Fewer than one in ten domestic violence cases before the District Courts last year were dealt with by immediate imprisonment or supervised community sanctions, a sentencing guidelines committee has noted.
There is “widespread acceptance” the social good would be better served by less, “or more parsimonious”, use of imprisonment by the District Courts, the Judicial Council’s sentencing guidelines committee has said.
The reasons for that include the detrimental effects of imprisonment on individuals, families and society; imprisonment being a risk factor for future reoffending; the “particularly higher” rates of reoffending by those sentenced to short prison sentences; and the financial costs of imprisonment, it said.
In a paper on the availability to District Court judges of community-based sanctions (CBS), the Sentencing Guidelines Information Committee said judges have a wide range of sentencing options in criminal matters.
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These range from dismissal, through unsupervised CBS (such as fines and suspended sentences) and supervised CBS (community service, probation), to custodial sanctions and ‘hybrid’ sanctions combining custodial and community-based elements, including part-suspended sentences.
CBS are used to a “significant” extent by the District Courts here, taking into account the percentage of matters dealt with by those courts, and where sanctions might be a “feasible option”, it said.
There is “clearly room for expansion” in the use of supervised CBS as an alternative to custody, it said.
Of 5,801 people jailed in 2022, 3,095 were imprisoned for terms up to one year and 393 for up to two years. Some in that cohort of committals, particularly those jailed for less than one year, might have had their terms potentially substituted by a supervised CBS.
Of 2,426 children dealt with in the District (Children) Court last year, 948 were dealt with by CBS, of which it appeared most – 619 – were supervised sanctions, it noted.
The paper specifically addressed the use of CBS concerning offences under domestic violence legislation.
Of 4,694 cases or appeals under the Domestic Violence Act in 2023, 280 were dealt with by immediate custody and 91 by immediate supervised community sanction. Most, 4,277, were dealt with by other means, including dismissal, strikeout, withdrawn, fines and suspended sentences.
A similar pattern was evident from Courts Service data for 2022. Of a total 3,742 cases, 263 were dealt with via immediate custody, 91 by supervised community sanction and 3,388 by other means.
Further analysis and research is required to explore the circumstances of such outcomes, the committee said. The fact some domestic violence incidents may be recorded under other categories such as assault might result in undercounting of cases, it noted.
Factors potentially affecting the use of CBS along with rehabilitative options include delays in getting probation reports, it said.
It is “critical” that the available range of community based sanctions have the trust and confidence of the judiciary, in terms of how the sanctions are managed and administered, and provided the probation service is resourced to deliver them consistently across the country, the committee said.
There is a need for further data analysis and research on these issues, it said.
Regarding domestic violence and abuse, an “increased and concerted” effort is required to ensure, from the perspective of sentencing and sentence management, that offending attracting such a level of societal concern and the focus of Government policy is appropriately visible across the data systems of relevant bodies “as a priority”.
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