Table Of Content

Children, Care and Crime The historical context of colonisation situates the analysis in Children, Care and Crime of the involvement of children with care experience in the criminal justice system in an Australian jurisdiction (New South Wales), focusing on residential care, policing, the provision of legal services and interactions in the Children’s Court. While the majority of children in care do not have contact with the criminal justice system, this book explores why those with care experience, and Indigenous children, are over-represented in this system. Drawing on findings from an innovative, mixed-method study – court observations, file reviews and qualitative interviews – the book investigates historical and contemporary processes of colonisation and criminalisation. The book outlines the impact of trauma and responses to trauma, including inter- generational trauma caused by policies of colonisation and criminalisation. It then follows a child’s journey through the continuum of care to the criminal justice system, examining data at each stage including the residential care environment, interactions with police, the provision of legal services and experiences at the Children’s Court. Drawing together an analysis of the gendered and racialised treatment of women and girls with care experience in the criminal justice system, the book particularly focuses on leg- acies of forced removal and apprenticeship which targeted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and girls. Through analysing what practices from England and Wales might offer the NSW context, our findings are enriched by further reflection on how decriminalisation pathways might be imagined. While there have been many policy initiatives developed to address criminalisation, in all parts of the study little evidence was found of implementation and impact. To conclude, the book examines the way that ‘hope tropes’ are regularly deployed in child protection and criminal justice to dangle the prospect of reform, and even to produce pockets of success, only to be whittled away by well-worn pathways to routine criminalisation. The conclusion also considers what a transformative agenda would look like and how monitoring and accountability mechanisms are key to new ways of operating. Finally, the book explores strengths-based approaches and how they might take shape in the child protection and criminal justice systems. Children, Care and Crime is aimed at researchers, lawyers and criminal justice practitioners, police, Judges and Magistrates, policy-makers and those working in child protection, the criminal justice system or delivering services to children or adults with care experience. The research is multi- disciplinary and therefore will be of broad appeal to the criminology, law, psychology, sociology and social work disciplines. The book is most suitable for undergraduate courses focusing on youth justice and policing, and post- graduates researching in this field. Alison Gerard is the Head of the Canberra Law School, University of Can- berra, Ngunnawal Country. Her research program focuses on social justice and has been published in leading international and Australian journals. She is currently a CI on an ARC Discovery Project examining ‘Crimmigra- tion’ in Australia. Alison has co-published on the incorporation of Indige- nous perspectives in university curriculum. Andrew McGrath is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Charles Sturt University. His PhD research, in which he interviewed 200 young people after they appeared before the NSW Children’s Court, was published as a journal article that won the Allen Austin Bartholomew Award for best article published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology in 2009. Since then, he has published a number of articles in both Australian and International journals on topics ranging from the impact of custodial penalties on re-offending, the sentencing of young Indigenous offenders, serious and violent offending careers and juvenile risk assessment. Emma Colvin is a Senior Lecturer in law and criminology at Charles Sturt University in NSW Australia, Wiradyuri/Wiradjuri Country. Her research explores the criminalisation of groups of people, such as children with experience of the out-of-home care system. Her research also examines bail and the impact of risk determinations on people perceived as risky because of their vulnerability or disadvantage, such as homelessness or substance use. Emma’s work has been published by high-quality publishers and high- impact journals, and she has attracted government and charitable funding to support her research interests. Annette Gainsford is a Wiradyuri woman from Bathurst NSW and is the Associate Dean Indigenous Teaching and Learning in the Office of the Pro Vice-Chancellor Indigenous Leadership and Engagement at the University of Technology, Sydney. Annette has extensive experience in Indigenous curriculum development that embeds Indigenous graduate attributes across higher education curriculum. Her experience specifically covers the disciplines of law, criminal justice, business and education. She is a recognised leader and expert in the field of Indigenous pedagogy, andragogy