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Archived Press Releases 2010 28th February 2010

HEADS IN THE SAND CAUSE TRAGEDIES

(28th February 2010)

Last week's murder of Gaynor White has tragically demonstrated once again the issue that the Sensible Sentencing Trust highlighted to the Drivers of Crime meeting in April 2009.

In that submission Christine Davey, SST's Spokesperson on Drug Issues, focused on the lack of options available to parents to intervene in the lives of their drug-using children, before they came to the attention of the criminal justice system.

It has now been identified that the young man being held for this murder was "a homebake heroin addict" who had "a long history of dealings with mental health services."

It is reported that the parents "tried to get him admitted to a mental health facility the week before the killing because they were concerned he would harm himself or somebody else, but were turned away."

The Sunday Star Times article describes the complete inability of the authorities to deal with this family's plight, an experience which is shared by families around NZ.

John Key's "P Plan" has identified that the Alcoholism and Drug Addiction Act is in serious need of an overhaul in order to address these needs, but that this will take some time to achieve.

In the meantime more innocent members of the public will be put at risk unless someone steps up to take responsibility for recognising these problems and doing something about them.

At the moment it seems the best response they can offer is a head in the sand and the hope that it will go away.

Sensible Sentencing believes the NZ public – including the parents of these potential offenders and their potential victims, deserve better than that sooner rather than later.

Regards,

Christine Davey
Sensible Sentencing Spokesperson on Drug Issues,
mobile 027 6376166
Christine Davey has first hand experience of P use in her family, and also supports many other NZ parents in her role as Administrator on the Fight Against P website www.fightagainstp.com

Through the Sensible Sentencing Trust Christine is campaigning for intervention in drug use at family request and removal of children from the care of known drug-users.