When are we going to introduce ‘bureaucratic responsibility’ laws on the lines of ‘industrial manslaughter’ laws? How much longer are we going to let bureaucrats and judges get off scot-free from the consequences of their decisions, while bosses stand to be jailed for things they didn’t even know about but supposedly should have?
Allow me to clarify: most Australian states now have ‘industrial manslaughter’ laws. These laws allow bosses to be heavily fined and jailed for workplace deaths, even if they were not directly responsible for the workplace, or unaware of unsafe practices. The presumption is that they should have known.
Well, alright: so, where does that leave the judges and bureaucrats who make decisions like this:
A man who raped and tried to kill a five-year-old girl in Western Australia’s far north in 2001, and recently attacked a support worker while on parole following his 22-year jail term, is set to be released into the community again […]
On June 18, 2001, [Stephen Neil White] befriended the girl’s guardian and dragged the child away from a campsite in Kununurra before raping her.
He also inflicted a life-threatening injury to the child by striking her over the head with a rock before taking her to hospital.
Oh, but they can’t know that he’ll be any risk to the community!
White spent almost 22 years in prison for the attack and was released in December 2023 on a three-year supervision order.
Then in June 2024 he attacked a disability support worker with a knife and was subsequently arrested and sent back to prison.
His offending in WA followed an eight-year prison sentence in South Australia after he raped a 73-year-old woman while in his twenties.
Who wants to lay odds that he’ll re-offend within months?
On Monday the Supreme Court decided to release White from prison under strict supervision, with the 59-year-old agreeing to abide by 67 conditions.
Justice Fiona Seaward determined the risk of reoffending could be managed by stringent management of White’s life which would involve 24-hour NDIS supervision, seven days a week.
Tell you what, judge, let’s add a 68th condition: he has to live in a spare room at your house for the period of his parole. Methinks our learned colleague might have second thoughts pretty quickly.
But it’s different when it’s other people who have to live in fear with this psycho in their midst. Especially when his supervision order ends next year.
If that sounds like grotesque judicial negligence to you, it gets worse.
Justice Seaward’s decision to release White was informed by a psychiatric report that detailed his history of schizophrenia, an intellectual disability and an acquired brain injury.
The report found White had made progress over recent years while incarcerated but remained “at a high risk of serious sexual reoffending” if not subjected to supervision conditions.
“Mr White’s primary risk for sexual offending would be both predatory and opportunistic towards predominantly vulnerable females of various ages,” the report read […]
In opting to release White, Justice Seaward said she had “formed the view the supervision order will ensure adequate protection of the community”.
“In reaching this conclusion I am also satisfied on the balance of probabilities that Mr White will substantially comply with the standard conditions of the supervision order,” she said.
Put your money where your mouth is, then. Put him up in your house, or in your street. Make your daughter walk past his place every day.
To add a final insult, the very taxpayers who are being placed at unforgivable risk by judicial/bureaucratic idiocy are being stung a fortune so that this creep can get out of jail free.
The court heard White had an NDIS plan valued at more than $800,000 per year to support his intellectual disabilities.
Which is five times what it would cost to keep him locked up where he belongs.
Start making judges and bureaucrats personally responsible for the entirely foreseeable consequences of their decisions. Then the soft sentencing and easy paroles will vanish like a child abducted in the night.
