NCJ Number
204817
Date Published
December 2003
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This document discusses the variable rates of detention from one jurisdiction to another.
Abstract
The divergence that currently exists in the numbers and rates of detention for young offenders throughout various criminal jurisdictions in Australia is staggering. The overall rate of incarceration of young offenders has decreased dramatically over the last 20 years. The concern is that the rate of incarceration of indigenous youth remains at 19 times the rate of the non-indigenous population. It is essential to consider the significance of the indigenous rate of detention in examining some of the causes of differences evident in the different jurisdictions. The significance of indigenous persons is clearly significant in making comparisons between the different States and Territories of Australia, with vastly different concentrations of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities being present in the different jurisdictions. When indigenous youth numbers are removed, Victoria, Queensland, and Western Australia are seen to be quite low, whereas New South Wales and South Australia remain quite high. The rates for the Northern Territory and the A.C.T. are very high and of interest, but hard to interpret reliably given their smaller population base. Almost 70 percent of the young people in detention in Queensland on June 30, 2002, were actually remanded and not sentenced. The figure for South Australia was around 55 percent and New South Wales around 47 percent. The remanding of a young person in custody, rather than release on bail, is often an indicator of the young person’s lack of connectedness. It often points to the young person’s social economic status, is usually indicative of a degree of homelessness, and may also indicate the lack of available community support services outside the criminal justice system.