The Victorian government has introduced new laws to parliament which would see grossly offensive behaviour punished by up to five years in jail.
Victoria's Attorney General Jaclyn Symes said the new laws target grossly offensive behaviour with jail time of up to five years.
"What we had in the Eastern Freeway tragedy was conduct that Victorians we're appalled by, and what we found was there wasn't really an offence that fit that behaviour," she said."It's not designed to target low-level offensive behaviour. In Victoria we have very high thresholds for offensive language, offensive behaviour."
Senior Constable Kevin King, Leading Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, Constable Joshua Prestney and Constable Glen Humphris, were killed in the crash, in April 2020. The new laws were prompted by calls from Stuart Schulze, whose wife, Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, was one of the four officers who died in the crash.
"It allows the courts to make the decision what they find to be the most offending, which is the correct thing to do because as society changes and society changes, what's offensive today is not offensive tomorrow," Mr Schulze said."I think it's a very good proposal, it's obviously come out of a tragic circumstance, but I can't imagine a circumstance in which the opposition wouldn't support that," Opposition Leader Matthew Guy said.
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