Justice delayed is justice denied

ADDRESSING domestic violence requires a coordinated community response that includes healthcare facilities, law enforcement agencies, non-profit organisations, schools that serve victims’ children and effective public policy.
Survivors require legal support to access justice, medical treatment, psychosocial support and often, especially in the case of intimate partner violence, assistance with finding emergency shelter and livelihood support to enable them to leave their homes
Even if they access medical reports from health workers with the intent to report an incident to police, many opt not to go to police stations.
Fear of insensitive responses from police, fear of being followed to a police station by their attacker or attacker’s family, lack of detailed information about their legal rights or legal processes, shame at having been assaulted and fear of possible retaliatory consequences from the accused party or his (or her) family all contribute to client attrition from referral systems.
These and others is causing delaying to processing such cases right to the court room and to when justice is served.
National Capital District Metropolitan Superintendent Perou N’Dranou has come with his burden on the lack of capacity.
N’Dranou says there are queues of mothers and husbands that want to lay their complaints but because they are still manually record data it was difficult to complete outstanding cases in a short period of time.
Simply, they need to have computer systems that can help towards completing each case so everyone that goes to the police station is assisted.
Unfortunately, as much as they do not want to turn away victims, they do not have the capacity to serve them well.
Another concern raised by some victims is that most of the time when they went to court with an alleged perpetrator, he or she did not always appear before the court with the same charges that he or she was initially charged with.
A network of Family Sexual Violence Units, family support centres and NGOs are increasing across the country but there is much work to be done, and
still many women don’t have support.
While the law is there to protect and support survivors or victims, a clear pathway must be readily available.
Leaving an abusive relationship can be exceedingly difficult – and inadequate services to help women plan for and cope after leaving makes it even more difficult.
The challenge we see now is on the police and prosecutors to pursue investigations or criminal charges against people who commit family violence – even in cases of attempted murder, serious injury, or repeated rape – rather than allowing them to resolve those issues through mediation and/or the payment of compensation.
Domestic violence ruins lives.
For every high-profile case, more victims die shrouded in silence and countless others endure the daily torture of not knowing when it will happen again.
It may be an old computer to you but if it will make compiling a report easier for a police officer so a mother or daughter is attended to swiftly, then it will help.
Communities play a vital role in seeing justice is served.