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CLAUSE NOTES
Sentencing Amendment (Assaults on Police Officers) Bill 2014
Clause 1: Short Title
Clause 2: Commencement on Royal Assent
Clause 3: Principal Act
Clause 4: New section 16A inserted in the Principal Act
The new section provides for the imposition of a
mandatory sentence of 6 months imprisonment on a
person convicted of an offence committed in relation
to an on-duty police officer that results in the officer
suffering serious bodily harm unless there are
exceptional circumstances.
The section also clarifies the inter-relationship of the
new section with other provisions of the Principal
Act.
Subsection (2) states that, even if the provision
creating the offence does not permit the
imposition of a sentence of 6 months'
imprisonment, s 16(1) will apply, except that
the sentence may only be one for 6 months'
imprisonment exactly.
Subsection (3) clarifies that a person who does
not have a conviction recorded by the court
under section 7 is not subject to the
mandatory sentence by virtue of the operation
of section 10(2)(b)(v). Section 10(2)(b)(v)
states that a finding of guilt without recording a
conviction has the same effect as if a conviction
had been recorded for the purpose of
"enactments providing for any other kind of
mandatory penalty on conviction..". Since the
proposed s 16A imposes a "mandatory penalty
on conviction", subsection (3) is necessary to
ensure that section 10(2)(b)(v) does not
operate to convert a finding of guilt into a
conviction to which the mandatory minimum of
6 months' imprisonment will apply.
Subsection (4) clarifies that the Court may still
impose single, general or mixed sentences
when the offender has been convicted of more
than one offence.
Subsection (5) clarifies that, despite subsection
(2) and s 11(2), the sentence imposed, in a
general or mixed sentence, may be for more
than 6 months' imprisonment where the
sentence is imposed in respect of multiple
offences. Subsection (2) indicates that the
sentence imposed is to be for exactly 6
months' imprisonment. Section 11(2) states
that "in imposing a single sentence on an
offender for more than one offence, a court
may not impose a penalty exceeding the sum of
the maximum penalties that could otherwise
have been imposed for those offences".
Subsection (5) is to the effect that neither
s11(2) or s 16A(2) are to be taken to prevent a
longer sentence being imposed, when that
sentence is for multiple offences, even though
the "maximum penalty" to which s 16(2) refers
is a term of imprisonment of exactly 6 months
Clause 5: Provides for the automatic repeal of the amending
Act after the amendments are incorporated into the
Principal Act.