Intervention Orders

The always-useful Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? blog notes that the Personal Safety Intervention Orders Act 2010 (Vic) has come into effect.

The statute replaces the Family Violence Protection Act 2008 (Vic), which in turn - along with the Stalking Intervention Orders Act 2008 (Vic) - replaced the Crimes (Family Violence) Act 1987 (Vic).

The purposes of the new statute are -

a) to protect the safety of victims of assault, sexual assault, harassment, property damage or interference with property, stalking and serious threats; and

b) to promote and assist in the resolution of disputes through mediation where appropriate.

The characterisation of stalking in s 10 is as follows -

(1) A person (the first person) stalks another person (the second person) if the first person engages in a course of conduct-

(a) with the intention of causing physical or mental harm to the second person, including self-harm, or of arousing apprehension or fear in the second person for his or her own safety or that of any other person; and

(b) that includes any of the following -

(i) following the second person or any other person;

(ii) contacting the second person or any other person by post, telephone, fax, text message, email or other electronic communication or by any other means whatsoever;

(iii) publishing on the Internet or by an email or other electronic communication to any person a statement or other material-

(A) relating to the second person or any other person; or
(B) purporting to relate to, or to originate from, the second person or any other person;

(iv) causing an unauthorised computer function (within the meaning of Subdivision 6 of Division 3 of Part I of the Crimes Act 1958) in a computer owned or used by the second person or any other person;

(v) tracing the second person's or any other person's use of the Internet or of email or other electronic communications;

(vi) entering or loitering outside or near the second person's or any other person's place of residence or place of business or any other place frequented by the second person or the other person;

(vii) interfering with property in the second person's or any other person's possession (whether or not the first person has an interest in the property);

(viia) making threats to the second person;

(viib) using abusive or offensive words to or in the presence of the second person;

(viic) performing abusive or offensive acts in the presence of the second person;

(viid) directing abusive or offensive acts towards the second person;

(viii) giving offensive material to the second person or any other person or leaving it where it will be found by, given to or brought to the attention of, the second person or the other person;

(ix) keeping the second person or any other person under surveillance;

(x) acting in any other way that could reasonably be expected -

(A) to cause physical or mental harm to the second person, including self-harm; or
(B) to arouse apprehension or fear in the second person for his or her own safety or that of any other person.

(2) For the purposes of this Act, the first person has the intention to cause physical or mental harm to the second person, including self-harm, or to arouse apprehension or fear in the second person for his or her own safety or that of any other person if -

a) the first person knows that engaging in a course of conduct of that kind would be likely to cause such harm or arouse such apprehension or fear; or

b) the first person in all the particular circumstances ought to have understood that engaging in a course of conduct of that kind would be likely to cause such harm or arouse such apprehension or fear and it actually did have that result.

(3) In this section - mental harm includes -

a) psychological harm; and

b) suicidal thoughts.

Under s 123 a person must not publish, or cause to be published, a report of the proceeding or about the order that contains

(2) (a) if a party to or a witness in the proceeding, or a person the subject of the order, is a child-

(i) the locality or any particulars likely to lead to the identification of the particular venue of the court; or

(ii) any particulars likely to lead to the identification of the child or any other person involved in the proceeding, either as a party to the proceeding or as a witness in the proceeding, or the subject of the order; or

(b) a picture of or including a child concerned in a proceeding for a personal safety intervention order.

The associated penalty is 100 penalty units or 2 years imprisonment or both for a natural person and 500 penalty units in the case of a body corporate.