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The Plenary Panel will be focused on;

Young People and Violent Extremism: Practitioners Reflections.

It will focus on the current challenges and opportunities relating to young people and violent extremism, drawing from the experience and reflections of a multi-disciplinary team who have been involved in assessment, management and intervention with young people across the spectrum of violent extremism, including prevention, diversion and rehabilitation and reintegration work.

The Panel will consist of;

• Peta Lowe – Director CVE
• Sarah Andruchow – Principal Policy Officer CVE
• Shane Healey – Senior Intelligence Analyst CVE
• Steve Barracosa – Psychologist CVE
• James March – Senior Practice Officer CVE
• Todd Donald – Caseworker CVE

Biography:

Peta Lowe, Director 

Peta started working in Juvenile Justice in 2006 and has undertaken a variety of roles within JJ across custodial, community and policy settings. She has a Masters in Social Work and a Masters in Terrorism and Security Studies. Peta is trained in a number of violent extremist risk assessment tools and is an accredited trainer of the VERA-2R tool.

Sarah Andruchow, Principal Policy Officer 

Sarah is currently the Principal Project Officer in the Countering Violent Extremism team for Juvenile Justice NSW. Since commencing with Juvenile Justice NSW in October 2017, Sarah has been responsible for providing operational and strategic advice on complex policy and project issues related to countering violent extremism. This has included assessment, management and interventions with terrorism related offenders as well as outcomes and evaluation planning. She has a Master of Criminology, a Bachelor of Arts (Government) and an Advanced Diploma in Public Safety. She is trained as a user in the VERA-2R.

Steve Barracosa, Psychologist 

Steve joined the JJNSW CVE team in May 2018 from Corrective Services NSW where he had been involved in the establishment and implementation of PRISM, CSNSW custody based assessment and intervention service for terrorist offenders and those at risk of radicalisation.

Steve is a Registered Psychologist with experience working with adult offenders. Steve is trained in a number of violent extremist risk assessment tools and is an accredited trainer of the VERA-2R tool.

Shane Healey, Senior Intelligence Analyst

Shane joined the JJNSW CVE team in June 2018. Shane comes with a significant military intelligence background. Shane has worked and lived in Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, Kurdistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria and the UAE. Shane has an extensive background analysing the threat posed by terrorist organisations like the Taliban, al Qaeda and the Islamic State as well as their affiliates. Shane has been part of several domestic Counter terrorism operations and has presented at several ANZCTC courses. Shane has a diploma in Government (Security), Diploma of Security and Risk Management, Australian Federal Police Advanced Counter Terrorism Investigations Program, is trained as a user in the VERA-2R and holds a Diploma in Counseling.

James March, Senior Practice Officer 

James came to Juvenile Justice in 2008 from Corrective Services and has spent the past 10 years working in a variety of roles and programs across both community and custody.  James is a Registered Psychologist who has both a Masters in Forensic Psychology, and a Masters in Terrorism and Security Studies. James is trained as a user of the VERA-2R.

Todd Donald, Caseworker

Todd has over 10 years experience within Juvenile Justice across community and custodial settings. Todd has worked in frontline custodial roles as well as offence specific case management roles within the Agency. Todd commenced working within the NSW Police led Engagement and Support Program (ESP) in June 2018.

Dr Rebecca Goodbourn¹, Dr Heather Nancarrow², Mr Andrew Taukolo³, Dr Karen Struthers⁴, Ms Elena Campbell⁵

¹Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety, Sydney, Australia, ²Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety, Sydney, Australia, ³YFS Ltd, Logan, Australia, ⁴Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia, ⁵RMIT, Melbourne, Australia

Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS) is a not-for-profit independent national research organisation. ANROWS produces, disseminates and assists in applying evidence for policy and practice addressing violence against women and their children. For the Australasian Youth Justice Conference, ANROWS is convening a panel to share some exciting upcoming projects that explore narratives of violence in relation to young people, and how those narratives impact prevention initiatives as well as responses.

