Category: Domestic Violence

Talking isn’t working: Push for PM to tackle porn, gambling, booze to stop violent men | SMH

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese must tackle Australia’s substantial problems with alcohol, gambling and children’s access to pornography if he wants to protect women, says an expert who helped shape the national plan to stop domestic violence.

Criminologist Michael Salter said policymakers must be prepared to take a wider view of prevention when national cabinet convenes for an urgent meeting on Wednesday to address growing community uproar about rates of violence against women.

In a challenge to Australia’s dominant strategy of changing men’s attitudes to prevent gendered violence, Salter said the government needed to be more practical about its policy opportunities.

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“It’s one thing to say that men and boys need to change – and we can keep saying that – but telling them to change is not a strategy,” he said.

“Alcohol, pornography and gambling are clear accelerants to men’s violence … Why is it the responsibility of a 13-year-old boy to change the culture around sexual violence, when it’s not the responsibility of an adult man earning millions of dollars a year promoting violent pornography to that teenage boy?”

Both gambling reform and online pornography have been thorny issues for the Albanese government, which has been balancing community expectations with strong pushback from the gaming industry and social media giants.

Salter said the past decade had shown that changing attitudes was difficult and did not always correlate with changes in behaviour.

“Young people’s attitudes to gender equality are more egalitarian than their elders, but boys and young men are also perpetrating physical and sexual violence at quite high levels, and in some spaces we’re seeing increases in perpetration,” he said.

“Reducing perpetration is going to require other levers beyond attitudes, and what are they? We need to take a non-ideological look at the evidence of what works now. Our message to the community can’t be about what’s going to keep women safe in 10 or 20 years when we’re talking about murder. The question is what’s going to keep women safe next week and the week after?”

Source: 12ft

National cabinet to meet on violence against women, with Albanese saying everyone ‘must do better’ | The Conversation

Tackling violence against women will be the sole agenda item for a national cabinet meeting Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has convened for Wednesday.

The meeting, held remotely, follows thousands of Australians attending rallies across the country, as community anger surges over the horrific number of women killed so far this year.

Albanese was at the Canberra rally on Sunday, where he received some heckling. He was accompanied by the Minister for Woman Katy Gallagher and the Minister for Social Services Amanda Rishworth.

The federal government has rejected calls for a royal commission into the issue, saying it already has a plan.

Rishworth told Sky on Sunday that victim survivors and many experts had had input into that plan. “So we believe we need to get on with the job.

“We have a Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commissioner and Commission that our government stood up. That role is incredibly important in monitoring. We believe we just need to continue to have this sustained effort. We believe that is what will make the difference,” she said.

So far this year 27 women have died in gender-based violence in Australia.

Police believe Meaghan Rose was murdered 27 years ago. Her suspected killer could be anywhere in Australia – ABC News

For nearly 27 years, the family of Meaghan Rose have been trying to prove she was murdered. Now, the ABC can reveal fresh details about her suspected killer.

Police allege Lees — Meaghan’s then-partner — had taken out a life insurance policy in her name before her suspected murder.

There was a 13-month waiting period on payouts for deaths by suicide. Meaghan died shortly after that set term ended, and Lees claimed a $203,000 benefit.

After Meaghan’s death, Lees and his child returned home to Victoria and in 2000, the pair moved in with recently-separated father-of-two Barry Waters.

Mr Waters, 42, was reported missing in 2001 and his headless body was discovered dumped in bushland near the Yarra Ranges the following year.

Lees was convicted of killing Mr Waters in 2004 following a secret affair with his wife, according to court documents.

He was sentenced to 20 years in prison, with a non-parole period of 16 years.

Fast forward to June 25, 2023, when Queensland detectives went to a property in Victoria to speak to him about the case.

The next day, his vehicle was found abandoned in the town of Portland and an arrest warrant was issued, as Victorian authorities launched a search and rescue operation.

Lees has now been missing for nine months, but police believe he is still alive and may be “hiding out” on farms or fruit picking in rural and regional Australia, Detective Sergeant Johns says.

Lees’s child, Wren Dawsong, made an extraordinary plea for their father to surrender to police last year, saying “Meaghan’s family deserve justice”.

Dawsong was living with the pair at the time Meaghan died.

“He’s not doing himself any favours by running and hiding so it’s time. He’s got to man up and turn himself in,” Dawsong said.

