It’s become all too common to learn that one branch of the ACT Government or another has been utterly remiss in its duties.
The Canberra Times reports on Magistrate Grant Lalor, investigating the apparent suicide of Tania Lioulios in July last year in a prison van, taking the unusual step of fingering ACT Health, Mental Health ACT, the courts, Corrective Services and ACT Policing before the conclusion of his inquiry.
- The inquest at the ACT Magistrates Court was told on Monday of a string of communication failures in the 24 hours before Lioulios’s suicide.
She had twice been sent away from the Canberra Hospital’s psychiatric services unit after its staff deemed her a low suicide risk.
She was also unsupervised in the rear of the van, while the two officers taking her to Belconnen were unaware she had made several attempts on her own life that day.
He even went so far as to ask the Director of Public Prosecutions, John White, to come and sit in on the rest of the hearing.