Dr Heather Nancarrow will open the panel by speaking to the context of the upcoming research projects and the aims of the arising recommendations.  Under Australia’s National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children 2010-2022, there are six identified national outcomes: communities are safe and free from violence; relationships are respectful; Indigenous communities are strengthened; services meet the needs of women and their children experiencing violence; justice responses are effective; and perpetrators stop their violence and are held to account. Dr Nancarrow will talk through the ways in which these intersecting outcomes are addressed by the upcoming research, and how the recommendations of the research work toward long-term, sustainable, evidence-based responses to violence against women and children.

Andrew Taukolo and Dr Karen Struthers will draw on recent Australian research regarding a peer-to-peer respectful relationships education program to discuss “On the right side of the line: the legal and moral line between unhealthy and healthy relationships for young people”. This will cover evidence and findings on the challenges for young people in knowing the line on sexual violence, consent, sexting and more, and how healthy relationships can keep young people safer and out of trouble. It will also highlight the upcoming release of the youth report of the 2017 National Community Attitudes towards Violence against Women Survey.

The panel will then move to focus on conceptions of adolescent family violence, and the responses that are influenced by those conceptions. Elena Campbell will present research on legal and service responses to adolescent family violence in three Australian jurisdictions. This project found that legal responses primarily designed to address adult, intimate partner violence are being imposed on children. This portion of the panel will question whether a legal response to the use of power and control should replicate that use of power over vulnerable children—the project found evidence of high rates of children involved with the legal system who had histories of trauma and/or psychosocial disabilities. These types of responses could deter families from help-seeking behaviour and prevent the legal system from understanding the problem’s true scale.

The panel will conclude with a brief discussion between the panellists bringing together the importance of narratives of violence across the projects. It will emphasise how these narratives impact youth justice initiatives from prevention to legal responses, and in particular, the effect on perpetuating intergenerational cycles of violence. Together the panellists will suggest ways forward in changing the narrative to promote effective youth justice initiatives.

Biography:

Dr Heather Nancarrow (chair) is the CEO of Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS). For more than 35 years, Heather has worked to address violence against women, including in community services and advocacy, policy and research. In 2008-09 she was Deputy Chair of the National Council to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children, which produced Time for Action, the blue-print for COAG’s National Plan to Reduce Violence against Women and their Children 2010-2022. She was co-Deputy Chair of the Council of Australian Governments’ (COAG) Advisory Panel to Reduce Violence against Women 2015-16; and in 2014-15 she was a member of the Queensland Premier’s Special Taskforce on Domestic and Family Violence, which resulted in the report Not Now, Not Ever, and a raft of major reforms in Queensland. Heather has a PhD in Criminology and Criminal Justice. Her scholarship is focused on justice responses to violence against women, particularly as they relate to violence in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

Andrew Taukolo (panellist) is an R4Respect Youth Leader and a Case Manager for the Youthlink Program at YFS Ltd. R4Respect is a peer-to-peer education program aimed at preventing violence in relationships —led by young people for young people. Andrew graduated from Griffith University with a Bachelor of Criminology and Criminal Justice and is also a member of the National Communities Attitudes Towards Violence Against Women (NCAS) Project Advisory Group.

Dr Karen Struthers (panellist) is a Research Fellow at Griffith University School of Human Services and Social Work and a consultant focusing on service innovation and evaluation. Karen was a former Minister in the Queensland Government with portfolio responsibility for Community Services, Housing and Women.

Elena Campbell (panellist) is the Associate Director of Research, Advocacy & Policy of the Centre for Innovative Justice at RMIT. Elena is a lawyer, speechwriter and former political staffer who has worked in legal and social policy for nearly 20 years. Elena’s expertise includes therapeutic justice, equal opportunity and human rights, as well as the prevention and elimination of violence against women.

At the CIJ Elena oversees a program of research which predominantly focuses on family violence. Within this program, the CIJ has developed particular knowledge in the area of perpetrator interventions, as well as in the value and operation of Intervention Orders and other court processes which attempt to respond to family violence. In this capacity, Elena has lead projects for Government departments and courts, to support the implementation of recommendations from Victoria’s Royal Commission into Family Violence. Elena is also involved in ANROWS funded projects focusing on interventions with perpetrators of family violence.

