More work required to address domestic violence and abuse incidents

CJI's Chief Inspector Brendan McGuigan called for greater focus to be applied to strengthening arrangements to deal with domestic violence and abuse incidents.  View Report Page.

A follow-up review assessing progress made against inspection recommendations found that further work was required to fully achieve 12 of 13 inspection recommendations.
 
The recommendations made in 2010 were designed to assist the PSNI in deliver a more consistent approach to handling domestic violence and abuse incidents and aid the PPS and PSNI to work in partnership to reduce the number of domestic violence incidents dropping out of the criminal justice process.
 
Victims of domestic violence need to be adequately supported and placed at the centre of the criminal justice process.  Work needs to be done to improve the experience of victims coming forward as it is only through consistency of approach and appropriate support the current fall in detection rates for domestic violence incidents can be halted and the number of perpetrators being brought before a court can be increased.