Mental Health

If you have committed a criminal offence due to certain mental health difficulties, a court can choose to discharge the matter on the condition that you enter into a treatment plan. This is an alternative to dealing with the matter under the usual criminal law provisions. There are a number of conditions you must meet to be successful in making an application for this, and your application will generally require medical reports to support your case. It is important to note a court may choose to deny an application made on these grounds, for reasons such as:

• The offence is too serious;
• The offence is highly prevalent; or
• Treatment having had had no demonstrable impact on curbing the criminal offending of the defendant.