In particular, Elena is leading the ground-breaking PIPA Project – Positive Interventions for Perpetrators of Adolescent violence in the home – which brings together the CIJ’s emphasis on addressing family violence with its focus on ensuring that the justice system functions as a positive intervention in people’s lives. She is also a Chief Investigator in a national project with five Universities around Australia looking at the development of Perpetrator Intervention systems.

Previously Elena worked as a legal adviser and staffer in the Victorian Government for over a decade. Elena has also been employed as a consultant for a range of social policy and justice organisations, including the Australian Human Rights Commission, focusing on gender discrimination. Elena sits on a number of advisory bodies in relation to family violence and also oversees the production of much of the CIJ’s written publications.

Ms Roxanne Moore¹, Mr Scott Avery², Ms Tammy Solonec³

¹Change The Record Coalition, Adelaide, Australia, ²FPDN, ³Amnesty International

The mass incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people is soaring as Australian governments continue to push “tough on crime” agendas. Children as young as 10 years old are subject to abuse and solitary confinement in harmful youth prisons. Aboriginal women are the fastest growing prison population and most are survivors of violence. Disability, poverty, family violence and homelessness continue to be criminalised instead of governments working with communities to address reasons why people are coming into contact with the so-called justice system. Inquiry after inquiry gathers dust as the numbers of Aboriginal young people in prison skyrockets.

This all-Aboriginal panel focuses on the intersectional injustices facing our young people and the critical changes needed now to end this for good. Further, raising the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 years will immediately stop generations of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander kids getting stuck in the quicksand of the justice system. Instead of the billions of dollars spent on damaging and ineffective prisons each year, Justice Reinvestment calls for a new approach, led by Aboriginal communities.

The Aboriginal-led Change the Record Coalition seeks to end the overincarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and the disproportionate rates of violence experienced by our people, particularly women and children.

Biography:

Ms Roxanne Moore, Change the Record Coalition (Panel Chair)

Roxanne Moore is a Noongar woman and human rights lawyer from Margaret River in Western Australia. She is currently working as the Principal Advisor to Change the Record Coalition, and also for the National Peak body on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services (NATSILS). Previously,

Roxanne was an Indigenous Rights Campaigner with Amnesty International Australia for three years. Prior to this, Roxanne worked for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission. She has worked as Principal Associate to the Hon Chief Justice Wayne Martin AC QC; as a commercial litigator; and has international experience with UNHCR Jordan and New York University’s Global Justice Clinic. Roxanne studied law at the University of WA, and completed an LLM (International Legal Studies) at NYU, specialising in human rights law, as a 2013 Fulbright Western Australian Scholar.

Ms Tammy Solonec, Amnesty International Australia

Tammy Solonec is a Nigena woman from Derby in the Kimberley of Western Australia (WA), with mixed ancestry. She lived in Perth, the capital city of WA for 26 years while she raised my two children who are now young adults, and now is based in Brisbane in Queensland. Since 2014 Tammy has been the Indigenous Rights Manager at Amnesty International Australia sponsoring the ‘Community Is Everything’ campaign to end the overrepresentation of Indigenous youth in the justice system. Throughout her career, she has been involved in advocating for Indigenous peoples on local, state, national and international levels, including extensive work for NAIDOC Perth, and work at the United Nations. Tammy studied law at the University of WA, and completed her legal qualifications at the Aboriginal Legal Service of WA, where she worked for four years including as Managing Solicitor of the Law and Advocacy Unit. After that she was a Board member of the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples. Tammy was awarded Young Female Lawyer and Lawyer of the Year for WA in 2012 and in 2017 was inducted in the WA Women’s Hall of Fame for International Women’s Day.