Anyone who sees Lees is asked not to approach him and to immediately call triple-0.

Source: Police believe Meaghan Rose was murdered 27 years ago. Her suspected killer could be anywhere in Australia – ABC News

Dads pass misogyny to their sons. The cycle of domestic violence won’t stop until they do | Sydney Morning Herald

Tackling domestic violence is about reforms to policing and courts and services, and it’s about listening to and protecting victims. But it’s also about working out how to end this cycle, how to stop men who denigrate and disrespect women from teaching their sons to do the same.

Not all men, of course. But enough. A 2019 global masculinity survey found almost 5 per cent of Australian men did not agree that women deserved equal rights to men, which equates to about half a million men across the country.

That view was more strongly held among men aged 18 to 35 than by their 55-plus counterparts.

The Man Box 2024 study found at least a third of Australian men thought a man should have the final say about decisions in their relationship, were entitled to know the whereabouts of their partner and were owed sex by women.

We live in a strange, two-speed world in which schools and community leaders are talking about consent and respect, yet boys can easily access material that is far more explicit, violent and hate-fuelled than anything previous generations saw.

They can spend much of their lives in the echo chambers of their online communities – the supporters of self-proclaimed misogynist Andrew Tate, the incels (involuntary celibates), the strangers spewing bile against women as they play Grand Theft Auto.

When boys and teens have a different example at home, they’re less likely to be influenced by what they see online. But when kids are seeing women denigrated at home, they have no counterpoint. They think that’s how the world works, and take those attitudes into their adult lives.

Source: https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/dads-pass-misogyny-to-their-sons-the-cycle-of-domestic-violence-won-t-stop-until-they-do-20240426-p5fmu2.html?12ft. 

Regulation of child contact centres called into question as staffer alleges concerns about possible child abuse were ignored – ABC News

Despite the risk to her career, Joan has chosen to speak with the ABC about what she witnessed in Sally’s case. She wanted to be identified but the Family Law Act prevents her from being named.

Sally was put in the custody of her father on the basis of a report written by a child psychologist who assessed the family on three occasions. On each occasion the psychologist interviewed the mother and the father and observed them with Sally.

Sally’s mother levelled allegations of domestic abuse against the father, and later raised questions about whether Sally was being physically abused in the father’s household.

The father and other experts alleged the mother was dishonest in her claims.

That was one of the reasons the psychologist deemed Wendy an emotional risk to her child describing their relationship as “enmeshed”. The psychologist also questioned the mother’s “emotional stability”.

Other experts, including child protection staff who had contact with the family, disagreed.

In a report, child protection said it was “unclear why the contact [with the mother] is supervised as the interaction was appropriate, and [Sally] showed no signs of being unhappy or uncomfortable being with her mother”.

Joan supervised about 40 visits with Sally and her mum between May and October of 2021.

She has several decades of experience as a social worker and has worked as a senior manager in the field.

Within a few weeks of having contact with the mother, father and the child, Joan alleges she observed worrying comments and behaviours from Sally that could potentially indicate abuse and she raised her concerns with her manager.

Joan’s manager, Nancy*, who cannot be named for legal reasons, raised Joan’s concerns with the Independent Children’s Lawyer (ICL) in the case.

An Independent Children’s Lawyer is appointed by the court to advocate for the child’s best interest in a parenting dispute.

Joan was shocked when her manager informed her that the child’s lawyer wasn’t interested in her abuse concerns and didn’t want them filed in a report because, according to the manager, “[the ICL] did not want to give the mother any material which would allow her to go back into court.”

Documents seen by the ABC revealed the owner, Nancy, was worried about her business. After hearing the centre’s concerns about the possibility Sally was being abused, the Independent Children’s Lawyer stopped sending new cases to the centre.

[P]rivate contact centres, like the one supervising Sally’s case, have no mandatory requirements and no regulatory body.

There is no agency tracking how many private centres exist, but an Australian Institute of Family Studies report released in December last year estimated there were more than 60.

Contact centres were primarily established so parents who were judged to be at risk of harming a child could have contact with their children in a safe, supervised setting.

Elspeth McInnes is a professor of sociology at the University of South Australia and has studied family separation and family law over several decades.

The professor says she is now hearing about more cases where parents who believed their child’s complaints of abuse, had lost custody and were only allowed to have supervised contact.

