Case Studies
Progress as a reason for further section 32s
Mathew is 27 years old and resides in a supported accommodation unit. He has been assessed within the moderate range of intellectual. Mathew’s diagnosis impacts on his problem solving skills, his ability to make decisions, his perception of events and his ability to regulate his emotions and interact with others in an appropriate way.
Mathew has a long history of behavioural problems including verbal abuse, threats of violence, physical assaults, self-harm and property destruction. As a result of his challenging behaviour Mathew has had significant contact with the criminal justice system, appeared before the Courts a number of times and has had over 40 previous section 32 applications made on his behalf.
Historically, Mathew’s contact with the police would arise from him threatening self-harm and acting on those threats. He would call 000 asking the police and ambulance for help. Once the police arrived Mathew would be unable to express why he had called the police and his behaviour would escalate into threatening the police and others around him.
On the last occasion Mathew’s behaviour resulted in him receiving a “trifecta” of charges including assault police, resist arrest and offence language in addition to being charged with making false calls to emergency services. IDRS appeared on Mathew’s behalf. The Support Plan provided to the court included intensive behaviour intervention, 24 hour support and case management in his group home, counselling for anger management, medication review and additionally, an incentive program to provide rewards to Mathew for when he didn’t have contact with the police and the development of ongoing staff training programs.
The primary submissions made by IDRS centred around reports detailing that prior to the support plan being developed and prior to him being placed in supported accommodation unit, each month Mathew would have an average 37 documented “behavioural incidents” many of those involving the police. Since implementing the support plan the number of incidents had been reduced to 5 per month with only one occasion involving police. This was considerable progress for Mathew. It was submitted that although Mathew was before the courts once again and he had been dealt with under this section previously, the plan was in fact greatly reducing the offending behaviour.
The magistrate accepted those submissions and granted the section 32 Order. To date it has been 12 months since Mathew has had police involvement which is his longest gap in offending behaviour in 10 years.
Obtaining support services Borderline Intellectual Disability