covid19-law.com.au
3. Criminal
E. Serious & Sex Offenders
i. Legislation
Commonwealth:
Made under the Coronavirus Economic Response Package Omnibus (Measures No. 2) Act 2020 (Cth):
ii. Case law
In some cases, COVID-19 may be relevant to applications under serious or sex offender supervision regimes, which, like bail applications, involve assessment of risk to the community.
In Secretary to the Department of Justice and Community Safety v Keen (a pseudonym) [2020] VCC 370, the Victorian County Court considered COVID-19 in the context of an application under s 14 of the Serious Offenders Act 2018 (Vic), which provides that a court must only make a “supervision order” where it is satisfied that the offender poses an unacceptable risk of committing a serious sex offence if a supervision order is not made and the offender is in the community. In that case, the Court considered whether the relevant offender would necessarily be “in the community” for the purposes of s 14, if, upon his release, South Australian authorities sought his extradition to that State. The Court held that the possibility of an offender being extradited to another State may not be a significant consideration where the COVID-19 pandemic makes the timing of such extradition uncertain ([17]-[18]).
E. Serious & Sex Offenders
i. Legislation
Commonwealth:
Made under the Coronavirus Economic Response Package Omnibus (Measures No. 2) Act 2020 (Cth):
- Coronavirus Economic Response Package (Modifications—National Redress Scheme for Institutional Child Sexual Abuse) Determination 2020: temporarily changes the requirements for a valid application for redress under the National Redress Scheme for the period of 1 March 2020 to 31 December 2020. According to the Explanatory Statement, the instrument "temporarily dis-applies the requirement under section 19 of the Redress Act that an application for redress must include a signed and witnessed statutory declaration in order to be valid. The effect of the modification made by the Instrument is to support applicants to apply for, or have an application for redress progressed and finalised, under the Redress Act during the COVID-19 pandemic, where government public health directives and social distancing restrictions may prevent them from submitting a valid application".
ii. Case law
In some cases, COVID-19 may be relevant to applications under serious or sex offender supervision regimes, which, like bail applications, involve assessment of risk to the community.
In Secretary to the Department of Justice and Community Safety v Keen (a pseudonym) [2020] VCC 370, the Victorian County Court considered COVID-19 in the context of an application under s 14 of the Serious Offenders Act 2018 (Vic), which provides that a court must only make a “supervision order” where it is satisfied that the offender poses an unacceptable risk of committing a serious sex offence if a supervision order is not made and the offender is in the community. In that case, the Court considered whether the relevant offender would necessarily be “in the community” for the purposes of s 14, if, upon his release, South Australian authorities sought his extradition to that State. The Court held that the possibility of an offender being extradited to another State may not be a significant consideration where the COVID-19 pandemic makes the timing of such extradition uncertain ([17]-[18]).
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