Human Rights

Human Rights Commission Justice Report finds disabled not equal before the law

MARK COLVIN: The Human Rights Commission is preparing to hand down a damning report finding that disabled people are unequal before the law.

The report finds the legal system in each state has a number of hurdles that discriminate against people with a disability.

It will recommend that each state urgently develop a strategy to ensure that people with a disability are treated more fairly before our courts, and that their rights are respected.

Nance Haxton reports.

NANCE HAXTON: Melissa Avery has a severe intellectual disability, but it took some time for the Queensland justice system to recognise it.

She loves pretty calendars and greeting cards, and over a period of four years was convicted of stealing them on several occasions. But because of Queensland laws, her disability wasn't taken into account by the court system.

As a result, she received so many minor convictions for petty theft she was at risk of being sent to jail.

Melissa Avery's mother Collein says it took years of fighting before her daughter's limitations were acknowledged by the courts.

COLLEIN AVERY: She has absolutely no understanding of the charges she's being faced with. She couldn't defend herself. Eventually, another lawyer took over our daughter's case. He was able to refer the case to the Mental Health Court.

She's been found permanently unfit to plead as a result of her intellectual disability and so we decided to appeal those early convictions that she had. And in 2010, in a landmark decision in our Supreme Court, 15 convictions were expunged from her criminal record.

NANCE HAXTON: Melissa's story is featured in the Human Rights Commission's Equal Before the Law Report, which finds that discrimination against people with a disability is widespread in Australia's justice system.

Disability Discrimination Commissioner Graeme Innes says her case is far from isolated.

GRAEME INNES: We heard from a woman called Maria who has cerebral palsy and little speech, and she wanted to tell police about a sexual assault but there was no communications support worker to help with the statement. The police relied on Maria's parents to provide communication support. Maria was, of course, uncomfortable giving personal details of the assault to police in front of her parents. And so her evidence was incomplete, and this caused problems for the investigation and during the court process.

So these are the sorts of stories that we heard in all areas of the criminal justice system, and they caused us to form the conclusion that people with a disability aren't getting an equal opportunity before the law.

NANCE HAXTON: Mr Innes says the report recommends that each state should urgently reform the legal system to ensure that people with a disability are not further discriminated against.

GRAEME INNES: We recommended that each jurisdiction - state, territory, and commonwealth - need to develop a holistic disability justice strategy which takes into account these issues and which is developed in partnership with people with disabilities, and that strategy would need to cover the availability of supports, the availability of better communication facilities, more training for police and corrections officers, more awareness of disabilities in the court system, some revisions of the unfit to plead laws in several jurisdictions, and also some corrections of the negative way in which people with disability are perceived because that negative perception leads on to the weight that their evidence is given and judgments about whether matters should be proceeded with or how they should be proceeded with.

NANCE HAXTON: For Collein Avery, the fight for justice continues.

COLLEIN AVERY: Just a very simple legislative amendment that says that when people present that have got a disability that they need the appropriate support in the court so that their disability can be given due consideration.

MARK COLVIN: Collein Avery ending Nance Haxton's report.

By: The ABC's Radio Current
When: 10/2/2014

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