Mr Scott Avery, First Peoples Disability Network

Scott Avery is descendant from the Worimi people and is the Research and Policy Director at the First Peoples Disability Network (Australia), a non-Government Organisation constituted by and for Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples with disability. He is undertaking a PhD at UTS on social inclusion and disability in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and has recently published the book ‘Culture is Inclusion: A narrative of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with disability’ based on this research. He has been awarded a research scholarship by the Lowitja Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Research, and is an Ambassador for the Mayi Kuwayu study on the value of Aboriginal and Torres Strait IsIander cultures to health and wellbeing.

Assistant Commissioner Joseph Cassar¹, Mr Dominic Teakle², Mr Alex Sakis³, Superintendent Mark Wall (chair)¹

¹NSW Police Force, Sydney, Australia, ²Police Citizens Youth Clubs (PCYC) NSW, Whalan, Australia, ³NSW Department of Education, Sydney, Australia

This panel will look at opportunities where young people may be referred into diversionary programs, such as the Commissioner’s RISEUP Strategy and the importance of collaboration between schools, courts, communities and police.

Speakers will discuss the value of incident and suspension data from schools to identify young people who have not yet come into contact with the criminal justice system.  Access to this information allows police to intervene earlier in the young person’s trajectory towards criminality and provide support to address the underlying criminogenic factors.

Police officers come into contact which children and young people in the course of their official duties as witnesses, victims and offenders.  Speakers will outline how the NSW Police Force seeks to ensure that all police officers are aware of the options available to them when dealing with young people and pursue early intervention and diversionary approaches as a matter of priority.

Once young people have come into contact with the courts, there is still a role to play in diverting young people from custodial sentences and referring them into intervention programs. Speakers will highlight the referral pathways from courts into educational and development programs for young people.

Finally, the panel will discuss the NSW Police and PCYC suite of early intervention programs for young people as part of the Commissioner’s RISEUP Strategy which seek to achieve positive outcomes for young people and divert them from the criminal justice system.  These programs help tackle the underlying causes of offending behaviour, reduce crime and violence.

Biography:

Superintendent Mark Wall has over 23 years of operational policing experience in both metropolitan and regional locations with the NSW Police Force.  His career has been spent in front line policing, from Broken Hill to Wollongong Police Stations and he has performed the role of Duty Officer at various metropolitan commands.  Superintendent Wall also has experience as Staff Officer to the Southern Region Commander in 2015 and, in 2017, as Staff Officer to the Deputy Commissioner, Regional NSW Field Operations.  During his time working with the Deputy Commissioner, Superintendent Wall assisted in forming the direction of the newly created Regional Deputy office as well as the re-engineering of the NSW Police Force and the formation of the Police Districts in regional NSW.  In 2019 Superintendent Wall was promoted to his current rank as the Commander, Youth and Crime Prevention Command.  He has completed a Diploma in Policing, Advanced Diploma in Police Management and Graduate Certificate in Applied Management.

Assistant Commissioner Joe Cassar APM joined the New South Wales Police Force (NSWPF) in December, 1987 and has performed General Duties policing in the Regional and Metropolitan Commands.  In 1992 Joe was designated as a Detective and worked in both local Criminal Investigations and Specialist Criminal Investigations, including the Drug Squad, Child Abuse and Homicide Squad.

In 2005 Joe was promoted to Detective Inspector, Crime Manager – Eastern Beaches LAC.  In 2008 Joe set up the NSWPF Alcohol Licensing Enforcement Command, which proved to be a primary contributor to changing alcohol related culture and alcohol service attitudes within NSW.  In 2010 Joe was promoted to Superintendent, where he commanded the Cabramatta, Shoalhaven and Wollongong Local Area Commands.  On 30 July, 2017 Joe was promoted to Assistant Commissioner, of the newly created Capability, Performance and Youth Command.  This Command takes in the Youth & Crime Prevention Command who work closely with all NSWP Commands and the Police Citizen Youth Clubs in reducing youth reoffending rates.

Joe has completed the Bachelor of Policing (Investigation); Graduate Diploma (Investigations Management) and the NSWPF Strategic Leadership Development Program.

PCYC NSW is a unique partnership between NSW Police, Rotary and the Community offering an amazingly diverse range of services to serve the community and empower young people to reach their potential.

