Police need to rethink the way they evaluate whether a report should be treated as urgent if victims of domestic violence are to be granted immediate protection, according to Victim Support Malta director, Roberta Lepre.

Her concern was echoed by the Malta Confederation of Women’s Organisations that said: “While we are very aware of the heavy workload the police face, we cannot but question the criteria or lack of them upon which the police base their judgment in deciding what constitutes a reasonable threat (to a victim)...

“It is this that is the weakest link in the process of protecting those who fall victim to the trauma that is domestic violence.”

Earlier this month, Police Commissioner John Rizzo said the immediate protection of domestic violence victims could be tackled by amending the law so that their reports would be treated as urgent cases.

As the law currently stands, once a victim has filed a report the police process it but they cannot treat the case as urgent and arraign the alleged perpetrator under arrest unless the legal criteria for urgency are fulfilled. The criteria include the possibility of a perpetrator injuring himself, injuring someone else or damaging property; or when the police have reasonable grounds to believe arrest is necessary to protect a vulnerable person.

Dr Lepre said domestic violence victims were vulnerable people and, therefore, the current legal framework provided the right tools for police.

“Maybe we need to change the way the police use their judgment to determine which cases fall within the urgent category... there is the need for more sensitivity training on this issue,” she insisted.

Mr Rizzo had also said that once a victim filed a police report it was immediately processed by the police. It was then up to the court to appoint the case for hearing. He suggested reviewing the system to amend the law that regulated how urgently such cases were treated by the Family Court.

The confederation supported Mr Rizzo’s call for changes to the law but added that first and foremost there had to be a system that reliably graded a reported case as one of urgency.

“There is an urgent need for a risk assessment protocol that police officers in police stations can rely on when determining what constitutes an urgent report or otherwise,” it said.

A government spokesman said Mr Rizzo’s recommendation to speed up serious cases would be discussed. “This will put us in a position to continue to improve the legal system of this delicate sector that has already seen recent wide-ranging and courageous reforms,” a Justice Ministry spokesman said.

In agreement with Dr Lepre, the spokesman added that the law already provided various instruments to protect domestic violence victims. These included the setting up of a specialised section in the Family Court to handle cases of a criminal nature related to family, the possibility of the police acting on reports made by third parties and the introduction of crimes such as harassment.

“These new measures (introduced in 2006) are leaving their mark,” the spokesman said, quoting recent statistics.

The manner in which the police handled reports of domestic violence was put into question during a silent demonstration in Valletta where the authorities were urged to take immediate action to protect victims. The issue was highlighted by the tragic case of 40-year-old Christina Sammut who was shot dead four weeks after she filed a report at the Rabat police station claiming her former partner had chased her with a knife. Soon after the shooting, on December 11, her ex-partner, Kenneth Gafà, turned himself in to the police.

More recently, a young woman, 23-year-old Alicia Spiteri, told a court that on Christmas Day she stabbed her boyfriend after he locked her up in a bedroom for 10 hours during which time he kept entering the room at intervals to beat her.

Domestic violence cases initiated by police

(The Times)