Source: Regulation of child contact centres called into question as staffer alleges concerns about possible child abuse were ignored – ABC News

Femicides: Belgium still failing to collect data despite pioneering law

Across Europe, more than 14,000 women were intentionally killed for being a woman between 2012 and 2022.

 

However, this figure is likely an underestimation of reality, as few countries recognise femicide, resulting in many deaths being written off as “ordinary” murders. Belgium signed the Council of Europe’s Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence (better known as the Istanbul Convention) in 2016, which requires signatories to collect statistical data on gender-based violence.

 

Belgium last year positioned itself at the forefront of the battle against gender-based violence with a new law, the Stop Feminicide Law, in which the legal definition of femicide was enshrined and boosted protections for victims.

 

Recognising that, to fully understand the phenomenon and its scale, more accurate official statistics were needed, the country also vowed to improve the collection of statistics on the phenomenon. Belgium is one of the worst performers when it comes to femicide data collection, but suddenly became one of Europe’s legislative pioneers in the fight against this crime.

 

However, almost one year later, Le Soir reported that, while the Federal Government does collect general data on cases of domestic violence, as well as on suspects of domestic violence and their gender, no figures on femicide victims could be provided, not by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, nor by the Federal Police.

 

Source: Femicides: Belgium still failing to collect data despite pioneering law

Bail authority previously ignored changes for sexual assault offences

On Wednesday, Minns announced a two-pronged response following Ticehurst’s alleged murder by a former partner, Daniel Billings, who had been released on bail just weeks ago after he was accused of sexually assaulting her.

As well as ordering an urgent review into the adequacy of bail laws from Crown Advocate David Kell SC, Minns said the Bail Act Monitoring Group – made up of a series of government agencies such as Corrective Services NSW and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions – would look at “operational” aspects of the laws governing bail.

Minns conceded the 28-year-old mother of one was failed by the state’s justice system, admitting his government had “serious questions” to answer after her alleged murder by a former partner who was already on bail for serious alleged offences.

But the Bail Act Monitoring Group previously reviewed bail in relation to sexual violence offences without recommending any changes to the law.

While the full review was never made public, at the time the Bail Act Monitoring Group admitted NSW Police were “of the view that overall the recommendations do not go far enough to address the issues identified through the course of the review”.

Billings had been charged with three counts of sexual intercourse without consent, four counts of stalking and harassment, two counts of damaging or destroying property and one count of animal cruelty.

Court records show Dubbo Local Court registrar L. Cusack placed him on an interim apprehended violence order and released him on $5000 bail on April 6. The bail decision was later continued by a magistrate in Parkes Local Court.

On Wednesday Minns conceded the use of local court registrars was an issue of “resourcing” for local courts in regional areas, particularly on matters heard on weekends.

He said it was a “very reasonable question” to ask whether registrars – who are not judicial officers – should be making bail decisions on serious alleged crimes.

Source: 12ft

The five demands of the No More national rallies happening this weekend

Rallies calling for government action on violence against women are happening in a dozen locations across the country over the weekend.

The No More National Rally Against Violence, starting in Ballarat this Friday at 5pm, was organised in response to the targeted attacks on women in Bondi Junction on April 13, as well as the concerning growth of gender-based violence in Australia.

Just 17 weeks into the year, 25 women have been killed in 2024 at the hands of male-perpetrated violence, according to Destroy the Joint’s Counting Dead Women.

Sarah Williams, founder of advocacy organisation What Were You Wearing, is the woman behind it all. She, along with several other organisations, have developed five key demands for action to come from the No More national rallies.

(1) Declaration of national emergency

(2) Media regulation on publishing images of victims

(3) #BelieveMe: Mandatory victim blaming prevention training

(4) Alternative reporting options; DFV specialist courts

(5) Better funding

he No More national rallies are happening in 12 locations this weekend. Williams calls on everyone, especially politicians and including men, to attend.

