The New South Wales Parliament last night voted to remove convicted child sex offender Dennis Ferguson from his home in Sydney’s Ryde. The law is a vigilantes’ charter. And worse than that, it represents a missed opportunity for a sensible rational policy discussion about how to resettle the hundreds of child sex offenders who are released from our prisons each year.
The general community response towards sexual offending is predictably and rightfully censorious: sexual abuse has the well-demonstrated potential to wreak havoc with bodies, minds and lives. However, the panicked community and media mindset to this most complex form of criminal offending is counter-productive in terms of the rehabilitation and reintegration of offenders. And most importantly it may also militate against progress towards reducing the future incidence and severity of sexual offending.
The dangerously ill-informed debate around Ferguson’s case, and that of many other cases in recent years across the country, demonstrates the need for there to be a nationally co-ordinated approach to dealing with child sex offenders and in educating the community.
So what might the core elements of such an approach be? In other words, what steps should be put in place by justice and health authorities in dealing with a child sex offender who is completing his or her term of imprisonment?
First, before the offender is released or immediately upon their release, there needs to be co-ordinated medical management by well-qualified specialists (psychiatrist, psychologist, general practitioner, social worker and/or other suitably qualified experts) who will conduct a thorough and expert s-xual risk assessment of the offender, together with a full medical examination and a mental health assessment to identify any excacerbating features such as depression or other forms of physical or mental illness.
Together with any on-going rehabilitation needs being met, a safety plan is an expected component of community-based management strategies. The safety plan may include on-going medical monitoring and management, together with crisis facilities that afford timely access to specialist services as needed. Any close friends, partners or relatives may form a component of safety plans if appropriate. This may require those support people to themselves have attended for education about sexual offending and risk factors.
Governments and community leaders, including the media, need to work to ensure that the community response to a released offender is characterised by empathy, a desire for understanding and a willingness to provide support and engagement. What is required for this to happen is for there to be a public education program to the complex issue of s-xual offending behaviours. The program must deliver the unambiguous message that stigmatising and vilifying rehabilitating individuals is anti-social behaviour that will mitigate against the rehabilitation process. And just as the media abides by protocols and laws in reporting around issues of race, for example, so they should be forced to do so in the case of child sex offenders.
Descriptions of child sex offenders as “monsters” for example, needs to stop.
Finally, given the fact that child s-x offenders have even less capacity to reintegrate back into the workforce than the average prisoner, financial planning, vocational support and suitable employment opportunities, where appropriate, need to be offered to offenders because this will enhance social interactions and their sense of value and purposeful contribution. The provision of stable and suitable housing within a generally supportive social community is naturally necessary for the proper and social functioning of the person re-integrating into the community.
If we want to seriously reduce the opportunity for child sex offences, then our political leaders need to show much greater leadership than they have to date. A national scheme that addresses the triggers for reoffending while educating the community would be a good start in turning the corner.
Greg Barns is a criminal lawyer and a director of the Australian Lawyers Alliance. Wendy Northey is a forensic psychologist who practises in the criminal justice system in Victoria.
Thanks Greg and Wendy. I wish everyone could just take a deep breath over this one.
Even for people who don’t agree with anything else written here, I think these two lines are ones that everyone should acknowledge:
Forget for the moment any argument about what rights Ferguson should or should not have – we are collectively acting against our own self-interest when we respond in the way that has occured in NSW (and before that in Queensland). The evidence is pretty clear that such responses increase the chances of reoffending occuring and further harm being done to children. So if we’re all as concerned about the children as we all profess to be, we should focus on what’s most likely to work, not what makes us feel better.
I know the vast majority of offences against children are by people known to the child, and more resources and genuine concern should be directed in this area. But people are rightly worried about the minority who attack children they don’t know.
But I’d rather know when such people are in my neighbourhood so I can be aware and keep an eye out for them (and I have known of former child sex offenders living in houses in my area) – it seems counter-productive trying to run them underground (or into the next suburb/town/state/country).
A further problem with the media coverage and portrayals is that it may well deter notifications of “en Famille” abuse, where a victim may well decide that they would rather live with the abuse than the destruction of their whole world by a media circus and the monstering of the perpetrator who may well be the major income earner for the family, and provider of whatever other security, house, food etc that the family have.
Well look the trouble with this piece no matter how well intentioned accurate or wise is that you’ve got a gigantic conflict of interest. Everything you say might be right but you make your living in part working for, or representing such offenders and get paid either direct or via legal aid or such like. No criticism for that, we embrace an adversarial system and first cab rank rule for lawyers, and maybe medical experts.
The trouble is in such a fraught debate the motives of the speaker need to be demonstrably unaffected, including perception. So the person speaking out publicly must have appropriate stature, transparent motive.
Defence lawyers lobby aren’t going to cut it when it comes to the safety of one’s own little children or related. Not in a million years. I refer in particular to the first author noting on abc radio news recently that he has such clients as a credential for speaking with expertise. Noted but not sufficient. And I know there’s a reference to The Lawyers Alliance – which I’ve never heard of – so maybe some clarification on that might be called for too.
Again not to say the above is wrong but unhelpful sourcing really.
Andrew Bartlett, you say these two sentences are the core truth in the article:
“However, the panicked community and media mindset to this most complex form of criminal offending is counter-productive in terms of the rehabilitation and reintegration of offenders. And most importantly it may also militate against progress towards reducing the future incidence and severity of s*xual offending.”
Some things are inherently complex, others are only made so by lawyers. Child mol*sting is not inherently complex.
A person who finds himself (or herself) to be s*xually oriented as a pa*dophile has two choices:
(1) become celibate and find harmless outlets, seeking professional or spiritual help if necessary;
(2) mol*st children.
When a person is found guilty beyond all reasonable doubt of going down the second road, he has made his choice. A decent libertarian justice system would, at that point, seek a humane way to prevent him from ever having the opportunity again for the rest of his life. In the same way that some driving offenders or sports cheats are given a lifetime ban.