NT Police Commander Danny Bacon reveals cops form new strike force as DV rates still too high in Top End

Domestic violence rates remain ‘stubbornly’ high in the Top End following spikes in assaults.

DOMESTIC violence rates remain “stubbornly” high in Darwin and Palmerston following spikes in assaults throughout last year and this year.

The latest Territory crime statistics, released on Friday, show DV offences were still more than 40 per cent up on the same time last year, while the figure was up more than 58 per cent in Palmerston.

Commander Danny Bacon said family violence offences were not as prevalent as at last month’s peak but were “still travelling too high”.

Cmdr Bacon said break-ins had gone down in the same period and police were now looking at how they could replicate that success to drive down rates of domestic violence.

“Strike Force Lyra has been formed, that’ll focus on our domestic violence offences and violent crime offences and that’ll supplement our Strike Force Trident which focuses on our property crime,” he said.

“We looked at the strategy of how we’re going with our property crime and they’re going quite well so we’re going to try and replicate that with our personal and domestic crime as well, so that’s the priority for us going forward.”

Cmdr Bacon said the focus on DV would also come with a push to keep Territorians safe over the holiday period.

That coincides, obviously, with our 12 days of Christmas and our Christmas campaign where we’ll be concentrating on various enforcement and education,” he said.

“So you’ll see increases in drug and drink driving testing, speeding, fatigue, looking at distraction and the issue of mobile phones over the festive season as well.”