New violence court creaks under cases

A flagship domestic violence initiative is in danger of being swamped by the sheer volume of cases it is struggling to deal with.

The specialist Family Violence Court at the Manukau District Court is meant to encourage men to get help to stop their violence, rather than pleading not guilty and forcing victims through interminable court battles.

But the court faces an enormous workload and is failing to monitor men sent on non-violence programmes.

Original plans to bring in victim advocates from outside agencies such as women's refuges, and to establish a community liaison group, have not materialised.

As a result, victims are not getting protection orders. Men are going to non-violence programmes but can't afford the fees because they lack the funding that would come with a protection order or direct court sentence.

Chief District Court Judge Russell Johnson says the court has succeeded in speeding up domestic violence cases.

But he said: "The quality control on how that happens is the next thing. I am the first to say that we have a lot more work to do."

Despite the problems, the Government plans to open four more Family Violence Courts next March in Auckland, Masterton, Porirua and Lower Hutt.

The Counties-Manukau police district has by far the country's highest rate of domestic violence, with almost twice as many recorded incidents for every 100,000 people as in the rest of the country.

It recorded seven family violence homicides in the first five months of this year - before the Kahui twins.

Lawyer Catriona MacLennan said the sole judge in the Family Violence Court every Thursday typically had to deal with 30 to 50 cases in the day.

"How can a judge possibly do justice to so many cases in one day? The courtroom is grossly overcrowded. There are people everywhere, with very few seats. The people are just piling into the corridor."

The manager of the South Auckland Family Violence Prevention Network, Rodger Smith, said the new court was originally supposed to refer violent men with their partners to get protection orders from the Family Court, which would then pay for their counselling.

"I remember someone saying the Domestic Violence Court should talk to the Family Court, but they are just not talking," he said.

"So I can understand that if they can't even talk to another part of their own system, then their ability or willingness to talk outside that system would be pretty minimal."

The agency was also supposed to be part of a community advisory group for the new court, with police, the Probation Service, lawyers and Child, Youth and Family. But the group had never been established.

Mr Smith said he was concerned that the new court sometimes referred domestic violence couples to joint couple counselling before dealing with the offender's violence.

The court's liaison judge, Judge Charles Blackie, said the new court was still "a great improvement on what we had before".

Far more men were pleading guilty, cases were being dealt with faster, and more men were being referred to anger management and drug and alcohol courses.

He said judges were considering extending the court to more than one day a week to deal with the volume of work, but had to leave enough court time for all other cases.

Chief Judge Johnson said he still wanted to get more community involvement, including agencies supporting victims.

He plans training for judges and lawyers and says the Ministry of Women's Affairs is investigating possible financing for independent victim advocates.