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doi:10.22459/ah.25.2011

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…Along the 'frontiers', First Nations people resisted colonial advances. Police played an important role in these early stages of Australia's settler-colonial project, with early police officers tasked to eradicate First Nations people and their culture in a violent process known euphemistically as 'dispersal' (Tatz, 2001).…”

Section: First Nations People In the Australian Criminal Justice Systemmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impacts of Drug and Alcohol use on Sentencing for First Nations and Non-Indigenous Defendants

2022

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This paper examines the ways personal use of illicit substances and alcohol are constructed as either mitigating or aggravating factors to explain offending. We consider the differential constructions of these factors for people who appear in supreme and district courts in northern Queensland, Australia, for offences involving illicit substance use, alcohol use, drug-related offences, and violence. Qualitative analysis of courtroom observations is understood through the lens of Critical Race Theory (CRT). Our findings reveal that personal use of illicit substances was primarily constructed by legal practitioners as an indicator of disadvantaged circumstances when discussing non-Indigenous defendants. In these cases, drug use was connected to other disadvantages such as poor mental health, physical pain, and trauma. In contrast, alcohol use was primarily raised as an aggravating factor for First Nations defendants, constructed by legal practitioners as a personal flaw linked to violent offending, and overshadowed the interrelated disadvantages that many First Nations defendants experience. This reflects social attitudes about First Nations people, reinforces individualistic explanations for offending patterns, and points to the institutional racism embedded in the structural processes of Queensland's higher courts that continues to profoundly impact First Nations people.

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Section: First Nations People In the Australian Criminal Justice Systemmentioning

confidence: 99%