NT at risk of abuse civil claims from lax detention record-keeping

The NT’s failure to keep proper records in the juvenile justice system could leave it exposed to civil claims.

The Northern Territory’s failure to keep proper records of what happened to youngsters in the juvenile justice system could leave the government exposed to a raft of expensive civil claims soon after the child detention royal commission wraps up.

Lawyers for current and former inmates are seeking to undermine the Territory’s ability to defend itself against abuse claims by arguing that incident reports and other documents, which may be the only alternatives to a child’s version of events, are unreliable.

It comes as child-abuse victims’ advocates say new research into acquired brain injury — a condition with lifetime consequences that they believe is directly tied to childhood maltreatment — could expose states and institutions to seven-figure compensation settlements.

Wayne Chamley, a spokesman for the sex-abuse victims’ advocacy group Broken Rites, said evidence now before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse clearly connected extreme abuse in childhood to psychiatric disorders in later life.

“We believe that there is a group within any survivor population who, once tested, would be assessed to have a particular form of acquired brain injury,” Dr Chamley said.

Attempts to settle civil suits between former Don Dale Youth Detention Centre inmates and the Territory government have so far proven unsuccessful.