Some Queensland police officers have cast judgement on the relationships and integrity of domestic violence victims, an inquiry has heard.
Domestic violence survivors who have evidence of death threats have been shrugged at by Queensland police, while some officers have treated LGBTIQ assault cases as “just two blokes having a go at each other”, an inquiry has heard.
Sandra Keogh, the chief executive of the Cairns Regional Domestic Violence Service, said she had a client who attended a police station to report death threats on her phone, but a policeman simply shrugged, saying: “What do you want me to do about it?” Keogh said she could refer to a 17-year history of incidents where some police responses had not “been very helpful and in many ways, harmful”, including male victims in same-sex relationships who had police respond with “well, it’s just two blokes having a go at each other”.Victim blaming was also common within the Queensland Police Service, the North Queensland Women’s Legal Service’s Hayley Grainger told the inquiry.
Thelma Schwartz, a Principal Legal Officer for the Queensland Indigenous Family Violence Legal Service in Cairns, recalled a mother who went to police explaining her 12-year-old daughter was allegedly being sexually abused, but she told the inquiry that nothing was done.Barrister Jeffrey Hunter QC, representing the QPS, questioned Schwartz about the claim, and asked whether the QPS could follow up.
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