One week in the NT's Youth Justice Court shows effects of tough bail laws

Australia Broadcast Center

26-07-2025

It's a Tuesday morning, the time most kids would be in their first class at school.
But in the Northern Territory's Youth Justice Court, children arrested overnight are being brought before a judge.
Sitting in the dock is year 6 student Molly*.
She is 12 years old, and last night spent her first night in a police watch house.
Her mum has come to court, and the judge has allowed Molly to hold her baby sibling for a few minutes while lawyers debate whether she should be released on bail.
It can be difficult to reconcile the small, softly spoken children who appear in youth court with the crimes they are sometimes accused of committing
A 14-year-old charged with rape; a 15-year-old accused of attacking a young girl with a claw hammer — these are real examples of the disturbing level of violence allegedly perpetrated by children in the NT.
But the bulk of young people who come before the courts are charged with far less serious offences, and often they have been victims of crime themselves.
After observing 100 cases in the Youth Justice Court over the course of a week in July, some glaring issues emerge.
The ABC observed a number of young people were not assessed for cognitive impairment or mental illness, despite court orders.
Territory Criminal Lawyers senior lawyer Jenna McHugh, who regularly represents young people, said court-ordered assessments were critical.
"They can significantly influence the court's decisions when it comes to sentencing, rehabilitation and referrals," she said.
Ms McHugh said a few years ago an assessment would have taken six weeks, but could now take up to year, and in some cases were unable to be completed at all.
In one case observed by the ABC, the court heard a 17-year-old girl whose mother had provided evidence of pre-natal alcohol abuse had waited 16 months for an assessment for Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD).
A psychologist working for the Department of Corrections told the court they did not have access to the multi-disciplinary team needed to diagnose children with FASD.
It also heard there were only two external service providers in the NT that could conduct FASD assessments for children going through the courts, and both had waitlists in excess of six months.
In another case, Lola*, 15, had spent time in and out of custody over the robbery of a service station, and was supposed to receive a mental health assessment in April.
The court heard she had been exposed to drug abuse as a young child but would be unlikely to have a mental health assessment due to a lack of qualified staff.
Lola pleaded guilty later that day without a report.
"We're effectively dealing with that young person and sentencing them blindly when it comes to their cognitive ability and their mental health," Ms McHugh said.
NT Children's Commissioner Shahleena Musk said understanding if a child had a severe mental illness or disability was vitally important to the sentencing process.
"The court desperately needs this information to inform their decision making … and to craft an order that is fit for the nature of the offence, the impact on the victim, and also the needs of this young person," she said.
Having worked as a prosecutor and a defence lawyer representing young people in court, Ms Musk said court-ordered assessments were also essential in reducing recidivism.
"If we're going to stop young people offending, we need to look at what's happened to them and how to address their needs … otherwise, we will see young people reoffend, and reoffend more seriously," she said.
In a statement, the NT Department of Corrections said a high volume of complex cases had "overwhelmed the current assessment capacity".
The Department said efforts to recruit its assessment team were being hampered by the small pool of available and appropriately qualified psychiatric, neurological, and forensic staff in the NT.
One of the most common questions judges in the Youth Justice Court are asked to consider is whether to release a young person on bail.
With some of the strictest bail laws in Australia, a shrinking number of rehabilitation programs, and a cohort of young people with complex needs, bail is becoming increasingly rare.
In one example, a teenager named Andy* who struggled with addiction and had already spent several months on remand due to procedural delays was denied bail due to a lack of rehabilitation programs in the Top End.
Andy's lawyer told the court his client had spent his 16th birthday behind bars and was facing more time on remand, where he wasn't receiving adequate help.
Judge Thomasin Opie denied bail because he said Andy's risk of reoffending was high in circumstances where there were no programs on offer that could cater to his needs.
"In circumstances where the bail laws preclude the court from granting bail, in the circumstances where no programs are being funded [to support] children on bail … children are left to languish," she said.
Ms McHugh said the situation was also concerning from a community safety perspective.
"These kids are growing up in detention and they're going to become adults who reoffend, and the offending is just going to get worse because no one is addressing any of their needs effectively," she said.
She said recent changes making it harder for young people to receive bail would only "kick the can down the road".
*Names have been changed. NT law prevents media from publishing information that could identify a young person before the court.