New laws criminalising grossly offensive conduct have been introduced into Victoria's parliament today in direct response to the 2020 Eastern Freeway tragedy.
Four police officers died after a truck ploughed into them while they were detaining driver Richard Pusey for speeding offences.
After the crash, Pusey filmed the dying officers while making vulgar commentary and later posted the video on Facebook.
He was ultimately sentenced to 10 months' jail after pleading guilty to outraging public decency, drug possession, reckless conduct endangering serious injury and speeding.
Only three months of his sentence was related to his actions in filming the dying officers.
Victoria's Attorney General Jaclyn Symes said the new laws target grossly offensive behaviour with jail time of up to five years.
"What we had in the Eastern Freeway tragedy was conduct that Victorians we're appalled by, and what we found was there wasn't really an offence that fit that behaviour," she said.
"It's not designed to target low-level offensive behaviour. In Victoria we have very high thresholds for offensive language, offensive behaviour."
The new laws were prompted by calls from Stuart Schulze, whose wife, Senior Constable Lynette Taylor, was one of the four officers who died in the crash.
"It allows the courts to make the decision what they find to be the most offending, which is the correct thing to do because as society changes and society changes, what's offensive today is not offensive tomorrow," Mr Schulze said.
The new laws look set to pass with the support of the Victorian opposition.
"I think it's a very good proposal, it's obviously come out of a tragic circumstance, but I can't imagine a circumstance in which the opposition wouldn't support that," Opposition Leader Matthew Guy said.
Meanwhile, Liberty Victoria president Michael Stanton said he was concerned about how the new laws could be applied in the future.
"We're always cautious when it comes to expanding the criminal law because there can be unintended consequences and eventually mission creep and an expansion of new offences over time — we've seen that time and time again," he said.