and Indig- enous research methodologies. Routledge Studies in Crime and Society Oppressed by Debt Government and the Justice System as a Creditor of the Poor Edited by Saul Schwartz A Criminological Biography of an Arms Dealer Yarin Eski The Rise of Politically Motivated Cyber Attacks Actors, Attacks and Cybersecurity Tine Munk Violence Situation, Speciality, Politics and Storytelling David Wästerfors Motherhood, Respectability & Baby-Farming in Victorian & Edwardian London Joshua G. Stuart-Bennett The Intersections of Family Violence and Sexual Offending Gemma Hamilton and Patrick Tidmarsh Children, Care and Crime Trauma and Transformation Alison Gerard, Andrew McGrath, Emma Colvin and Annette Gainsford For more information about this series, please visit www.routledge.com/ Routledge-Studies-in-Crime-and-Society/book-series/RSCS Children, Care and Crime Trauma and Transformation Alison Gerard, Andrew McGrath, Emma Colvin and Annette Gainsford First published 2023 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2023 Alison Gerard, Andrew McGrath, Emma Colvin and Annette Gainsford The right of Alison Gerard, Andrew McGrath, Emma Colvin and Annette Gainsford to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Gerard, Alison, author. | McGrath, Andrew, author. | Colvin, Emma, author. | Gainsford, Annette, author. Title: Children, care and crime : trauma and transformation / Alison Gerard, Andrew McGrath, Emma Colvin and Annette Gainsford. Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2021. | Series: Routledge studies in crime and society | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022020378 (print) | LCCN 2022020379 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367554033 (hardback) | ISBN 9780367554057 (paperback) | ISBN 9781003093367 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Child welfare—New South Wales. | Children— Institutional care—New South Wales. | Juvenile courts—New South Wales. Classification: LCC HV802.Z8 N4944 2021 (print) | LCC HV802.Z8 (ebook) | DDC 362.709944—dc23/eng/20220512 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022020378 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022020379 ISBN: 978-0-367-55403-3 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-55405-7 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-09336-7 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003093367 Typeset in Times New Roman by codeMantra Contents Acknowledgements ix List of acronyms xi Introduction 2 1 Historical and contemporary contexts of out-of-home care 25 2 Care-experience, trauma, abuse and the criminal justice system 47 3 The residential care environment 67 4 Policing children with care experience 87 5 Lawyers, cultural competence and advising children with care experience 106 6 Care-experienced children in the NSW Children’s Court 124 7 Gender and criminalisation 147 8 Reducing criminalisation: innovations from England and Wales 172 Conclusion: ‘hope tropes’ and routine criminalisation 199 Index 213 Acknowledgements We would like to thank the respondents and agencies with whom we worked to collect and analyse data that appears in this manuscript. We were guided in our research design and analysis by our Advisory Board who, through their thoughtful and engaged advice, greatly enriched our work. We were also supported in the early stages of this project by the research assistance provided by Dr Natasha Sugden and Maureen Bates-McKay. We also thank our universities, Charles Sturt University, the University of Canberra and the University of Technology Sydney, for providing various practical ele- ments necessary to support and realise quality research. Having an environment of sharp colleagues to bounce ideas off has sharpened the writing that appears on these pages. We particularly thank Professor Leanne Weber. We are also grateful to our copy editor Julia Farrell. Our pilot study was funded by Charles Sturt University, and the subse- quent data collection was funded through a Criminology Research Grant by the Australian Institute of Criminology. We are thankful as this funding enabled the research to take place. Ultimately, this research was founded upon a commitment to meet research needs identified by community stakeholders. We hope it contributes to a fundamental shift in policy, practices and processes. We have thoroughly enjoyed working together as an interdisciplinary research team – law, criminology, psychology and Indigenous education. Our diversity in areas other than our academic qualifications has been a signifi- cant component in the strength of our teamwork, analysis and contribution to research. Each of the team has this to say to their support crews: Alison – I’d like to thank Sophie, Sebastien and Zadie for making room for this research and for making family life loving, fun and flexible. I’ve learned an immense amount from these thoughtful co-authors on this journey and those around us for various parts of it. I have a stronger connection to Country and am stronger as a result. Andrew – Many thanks to my co-authors. It has been a rewarding experience working in this multi-disciplinary team. Thanks also to the people who agreed to participate in our research, I hope we have done justice to