Since the Royal Commission into Family Violence made this recommendation, a number of enhancements have been implemented to improve flagging of family violence related cased and links between Victoria Police, Courts and Corrections Victoria case management systems.
A family violence/sexual assault notation has been incorporated into the police charge sheet as a mandatory field. Modifications have been made to the family violence flag in the Court’s current case management system ‘Courtlink’, so that it is able to capture this information when provided by police. Police and the Courts have made changes to their IT systems to include the family violence flag in information that is electronically transmitted from LEAP to Courtlink. Charges not originally identified as family violence related but, during the hearing the Court determines they are family violence related, Courtlink can be updated to reflect this.
A new Case Management System (CMS) is being developed for the Magistrates' Court of Victoria and the Children's Court of Victoria. The CMS will replace the current IT systems including Courtlink to strengthen and share appropriate information across the courts and key external parties including Victoria Police and Corrections.
The 2021/22 State Budget also provided funding to improve the flagging of family violence perpetrators in the Corrections case management system.