way there.

Good in theory, but in an area like Adelaides North there would be more devices than Police on any given night.
And if he knew they were on their way he may have escalated it from the beginning.
Someone who's that way inclined dont care about repercussions, emotions are too high and there may be nothing else to lose.

 

[burge13]

Good in theory, but in an area like Adelaides North there would be more devices than Police on any given night.
And if he knew they were on their way he may have escalated it from the beginning.
Someone who's that way inclined dont care about repercussions, emotions are too high and there may be nothing else to lose.

Still better than not having it

 

[PenfoldsFan]

Still better than not having it

Maybe, maybe not.
The closest Police station is 10 minutes away at priority 1 so he'd know what his window of opportunity is.
Does that force his hand to use a knife or gun for efficiency, I dunno.
Not sure anyone wants to test that water.

 

[Kurve]

I definitely think better education about identifying toxic and abusive relationships before they reach the bleedingly obvious point is a good thing. Young people learning what respectful and disrespectful relationship behaviours look like so that they might see warning signs long before it reaches the point of escalating to emotion and/or physical abuse.

Respectful relationships need to be taught in school, no harm in sending the same material home with the kids so the parents can have a read.

We also need a culture shift. Ten years ago and perhaps still going on, people would consider even talking about DV in someone else's relationship as intrusive, gossipping and not their business. My take is that DV is everybody's business.

That's not to suggest that anybody should rush in to every one they might see on the street and risk getting killed themselves of course.