Dominic commenced at PCYC NSW in November 2016. Dominic has extensive executive experience across Government, Events and entertainment, IT services and sporting organisations, with a 20 year career as an Army Officer which included representational and operational experience. He brings to PCYC NSW a strong values based leadership style, respect for the Police and history, and a passion to grow the legacy of PCYC NSW to deliver expanded empowering experiences to youth and the community.

Alex Sakis is responsible for leading a multi-disciplinary team that works with NSW schools to assist vulnerable students including those that may be exhibiting anti-social and extremist behaviours. Alex Sakis has over 20 years’ experience with the NSW Police Force, including over a decade of work on efforts to counter violent extremism and complex community engagement. He is committed to the design and implementation of strategies to support young people that are participating in high-risk taking behaviours.  He works closely with NSW Police and other relevant stakeholders to identify and manage risks in these areas.

Ms Alison Tibbey¹, Ms Janet Bels, Ms Vicki Geach, Ms Donna Young, Ms Jodi Rigg

¹NSW Department Of Justice, Juvenile Justice, , Australia

Mental Health conditions affect one in five employees in Australia and present substantial costs to organisations.  A 2014 PWC report identified every dollar spent on effective mental health initiatives will, on average, have a positive return on investment of $2.30. The single most critical success factor is employee participation.

The Peer Support Program started in Corrective Services 22 years ago and has grown to include Juvenile Justice, Victims Services and the Pride in Justice Network.  Staff volunteer as Peer Support Officers (PSOs) to assist colleagues who are experiencing challenges at work, or in their personal life, particularly in times of stress.

The officers receive training and access support from a Peer Support Coordinator, fellow PSOs, local management, an annual conference and the Employee Assistance Program.

Following the program’s 2016 launch in Juvenile Justice, it has since grown to 33 PSOs across the agency, 49% are located in Northern NSW.

The rural and remote nature of Northern NSW is a key driver in the concentration of PSOs where access to other support services is not always readily available. The program has also been an effective way to address the impact of vicarious trauma which can develop as a result of caseworkers engaging empathically on an ongoing basis with their clients’ traumatic experiences.

The PSO initiatives in Northern Region help strengthen community connections and contribute to the creation and sustaining of positive and supportive work environments for staff. PSOs from Northern Region will share examples of these initiatives during the presentation.

Biography:

Alison coordinated the Peer Support Program for Corrective Services NSW staff for 10 years.  In 2015, her role was expanded to include Juvenile Justice, Victims Services and Pride in Justice Network.  Alison’s passions include promoting resilience, supporting people and providing skills to staff to support others

Janet is based in Lismore and has been with Juvenile Justice (JJ) since 2011 and a Peer Support Officer (PSO) since 2017. Janet believes self-care is fundamental to the wellbeing of staff providing trauma informed interventions for young people.

Vicki is based in Glen Innes and has been with JJ since 2011 and a PSO since 2017. Vicki says she enjoys assisting staff and in turn seeing her colleagues support one another.

Donna is based in Tamworth and has been with JJ since 2006 and a PSO since 2017. Donna says the group activities she organises encourage staff to focus on their wellbeing and build a supportive team environment.

Jodi is based in Grafton and has been with JJ since 2010 and a PSO since 2016. Jodi enjoys being able to assist in building a positive workplace morale and her fundraising initiatives support local organisations who assist young people when they leave custody.

Dr Tamara Blakemore¹

¹University Of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia

Interpersonal violence (including family and domestic violence) is a complex, serious and growing issue in regional and rural Australia requiring coordinated and contextualised responses. The ‘Name; Narrate; Navigate’ pilot program was developed to address the current unmet need for coordinated early intervention services and supports specifically targeted at young people who perpetrate violence in their relationships with partners, parents and carers. Drawing on the results of pilot research in the Hunter Region of NSW as well as the collaborative input of a community of invested practitioners this program uses photovoice methods to engage with young people around key drivers of violence: emotional literacy; communication skills; empathy; power and control; blame, shame and choice. Photovoice methods have been demonstrated as useful in working with those involved in the criminal justice system (e.g., Fitzgibbon & Healy, 2017; Fitzgibbon & Stengel, 2017), particularly for their capacity to reveal novel and expressive insights into the lives of those often thought ‘hard-to-reach’.  This presentation highlights the collaborative, trauma informed and culturally sensitive approach taken in the development of the ‘Name; Narrate; Navigate’ pilot program and presents developing insights from initial phases of implementation and delivery of the program in the Hunter.

