Former SA public prosecutor Stephen Pallaras wants to ban the parole board if he wins a spot in state parliament

A controversial former top SA prosecutor is set to push a bold ban to the ballot box in the next state election.

Stephen Pallaras. Picture: Matt Turner

A controversial former top SA prosecutor and judge is taking his fight to abolish the parole board and block criminals from winning shorter jail terms to the next state election.

Stephen Pallaras KC – who is gaining a new statewide profile holding True Crime events – said “prisoners should serve their full sentences” to lift public safety and stop repeat offences.

The King’s Counsel and former SA Director of Public Prosecution was now preparing to take his battle to also establish a standalone court to hear domestic violence cases to the upper house.

Stephen Pallaras is taking his fight to abolish the parole board and block criminals from winning shorter jail terms to the next state election.

He would stand as an independent for his Real Change SA party in March next year.

Among his controversial law reform plans was to see domestic violence laws overhauled so offenders were removed from homes rather than victims and to reinstate powers stripped from the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC).

A few years ago the state government voted to diminish the ICAC’s powers “in record time”, according to Mr Pallaras.

And “what really bugged me about it was parliamentarians were voting on their own interests”.

“I was a loud voice when the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions was advocating for an ICAC but parliament has taken a couple of knuckles off the fist,” Mr Pallaras, 74, said.

Former Director of Public Prosecutions for South Australia Stephen Pallaras KC, centre, is standing as an independent at the next state election. Picture: Supplied

It will be Mr Pallaras’s second bid for a place in state parliament after an unsuccessful tilt at the upper house last election.

He claims to now have more funding and preparation in fighting for a parliamentary spot.

Mr Pallaras was the state’s outspoken Director of Public Prosecutions from 2005 until 2012 and then was a Justice of the High Court and Court of Appeal in the Solomon Islands overseeing numerous murder trials following that country’s shocking civil war.

Now he was particularly committed to addressing the “rise in domestic violence rates in this country that are out of control”.

“I can’t tell you how frustrating it is to sit outside our policy makers and see the way in which the current, and tragically ineffective, laws relating to domestic violence are not protecting vulnerable women and their families.”

In the past six months he started holding True Crime events starting with about 50 people at North Adelaide hotel, this had grown to about 400 attending the most recent at the Arkaba Hotel with other events held across the state.

“I’ve worked in defence, prosecution and as a judge, the only place I haven’t been is in the dock which I don’t intend pursuing,” he said.

Originally published as Former SA public prosecutor Stephen Pallaras wants to ban the parole board if he wins a spot in state parliament