The ACT government will introduce laws to clamp down on drink spiking on Thursday, but has provided no details of what it plans.
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If the ACT bases it laws on NSW, where drink spiking was tightened in 2008, it will become an offence to add a drug or extra alcohol to someone's drink with an intent to cause them harm. An offender doesn't have to actually do the harm to be prosecuted, just have the intention. In NSW, if you are found guilty of drink spiking, you can be sentenced to up to two years' jail.
Earlier this month, Attorney-General Gordon Ramsay said there was a gap in the current law, in that it didn't broadly cover people who tried to drug or intoxicate others without them knowing or agreeing. At the moment, it depended on the kind of drug used and the circumstances in which it was given.
"The new provisions will better address the dangerous behaviour of drink spiking irrespective of what is used," he said.
The government has confirmed that the legislation will be introduced on Thursday but would say nothing of the detail on Wednesday.
The flaw in the current laws was exposed when Sydney man Juswan Mokmargana, 46, spiked a woman's drink with two tablets of Stilnox while she was away from the table at a Canberra pub in April 2016.
