Criminal justice
Justice Support Program
Overview
To strengthen the Justce Support Program’s impact and ensure more sustainable advocacy, JSP is narrowing its focus to young people with cognitive impairments whose disability is a key factor in their justice involvement. By making young people a priority area, we can provide deeper, more tailored guidance to ensure they receive the support they need.
The Justice Support Program (JSP) supports young people (up to 25 years old) with cognitive impairments (e.g. intellectual disability, brain injury, or foetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD)), who are involved in the criminal justice system. We work to ensure their disability and individual circumstances are fully understood, promoting fair treatment and access to the right supports.
Our primary goal is to connect you with legal services, advocate for your needs, and help clarify important information like bail conditions and court processes. We work closely with you to ensure police, lawyers, and courts fully understand your disability.
We can also support you in making informed decisions, expressing your views, and advocating for your interests in education, employment, health services, housing, and the NDIS.
We are a not lawyers.
What we do
Justice Support Program advocates can:
- Arrange a referral to an appropriate legal service for advice or representation
- Advocate for the appropriate cognitive or psychiatric assessments, to make sure you’re fit for trial, and your needs are properly understood.
- Support you to communicate your disability needs to police, lawyers and others in the criminal justice system
- Help you understand your court directions (e.g. bail, curfew, appearance dates, appointments, etc.)
- Advocate with service systems to get you appropriate and responsive supports (e.g. personal assistance, counselling, restorative justice, etc.)
- Work with you to try and get the right support you need after court (e.g. education, employment, health services, housing, and the NDIS.)
Who we assist
We assist people who meet all the below criteria:
- You have a cognitive impairment (e.g. intellectual disability, acquired brain injury, FASD)
- You are 10-25 years old
- You are involved in the criminal justice system as a suspect, defendant, victim or witness.
- Your disability is a significant factor to your involvement in the criminal justice system
- There is no other more appropriate service available to advocate for you
How to get help
JSP currently works closely with YFS to receive referrals. Referrals from other organisations or individuals are also welcomed and will be considered by the Principal Advocate, depending on capacity.
JSP has limited resources and may not be able to assist everyone who contacts us. If JSP is unable to assist you, we will always attempt to refer you to another service.
You can contact QAI on 07 3844 4200 or 1300 130 582 or use the contact form below.
You do not need to provide evidence of cognitive impairment to get help from JSP. You will be required to provide some personal details JSP needs to deliver services. As with all QAI services, all personal information is treated as strictly confidential.
“I was extremely happy about the Justice Support Program which was a very big help to me. I don’t know where I would have been without Liz, she was a great help in every way possible. Thank you very much.”
Gary, JSP Client
“Very grateful for the help,
it was also very empowering.“
JSP client
Get in touch with us
If you have any questions or would like to find out more, contact us on (07) 3844 4200 or qai@qai.org.au or use the form below to send us a message.