The criminal legal system does not deliver justice for First Nations people, says new book
The Conversation, 9 November 2022
We continue to bear witness to the visceral hatred of Aboriginal people by too many non-Aboriginal people – and the sheer indifference of too many others. The collective trauma borne by First Nations families and communities throughout Australia is palpable.
Review: Black Lives, White Law: Locked Up and Locked Out in Australia
Ten-year-olds do not belong in detention. Why Australia must raise the age of criminal responsibility
The Conversation, 23 July 2020
Do we really believed ten-year-olds have the knowledge and developmental capacity to make life-changing decisions about what is right and wrong to a standard of criminal responsibility? Australia is seriously out of step with international standards.
Defunding the police could bring positive change in Australia. These communities are showing the way
The Conversation, 10 June 2020
Far from being an empty slogan in the Australian context, the call to defund the police raises fundamental questions of principles and policy. Do we want more police and prisons at the cost of social housing, mental health services, domestic violence and family support programs?
More guns and prison are not the solution to racial disparity. Could defunding the police be the answer?
The Guardian, 9 June 2020
The defund the police movement contemplates more far-reaching change. It is also a call for abolition and a plea to imagine community safety and security without the institution of police as we know it today. Abolitionism challenges the constant potentiality of state violence and repression and suggests a different logic of community empowerment, harm reduction and social justice..
Racism pervades Australian society – and the effects can be lethal
The Guardian, 23 August 2019
We see institutional racism at play in many, if not most, Aboriginal deaths in custody…The relaunch of Guardian Australia’s Deaths Inside database on Indigenous deaths in custody gives us a chance to look at the systemic and institutionalised racism operating against Indigenous people.
Royal Commission into deaths in custody 25th anniversary: What’s changed?
NITV /SBS 13 April 2016
“More punitive responses to law and order” since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody finished in 1991 work against its recommendations to decrease deaths behind bars, says UNSW Criminology Professor Chris Cunneen.
Is a Royal Commission the best response to the NT juvenile justice crisis?
ABC News 27 July 2016
We already have the evidence base for the problems in juvenile detention. What we need is the political will and leadership to end the abuse, write Melanie Schwartz and Chris Cunneen.
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