Public drunkenness decriminalised in Victoria: Drunks taken home to sober up instead of jail cells

Victoria is set to decriminalize public drunkenness as part of legal reforms that will replace the criminal justice response with a health-based approach.

Under the changes, which will take effect from November, intoxicated people will be taken home or to centers designed to help them sober up instead of to police stations.

Attorney General Jaclyn Symes said the new approach would broaden a strategy to put a focus on health at the center of police responses.

“We want to invest more, we want to bolster (services), we want to make sure that people are not put in cells to sober up,” he said Tuesday.

Being drunk in public will no longer be a crime in its own right. We want people to get a health answer when they’re drunk in public.”

Victoria Police will no longer lock up people for public drunkenness

But Victoria Police Union Secretary Wayne Gatt said the reforms would be “negligent and reckless” and would require replacement powers for the authorities.

“What the police will have to do, in cases where no crime has been committed, is to sit and watch and wait for a crime to be committed,” he said.

“We think that will put the community at significant risk.”

Ms Symes said the reforms were not intended to negatively affect the police despite upholding the decision not to give police new powers once the crime is decriminalized in November.

“These laws try to decriminalize public intoxication, they’re not meant to stretch police powers further, they’re not meant to ensure that being drunk is an excuse or a get-out-of-jail-free card for other crimes,” he said.

“Police will still have the option to intervene when someone disturbs the peace, causes a scene or has concerns about violent or similar behaviour. We hope that’s a continued answer.

Victoria will stop arresting people for being drunk in public, instead taking them home or to sober-up centers

It comes more than five years after Yorta Yorta’s wife, Tanya Day, died after suffering a serious head injury in a police cell after being accused of being drunk in public.

Tanya Day was taken off a train and arrested for being drunk in a public place in December 2017.

An inquest into the death of Ms Day revealed that she was asleep on a V/Line train in the Victoria region before she was arrested and taken to Castlemaine Police Station.

Ms. Day hit her head at least five times inside the cell and died in hospital 17 days later.

His family said in a statement that health-focused legal reforms could help save lives.

“Our mother would still be here with us today if Victoria Police had treated her condition seriously and addressed her with a public health response, but they chose to criminalize her at her most vulnerable,” the Day family said.

“She was left to die alone on the floor of a police cell after officers responsible for monitoring her failed to care for her properly as required by Victoria Police guidelines.”

‘Public drunkenness laws are outdated and discriminatory.’