Queensland’s Crime and Corruption Commission received six domestic violence-related complaints about police officers within two weeks of allowing such matters to be treated as corruption instead of misconduct, an inquiry has been told.
One officer had allegations of strangulation and rape made against them, while another allegedly had access to child exploitation material, the commission of inquiry into Queensland police responses to domestic violence heard Monday.
Elizabeth Foulger, executive director of Integrity Services at the CCC, told the inquiry that these two matters have been referred back to Queensland police to deal with, subject to a public interest review.
The inquiry heard that the CCC received the six complaints in a two-week period in June and two were classified as alleged corrupt conduct and four were classified as alleged misconduct.
The CCC reviewed its policies in June to classify domestic violence by police officers involving a serious criminal offence – such as rape, strangulation, assault and stalking – as corruption.
Previously, these offences were only classified as corrupt conduct if an officer committed them while they were on duty, Foulger said.
Foulger told the inquiry it had been an “error” not to consider domestic violence perpetrated by police officers as corruption when the body reviewed its policies for police last September.
Her submission to the inquiry said such behaviour demonstrates a disregard for public safety and the laws police are obliged to uphold, as well as an inability to impartially investigate domestic violence matters.
Commissioner Deborah Richards also asked police about “disturbing” comments about domestic violence that were revealed by Guardian Australia on Sunday.
The Queensland Police Service (QPS) is investigating the social media posts, which were made on a private Facebook group for law enforcement personnel.
The posts belittled domestic violence victims and implied officers purposefully avoid responding to such incidents.
Sen Sgt David Nixon, from QPS’s ethical standards command, told the inquiry that the force’s north Brisbane district was investigating the posts.
A QPS spokesperson said “the identification and location of the member will form part of the investigation”.
The inquiry also heard that 70% of the domestic and family violence complaints about QPS members since 2017 resulted in no further action by the ethical standards command.
Data shown to the inquiry indicated a similar proportion of reports for all alleged offences resulted in no further action.
“A number of circumstances can lead to no further action,” Nixon said.
“That could be … the officer has been exonerated of any involvement. It could be it was frivolous and vexatious or there was no information to support it being misconduct.”
QPS have previously said they “look forward” to receiving the commission of inquiry’s recommendations and are “supporting” officers to give evidence at the public hearings.
In Australia, the national family violence counselling service is on 1800 737 732. In the UK, call the national domestic abuse helpline on 0808 2000 247, or visit Women’s Aid. In the US, the domestic violence hotline is 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). Other international helplines may be found via www.befrienders.org