Biography

Dr Tamara Blakemore is a social work practitioner, researcher and educator. Her framework for practice is focused contexts and connections and how experience of these prompt, facilitate and constrain wellbeing. Tamara is a conjoint researcher with the Australian Centre for Child Protection (UniSA) with whom she has worked to produce research for the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. A senior Social Work lecturer in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at UON, Tamara remains actively involved in clinical practice and is an advocate for holistic, connection based responses to social issues experienced by children, young people, their families and communities.

Carolyn Newbigin¹, Dr Tamara Blakemore², Karen  Freeman³, Elena Campbell⁴, Aaron Tang⁵, Lydia Hamilton¹

¹Juvenile Justice NSW, Sydney, Australia, ²University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia, ³NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, Sydney, Australia, ⁴RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, ⁵Legal Aid NSW, Sydney, Australia

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the use of violence in the home by children and young people, and the way that this differs to domestic and family violence (DFV) perpetrated by adults. There is also an increasing acknowledgement of the importance of developing appropriate responses, ensuring that young people who are victims of DFV and/or use violence in the home receive the specialist support they need. As the focus of national and jurisdictional strategies to address DFV have largely focussed on adult intimate partner violence, there are significant gaps in policy and service provision for young people, however there have been a small number of research projects and pilot programs across Australian jurisdictions.

This panel is comprised of experts who work on these research projects, programs and in policy development across NSW, Victoria, Tasmania and Western Australia. The panel will discuss their key findings and insights, the approaches currently in place across these jurisdictions, and will conclude with a Q&A session with conference attendees.

(Note: Further panel members to be confirmed prior to the conference)

(Note: This panel is intended as the final part of the juvenile DFV concurrent session)

Biography:

Carolyn is a Senior Projects and Policy Officer focussing on the development of a domestic violence strategy for Juvenile Justice NSW. Carolyn has been with JJ for three years, and previously worked for the Australian National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS) on a research project looking at the prevalence and the experiences of violence for diverse groups, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women. She has a background in psychology and social research and began her career at the Australian National University (ANU) where she worked as a researcher examining social identity theory, perception formation, prejudice and behaviour change. She has postgraduate qualifications in Psychology from the University of Canberra, in Social Research from the Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute, and undergraduate degrees in Psychology and Philosophy from ANU.

Dr Tamara Blakemore is a social work practitioner, researcher and educator. Her framework for practice is focused contexts and connections and how experience of these prompt, facilitate and constrain wellbeing. Tamara is a conjoint researcher with the Australian Centre for Child Protection (UniSA) with whom she has worked to produce research for the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. A senior Social Work lecturer in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at UON, Tamara remains actively involved in clinical practice and is an advocate for holistic, connection based responses to social issues experienced by children, young people, their families and communities.

Karen’s has worked extensively in social policy and justice research in a range of areas including program evaluation, illicit drug use and crime, young people in the criminal justice system, and the effects of victimisation on mental health. She is currently the Principal Program Evaluator, Domestic Violence, with NSW Bureau of Crime Statistic and Research.

Former lawyer, political staffer, speechwriter and consultant speechwriter, Elena Campbell has worked in legal and social policy for nearly twenty years. In that time she has developed considerable expertise in equal opportunity, human rights and responses to gendered violence, particularly within the legal system. Now Associate Director at the Centre for Innovative Justice at RMIT University, Elena is leading a program of research focussing on perpetration of family violence, as well as on improving legal responses to family violence which move away from system activity as their primary objective. Elena’s research program also focusses on the pathways from family violence victimisation which lead to women and children’s criminalisation.