The following Letter to the Editor comes from former Ballarat Police Superintendent Andrew Allen, in response to this story that appeared in The Courier. Mr Allen was Superintendent in Ballarat until 2017.
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As loath as I am to be critical of any Victoria Police Officer in these difficult times, I find I cannot, in all good conscience, allow the comments of Superintendent Jenny Wilson, to go unchallenged and for her to be held accountable in making them.
As a former divisional superintendent of Ballarat Police and having many years of experience in law enforcement, I am perturbed as to how Supt Wilson makes the nexus of a rise in family violence rates to Ballarat's history of sexual abuse as her conclusion of generational increases in family violence after the latest crime statistics released by the CSA.
Supt Wilson proffers no factual evidence to support her claims to justify the significant increase in Ballarat's family violence rates of almost 11%.
Ballarat's history of sexual abuse has a separate, complex range of social and crime related issues.
Supt Wilson's comments denigrate the positive work of the Ballarat Police family violence unit and other relevant agencies undertaken across the Ballarat community day in, day out.
Her comment of "we've definitely seen generational issues come from that" is perplexing in not providing any facts or data to substantiate her statement, is flawed.
For Supt Wilson to make such backward looking comments impugning Ballarat's difficult and sad past, rather than addressing today's family violence complexities, demonstrates a senior police officer who has not undertaken proper research and consequently fails to comprehend her role as a community leader.
Andrew P Allen APM, Sunshine Coast Qld
