Director Summary Crime and Therapeutic Justice, Kate Bundrock
Overseeing our work across summary crime and therapeutic justice, Kate says the new role was created in recognition of the importance of the work for our clients, the expansion of therapeutic courts and opportunities to work differently in the criminal justice system.
‘We want to think deeply about services – how we can make them better, can we do things differently? And can we use our experience and the experince of our clients to improve the system?
‘The goals of our work in summary crime and therapeutic justice are to help our clients participate in legal processes, to make sure that their rights are protected and to advocate for the underlying causes of offending to be addressed.’
Kate says some of her formative experiences as a lawyer – practicing as a duty lawyer on Yorta Yorta Country in Shepparton, as well as at our former Preston office on Wurundjeri County – are experiences that she carries into her current role.
'I started my career in a corporate law firm, where I felt miserable and out of place. When I came to do this work [at VLA] it had meaning and although I was working as a lawyer, it was at heart a social justice role.
‘And I guess that's what has carried me through the whole way – I really do see what we are doing as a social justice in action.’
One important focus for the leadership team across all of our work will be recognition of the impact of the criminal justice system on First Nations people and doing what we can to support a better way, said Kate. While the program’s work contributes across a number of our strategic directions, Kate says at the heart of it is the priority around increasing access to justice for our clients.
Associate Director, Therapeutic Justice, Elanor Peattie
While therapeutic justice was already within the Summary Crime program’s work, it is being given more focus and resourcing, with the creation of the new associate director therapeutic justice role, which Elanor Peattie was appointed to in June 2023.
The new role reflects the expansion of therapeutic courts across the state, including into the County Court, as well as the importance of incorporating therapeutic approaches into all our criminal law work and exploring opportunities for restorative justice.
Elanor brings extensive experience working in criminal law as a prosecutor, before coming to legal aid and working in both indictable and summary crime, at regional offices and in therapeutic court roles.
More recently, she managed Judicial College of Victoria education programs for judicial officers and multidisciplinary teams working in therapeutic courts.
Elanor says this opportunity to work directly with judges and magistrates was really interesting and rewarding:
‘I got to see the justice system from a different perspective. In developing the training program I had the opportunity to work closely with and learn from international experts in therapeutic justice, which was incredible.’
Elanor’s firm commitment to social justice and helping clients brought her back to VLA in 2021.
As associate director, one of the key areas Elanor will focus on is the Assessment and Referral Court (ARC) expansion as it progresses to roll out across the state. She will also be looking at cultural safety in therapeutic courts and how this can be embedded to ensure First Nations clients have a positive experience when they are involved in therapeutic justice programs.
Elanor says the program will look to be guided by the lived experience of clients in designing, reviewing and improving services.
‘There is great momentum happening at VLA in listening to and incorporating lived experience and I think in therapeutic courts there's a really good opportunity for this, because we work very closely with clients over a protracted period.’
Associate Director, Summary Crime, Carrie O’Shea
Incorporating duty lawyer services, Help Before Court and funded case work, summary crime is our largest service delivery program. The team also contributes to VLA’s law reform and strategic advocacy work.
Carrie’s experiences working as a senior lawyer at Broadmeadows and job-sharing the regional manager position at Sunshine, both on the lands of the Wurundjeri People, have developed her passion for working in the ‘beating heart’ of criminal law, the Magistrates Court.
‘It's people's first entry point into the justice system and it is a place where if you help people redirect their lives or to engage in rehabilitative programs, it can actually have such a significant impact and be a real turning point for people. If you take the care to provide a good service and appropriate referrals, you can really have that significant impact.’
Starting as associate director summary crime in April, Carrie says she is enjoying the opportunity to have a statewide oversight and focus on an area of law that she is passionate about.
‘Having worked in the system for so long, I've identified a lot of barriers to being able to do our job well that are systemic. I’ve also seen how agencies don't always work well together. I really want to be a part of trying to make improvements and to draw on my lived experience as a lawyer in the system to advocate for those changes.’
Carrie believes this strategic work will help ensure that undertaking legally aided summary crime work is sustainable and rewarding for private practitioners.
Carrie says implementing the review of our remand services, conducted by RMIT’s Centre for Innovative Justice, will be a key focus. This work is a commitment in our corporate plan and a reflection of the importance of these services to our clients, as well as the significant changes we've seen in the criminal justice system in recent years.
‘Remands are such a huge area where we have an enormous impact on the lives of people who are in a very vulnerable state. It's such an important area for potential reform and for us and the system to do things better.’
Carrie is also conscious to ensure client voices and experiences are centred in service development and delivery:
‘My experience representing the same clients for months or even years in the Assessment and Referral Court has given me a good understanding of those issues which lead people into the justice system and the barriers to rehabilitation. I think I can bring that experience to decision making and prioritising areas of focus for the organisation.’
Project Manager, Summary Crime, Toby Verey
Led by Toby Verey, Better Justice, Every Day, is a key program of work within summary crime focused on improving our services and settings and making sure they are aligned to our clients' needs the organisation’s goals. Toby is now also looking forward to working to improve our remand services in response to the remand review.
Since starting at VLA in 2010 as part of the new lawyer’s program, Toby has worked in a range of regional offices and program areas, including civil justice, legal help, client access (now client intake and inclusion) as well as Disaster Legal Help Victoria during the 2019–20 bushfires.
Toby says his interest in contributing to broader change led him to take on project management roles:
‘I really want to make a systemic impact for a range of clients. I think when you do that you sacrifice that immediate gratification you get from being able to high-five a client outside of court when they get a good outcome – you don’t get that kind of feeling when 1,000 people have managed to access your service who couldn’t access it before. But looking at the data can help to see and celebrate that wider impact.’
Toby also says he enjoys the diversity of ways of thinking and opportunity to be creative in the project space.
Managing the Help Before Court project and rolling out it out as a new program has been a key achievement to date, which has helped to improve the backlog of cases before the courts and take pressure off duty lawyers.
‘It is a pretty major achievement, it is the first time we know of that it has been done in Australia. In many cases it has saved people having to go to court – so it’s saving the court’s time, it is saving lawyers’ time, it is saving police time and it benefits the client all in one package.’
Toby says a key focus in developing Help Before Court was ensuring the work was led by client voices. While the pandemic increased the pressure to roll out the project quickly, the team kept their focus on making sure that their ideas met real needs and solved clients’ problems.
‘If we don’t talk to clients, we don’t know if the solution we have come up with is the right one.’
More information
Read more about our criminal law work.
Reviewed 18 August 2023