Member for Northern Tablelands Brendan Moylan has expressed his disgust over the spate of break and enters in Moree and has called on the State Government to urgently address the shortage of police in the region and review the way 10-to-14-year-old offenders are dealt with in court.

“Like everyone in our community I am disgusted by the recent spate of break and enters in my hometown of Moree,” Mr Moylan said.

“Moree is my home and I have lived in town now for over 20 years and like many in our community I have been broken into previously and empathise with the innocent victims who have had their lives completely turned upside down.

“I am really pleased our local court has a new magistrate, and I am hopeful when our police catch these offenders, and they will be caught, they will be dealt with appropriately.

“Our local police do a good job, and we need the court to start dealing with offenders properly, so they are deterred from committing further offences and a message of general deterrence is sent throughout the community.”

Mr Moylan said one of the State’s biggest problems was the 2,279 police vacancies across NSW, representing a vacancy rate of approximately 12 per cent.

“There were recently 1,362 police officers on long-term sick leave in NSW, which takes the total police officer shortage when added to vacancies to nearly 20 per cent.

“These vacancies are impacting the ability of police right across NSW, not just Moree to protect our communities.

“The State Government needs to do more to address these vacancies.”

My Moylan said the State Government should also seriously consider the current laws surrounding children and criminal intent, what lawyers, courts, and police call Doli Incapax.

“Doli incapax describes the inability of children under the minimum age of criminal responsibility to form criminal intent. The minimum age of criminal responsibility in NSW is currently 10 years.

“However, in NSW where a child is aged over 10 years but under 14, there is a common law presumption of doli incapax.

“This means the prosecution (the police) is required to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the child, at the time of doing the act, knew it was seriously wrong as a matter of morality, or according to the ordinary principles of reasonable persons and not merely naughty or mischievous.

“It also means it is extremely hard for the police to win a case against anyone aged under 14 years.

“It just beggars’ belief. How can a 13-year-old who has been charged by police numerous times state that he/she did not know breaking into a house is a serious crime?”

Mr Moylan said he would like to see the State Government take this onus off the police and place it on the defendant. If a defendant claims he or she did not know breaking into a house was a criminal act, then they should be the one to prove it.

“Another glaring concern that must be addressed is Moree has received a lot of NSW taxpayers’ money to deal the crime issues in our town and we need to ask if all that money is working.

“I would love to see a breakdown or an audit of all the Federal and State money that is going into services in Moree so we as community members can see whether all this money is actually achieving any results,” he said.