Courts are missing the chance to stop serious domestic and family violence offences from occurring by letting first-time perpetrators go with a slap on the wrist.
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The ACT Director of Public Prosecutions Jon White wrote to an inquiry into the ACT government's policy response to domestic violence to call for more options for early intervention for less serious family violence offenders.
When sentencing, courts can order offenders to attend programs targeted at family violence offenders.
However in the ACT, these programs are focused on more serious offenders with previous criminal records.
"Offenders who are appearing in court for a first offence, and where that offence is not one of the more serious offences, are rarely required to attend programs," Mr White wrote.
"This is in contrast to alternative models operating elsewhere where less serious and first time offenders are targeted by programs.
"Currently, an offender may come to court once or twice, enter a plea of guilty, and have the sentencing dealt with in 15 minutes or so.
"It is difficult to see how that in itself would bring about long lasting behavioural change."
Because of the focus on more "entrenched" offenders, Mr White said the ACT was missing the chance to intervene at "this early stage where behavioural change might be possible".
"It seems likely that the majority of family violence offenders and their families would benefit from some sort of program," he said.
There has been a sharp increase in the number of family violence prosecutions in the ACT in the past six years, with 687 prosecutions in the last financial year alone.
The ACT government introduced a $21 million domestic violence package in 2016, funded by a $30 levy on all households, and a Legislative Assembly inquiry is examining how effective that has been.
Mr White said the ACT's record of reform in domestic violence policy was "enviable" but more could be done.
He suggested introducing "intermediaries" for children and other vulnerable witnesses giving evidence, such as child pyschologists or speech therapists who could rephrase questions from lawyers into language the witness could understand.
Mr White said the ACT should follow Queensland's lead in allowing evidence of relationships to be admitted to provide context to the crime.
As it stands, evidence is generally limited to the offence that the perpetrator is standing trial for.
"We know that when family violence occurs it is rarely a one off incident. It is usually the case that many incidents of physical violence occur before a victim contacts police," Mr White wrote.
"Seemingly strange behaviour on the part of the complainant is therefore unexplained and can be used against a complainant to undermine their credibility."
Mr White also suggested case management hearings be scrapped and domestic violence hearings be listed in a block outside of the four Supreme Court criminal trial blocks.
"Block listing has been an outstanding success in the Supreme Court, significantly reducing the delay in listing trials,"Mr White said.
"In the Supreme Court listing periods 50 per cent of accused plead guilty on or before the date of the trial. Sometimes the figure can be considerably higher.
"However this will only work if the block listing in the Magistrates Court takes place outside of the four Supreme Court criminal trial listing periods.
"Due to the perilous state of my office's resources it cannot cover simultaneous intensive listing periods.
"Case management hearings are a step along the way to the hearing of the matter that are not necessary and significantly add to delays. They are a poor use of resources of the court and my office."