  • Ballarat, VIC: Friday 26th April 5pm @ Bridge Mall – Town Hall
  • Newcastle, NSW: Friday 26th April 6pm @ Newcastle Museum – Nobby’s Foreshore
  • Sydney, NSW: Saturday 27th April 1pm @ Belmore Park Haymarket – Hyde Park
  • Adelaide, SA: Saturday 27th April 11am @ Parliament House
  • Melbourne, VIC: Sunday 28th April 10am @ State Library – Federation Square
  • Bendigo, VIC: Sunday 28th April 11am @ Rosalind Park
  • Geelong, VIC: Sunday 28th April 11am @ Market Square Mall
  • Coffs Harbour, NSW: Sunday 28th April 11am @ Coffs Jetty Foreshore
  • Perth, WA: Sunday 28th April 12pm @ Forrest Pl – Parliament House
  • Sunshine Coast, QLD: Sunday 28th April 11am @ Foundation Square – Cotton Tree Park
  • Brisbane, QLD: Sunday 28th April 11am @ King George Square
  • Canberra, ACT: Sunday 28th April 2pm @ Parliament House

Source: The five demands of the No More national rallies happening this weekend

Bondi Junction attack: Women are sick of being afraid | The Saturday Paper

How could anyone stab a nine-month-old baby?

Why would a man target women going about their business in a shopping centre?

The man stabbed to death four other women – a university student, an artist, an architect and mother of two, an ecommerce assistant who was happily planning her wedding. Tragically, a 30-year-old refugee working his first day shift as a security guard at the centre was also killed.

Most of the people injured and hospitalised in the attack were also female, prompting the commissioner of New South Wales Police Force, Karen Webb, to say it was “obvious” the offender targeted women and avoided the men.

What was obvious to the most senior police officer in the state had not been so plain to armchair detectives, who jumped to incorrect conclusions about the offender’s motivation – that he was an Islamic extremist; that he was a young Jewish man, wrongly identified in media.

There was also, later, a focus on the perpetrator’s mental health – he’d been diagnosed with schizophrenia.

The mental health system in this country has been beset with problems for years, but as Professor Patrick McGorry, who has worked with people with schizophrenia for three decades, told the ABC’s Rafael Epstein, people with this diagnosis are less likely to commit acts of violence, not more.

Further, we typically don’t see acts of mass violence being perpetrated by mentally ill women.

Extreme acts of violence of any type perpetrated by women are extraordinarily rare.

On the other hand, our nation’s memory is stained by horrific attacks by male perpetrators – from the Bourke Street Mall car killings, to the Lindt Cafe siege, to Port Arthur, to the Hoddle Street massacre, to the Belanglo State Forest backpacker murders and now Bondi Junction.

Regardless of the sex of the victim, Australian Bureau of Statistics research shows 95 per cent of Australians who experience violence suffer at the hands of a male perpetrator.

When women are angry, or isolated, or depressed, or distorted by extremist ideology, or mentally ill, the statistics show that, overwhelmingly, they don’t resort to violence.

It is only if men take the burden of male violence away from always being a problem for women, if they look into their hearts and acknowledge there is a problem, that we will ever move forward.

Source: 12ft

The Hidden ‘Genocide’ of the Family Courts | by Bandy X. Lee | Mar, 2024 | Medium

In the U.S. Family Courts, the most heinous human crimes imaginable — the torture, maiming, and murder of innocent children — are occurring at industrial scale, with hundreds of new cases of children per day, day after day, year after year, over decades, in all fifty U.S. states. Yet, these children are not the primary targets, but their loving mothers (and occasionally loving fathers) who, as they witness the destruction of their children — murdered at a rate of one every six days — die from grief, suicide, cancer, heart attack, or “broken heart syndrome.” As happens with systematic genocide, the organizers of these massacres are not punished according to the law with death penalties and life imprisonments but rewarded with promotions and multiple billions of dollars a year.

Every victim litigant was a healthy, normal, and capable, even thriving suburban mother until she entered Family Court; every mother never believed something like this could happen to her, until she found herself entrapped in a predatory system whose goal was complete decimation of her. The obvious purpose is to render her incapable of fighting back or becoming an effective whistleblower.

The recent deaths of Catherine Kassenoff — a former special counsel to the New York State governor — and of Sinéad O’Connor — a highly-successful Irish singer — illustrate that legal competence and talented capabilities make matters worse, not better, for mothers in Family Courts.

Because Family Courts, by enabling or at best not holding accountable abusive personalities, have the effect of ballooning their entitlement, expectations, delusions of grandeur, and unlimited violence. These individuals, able to weaponize the legal system to enslave, torture, disfigure, and decimate their victims under “legal protection,” are actors in the larger Family Court carnage for profit that has now become an industrial organization of genocide.

Source: The Hidden ‘Genocide’ of the Family Courts | by Bandy X. Lee | Mar, 2024 | Medium