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Review of Gatekeeping Role in Young Offenders Act
Feedback from Youth Liaison Officers at YLO Forum in Goulburn on 23/24 August 1999
1. Who should the gatekeepers be? a) Police prosecutors Close liaison between police prosecutor and YLO in minor matters involving juveniles (matters that should not really hit court) Power by police prosecutor to send matters back to investigator to re do brief/change to action as per s 4 or 5 of YOA. b) SYOs All matters should be referred to the YLO. There would be much greater uniformity and less errors. (i) YLO positions (ii) Rank.
Rank and position of the YLO within the LAC structure, should be rank of sergeant. Senior police not taking notice of YLO - I am constable, they are senior constables sergeants etc.
Lack of support from middle and upper management in position of YLO. SYOs in rural areas are an issue which needs addressing. There are simply not enough police in isolated areas to successfully and professionally implement the procedures of the YO Act as in some cases the investigating official may end up making a determination as SYO. Large problems with distance involved for some LACs, My LAC is about 100,000 square kms. It takes from 1-6 hours to get around to stations.
a) Police. Internal police training - nil since when YOA came out. At that time the lecture was only 10 minutes. Training for SYOs will greatly improve referral rates. Training for SYOs must be mandatory and form part of OCRs. I believe that each LAC Youth Liaison Officer should be responsible for training the Specialist Youth Officers for his or her LAC. Not how it is at the moment. Make a list of all the offences that can be dealt with by a warning/caution/conference. If the offence does not appear on the list then it can’t be dealt with by these options. Can you list all the offences that should or can be given warnings for, cautions for and conference for. We need some direction and some examples of these offences. b) Magistrates There should be more training for magistrates in relation to the YO Act. Is anyone monitoring magistrates decision re conference referrals? A certain magistrate will not refer any juvenile for any matter to a conference. Many magistrates in my area have been referring on offences where a caution by the “beak” would be far more cost effective and appropriate. Why do not the magistrate’s write or inform of their decisions when referring young people to conference? What flow of information do the magistrates have access to or do they solely depend on administrators keeping them informed re the YOA. c) Court staff There needs to be an agreed set of administrative procedures operating at each court. At Metropolitan Children'’ Courts this should include a nominated court staff member to be responsible for Young Offenders Act matters. All frontline court staff may benefit be being more aware/knowledgeable of YOA and its procedures. 3. Implementation and administration a) Cooling off period Encourage ‘cooling off period’ between offence detection and decision on how to proceed. Encourage more police to use the 21 day window/cooling off period when in doubt when dealing with juveniles. Police making decision in “heat of the moment.” 14 days does not seem to be utilised all that often. There is a problem when dealing by arrest when a juvenile is arrested when he comes from out of town and has no local attachment, parent or otherwise. These people often take off and later cannot be located. We have done this on occasions and it then creates more work and time to take out warrants. What should we do? b) Role of lawyers Train the ALS to be able to be contacted when a young person from the Aboriginal Community comes into custody. At present in the Southern Rivers Region there are several numbers to contact, all of which at most times go unanswered or messages left on answering machines are never or rarely responded to. Traditional rivalry between police and lawyers. How can this be overcome? Is it possible for YLOs to speak directly with legal aid hotline to gain satisfaction re quality of advice given rather than deliberate obstruction. Young offenders legal aid hotline needs to be available 24 hours a day. Legal Aid Hotline to be of use and to gain credibility needs to be 24 hours, 7 days a week with well trained staff. Young people are very reluctant to seek legal advice. Difficulty getting extended family to attend. c) Attendance at conferences. It is very difficult to get arresting police to conferences due to short notice being given about when they are being held. Not enough notice, convenors (some) give me 1½ weeks notice and even in one case 2 days notice of conference. Firstly get police to fax their availability to convenor before deciding on date. d) Admissions and doli incapax Concerns for 10-14 year olds being sent to court because of issues of doli incapax. I have had a couple of kids in this age group referred to conference. These referrals have been rejected due to issues of doli incapax not being dealt with properly in the police interview. These kids have then been summonsed to court. If these kids had been 14 plus the referrals would probably have been accepted. Recently had one homeless kid charged simply because all attempts to get an independent person to sit in on interview failed. No one could be located. The kid was charged without being interviewed for an offence which, if admitted, could have been cautioned. 4. Consistency of decision making a) Mandatory offences? Mandatory offences for caution/conference? Definitely not. There are too many other issues which preclude this ie previous history, personal situation or police discretion. Not keen on mandatory offences referred to caution/conference. Need to look at “entire picture” of individual. Too many inconsistencies re police action ie warnings, cautions, conferences and charging in relation to robbery offences. All robberies are serious and therefore should be dealt with at court. Magistrates should be directed to deal with the matter. b) Guidelines Conference administrators and police and magistrates and DPP (all gatekeepers) require a protocol which permits them to "score” cases as a guideline for referral to caution/conference/court. Magistrates require practice directions from the Senior Children’s magistrate as a matter of urgency. Practice directions urgently required. Should ensure inappropriate matters are not referred to conferencing.
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