The rates of stalking are likely to be underestimated which means offenders could be missing out on treatment and rehabilitation that is key to preventing re-offending, a report reveals.
Data shows 56 per cent of of all people sentenced for stalking in 2015 and 2016 offended again within four years in Victoria, with higher rates in regional Victoria and almost 5000 offences lasting more than 12 weeks.
Stalking behaviours are frequently charged or sentenced as a combination of family violence offences like property damage, breaching an intervention order and making a threat to kill, without a stalking charge.
The high maximum penalty for stalking in Victoria of 10 years' imprisonment means charges can often be dropped during plea negotiations.
A Sentencing Advisory Council report released on Friday says charging decisions can affect an offender's ability to receive treatment most likely to reduce their risk to community.
The research also tells us that there are often complicated psychological issues that contribute to stalking, whether it is a psychotic illness, a personality disorder or a cognitive disability.
- Emeritus Professor Arie Freiberg AM, Sentencing Advisory Council chair
Sentencing Advisory Council chair Emeritus Professor Arie Freiberg AM said there were high rates of mental illness among stalkers.
"The research also tells us that there are often complicated psychological issues that contribute to stalking, whether it is a psychotic illness, a personality disorder or a cognitive disability," he said.
"It is important that we respond to those aspects of stalking too."
The report says increasing awareness among prosecutors of the importance of the stalking charge in ensuring appropriate treatment through problem behaviour programs could be a way to improve outcomes.
It also advocates for access to programs in rural and regional Victoria and in prisons to reduce re-offending rates and to identify cases without a stalking charge that should be referred to these programs.
There were 190 stalking, harassment and threatening behaviour offences recorded in 2021 in Ballarat, according to the Crime Statistics Agency.
The Grampians region makes up four per cent of Victoria's population and four per cent of stalking charges sentenced at court, with a 31 per cent imprisonment rate from 2011 to 2020, the report reveals.
IN OTHER NEWS:
The rates of stalking are over-represented in regional Victoria, but this is almost exclusively in the Gippsland region which accounted for 12 per cent of all stalking sentences but only four per cent of the population.
Stalking offences increased across the state in 2020 compared to 2019.
Eighty-seven per cent of offenders were male and 80 per cent of victims were female.
More than half of stalking offences happened in a family violence context between 2016 and 2020 and more than half of all recorded stalkers were either current or former intimate partners of the victim.
A common example was former intimate partners sending hundreds of messages or making hundreds of phone calls over a brief period at the end of a relationship.
The report titled Sentencing Stalking in Victoria is one of three Sentencing Advisory Council reports being produced to assist the Victorian Law Reform Commission in making recommendations to government.
The Victorian government asked the Victorian Law Reform Commission in February 2021 to investigate criminal justice responses to stalking and breaches of intervention orders and how they are sentenced.
Victoria carries the highest maximum penalty for stalking in Australia.
Rochelle Kirkham
Rochelle covers court and has a particular interest in social issues including homelessness, food security and family violence.
Rochelle covers court and has a particular interest in social issues including homelessness, food security and family violence.
