ABC News, 19 October 2020:
Domestic
violence workers say they come in “waves” — women who, three or
four at a time, step forward for help escaping a special class of
abuser experts deem particularly high risk: police officers.
Often
they’ll call from out of town. A woman living in a rural community
in one of Australia’s eastern states recently got in touch with a
domestic violence service in a busy city, hundreds of kilometres
away. She told support workers her husband — a cop with specialist
training and connections — had assaulted her in front of his
colleagues, enlisted friends and relatives to help stop her leaving,
and warned her that if she ever tried to run, he’d track her down,
kill her and bury her some place her body would never be found.
She
believed him.
At
one point in the elaborate escape plan the service devised, the woman
put her phone on a truck heading north, climbed into a car booked
under a fake name, and sped off in the opposite direction. “Hers
was a particularly tricky case,” one of the staff involved
explained, “because of how isolated she was.”
But
the abuse she experienced — and the powerlessness to leave she felt
— is similar to what other women in violent relationships with
police say they endure. Where do you turn when your abuser is part of
the system meant to protect you?
An
ABC News investigation has found police in Australia are too often
failing to take action against domestic violence perpetrators in
their ranks, fuelling a culture of impunity in law enforcement
agencies across the country and putting victims’ safety at risk.
In
public, senior police have consistently claimed they hold serving
officers to higher standards and even “more accountable” for
committing domestic violence. But behind closed doors, police concede
they’re treating badged abusers differently to offenders in the
broader community.
National
data on the number of police officers charged with domestic violence
— the first time such a snapshot has been compiled — shows state
police forces have taken criminal action against relatively few
officers. Documents obtained by the ABC under Freedom of Information
reveal at least 55 police officers around Australia were charged with
domestic violence-related offences in 2019, with charges ranging from
breaching protection orders, assault with a weapon and reckless
wounding, to strangulation, stalking, sexual assault and making
threats to kill.
The
rank of officers charged ranged from probationary constable to
inspector and the majority were male; of 41 cases in which the
officer’s gender is known, four were women. (In most cases the
information obtained does not identify how many were found guilty of
their charges or had convictions recorded.).
With
evidence suggesting police are at least as likely to perpetrate
domestic violence as the general population, experts say the figures
are likely to be just “the tip of the iceberg”, and highlight how
difficult it can be not only for victims to report abusers in police
ranks, but to get police to take action against their own. In the
year ending June 2019, for instance, there were roughly 37 domestic
and family violence offenders per 10,000 persons in NSW. Yet of more
than 17,000 officers employed by NSW Police, last year just 11 were
charged.
“The
number of police officers charged is strikingly low given the extent
and severity of the [alleged] violence and what we, even as a small
project, hear from the people we support who experience this kind of
abuse,” said Lauren Caulfield, coordinator of the Policing Family
Violence project in Melbourne.
Because
police do not publicly report information about employees involved in
domestic violence matters, it’s difficult to get an accurate sense
of the scale of the problem, Ms Caulfield said. Information about
officers who were charged, for example, doesn’t include family
violence callouts, police named as respondents on protection orders,
or instances where victims have tried to report abuse and been
discouraged or not taken seriously.
Family
and domestic violence support services:
1800
Respect National Helpline: 1800 737 732
Women’s
Crisis Line (NSW): 1800 656 463
Safe
Steps Crisis Line (Vic): 1800 015 188
Men’s
Referral Service: 1300 766 491
Mensline:
1300 789 978
Lifeline
(24-hour Crisis Line): 131 114
Relationships
Australia: 1300 364 277
Read
the full article here.
ABC News, 21 October 2020:
Dozens of Victoria Police officers were charged with family violence offences in the five years to 2019 but only one was found guilty and none had convictions recorded.
Documents obtained by ABC News under Freedom of Information show Victoria Police brought family violence charges against 82 officers between 2015 and 2019, with more than twice as many charged in 2019 than in 2015.
The charges, against 68 male officers and 14 female officers, ranged from contravening family violence intervention orders and recklessly causing injury, to rape, false imprisonment, aggravated assault and making threats to kill.
Of those 82 officers, 10 senior constables and senior sergeants went on to appear in court, nine of whom had their charges withdrawn and just one was found guilty, though no conviction was recorded.
For context, 11 per cent of defendants finalised in Victoria's criminal courts in the year to June 2019 had their matters withdrawn by the prosecution, and 84 per cent of family and domestic violence defendants had their charges proven.
Documents show some of the officers were subjected to internal disciplinary actions including performance monitoring, transferral to other duties, reduction in rank and suspension without pay, however none were sacked or dismissed......
Relatively few officers have been charged with family violence offences in recent years, a trend experts partly attribute to policing bias and conflicts of interest which can make it difficult for police to conduct impartial investigations into their colleagues. Now, the new data casts a harsh spotlight on how courts are responding to abusive police, whose service as officers may be shielding them from more severe punishment.
"Given the severity of the violence [alleged] in these matters, the fact that no convictions have been recorded for police officers found guilty of family violence charges is staggering," said Lauren Caulfield, coordinator of the Policing Family Violence project in Melbourne.
"These statistics really illuminate the pervasive and chilling culture of impunity that police officers operate within. Police know the system — they know how to do plea negotiations and consolidate and reduce charges, and at every step of the way concern for their role and reputation continues to protect them."......
Read the full article here.
