De-Criminalising Adolescent to Parent Violence Under s 76 Serious Crime Act 2015 (c.9)
| Published date | 01 February 2020 |
| Date | 01 February 2020 |
| Author | Christina Quinlan,Vanessa Bettinson |
| DOI | 10.1177/0022018319879845 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
De-Criminalising Adolescent
to Parent Violence Under s 76
Serious Crime Act 2015 (c.9)
Vanessa Bettinson
De Montfort University Leicester, UK
Christina Quinlan
De Montfort University Leicester, UK
Abstract
This article questions the appropriateness of including adolescent to parent violence (APV)
within the elements of a criminal offence designed to criminalise domestic violence and abuse.
The offence, s 76 Serious Crime Act 2015, prohibits controlling and coercive behaviours
towards a person personally connected to the defendant. This spans ongoing intimate rela-
tionships and a wide range of family relationships. The authors conducted a small-scale research
study that looked at practitioners’ understandings of APV and found that many cases of APV
could satisfy the s 76 offence. The article examines the correlation between the concepts of
coercive control and APV, noting that there are significant differences that justify treating
adolescent-perpetrators of APV differently to adult-perpetrators of intimate partner coercive
control in the criminal law. These factors concern the unique vulnerabilities of both the parent-
victim and the adolescent-perpetrator in APV, and human rights law requires the equal pro-
tection of both parties on the basis of their vulnerability.
Keywords
Domestic abuse, domestic violence, coercive co ntrol, adolescent to parent violence, s 76
Serious Crime Act 2015
Criminalising coercive and controlling behaviours is increasingly of interest in several legal jurisdictions
following England and Wales’ enactment of s 76 Serious Crime Act 2015. Scotland has since enacted its
own criminal offence of domestic abuse with its first conviction on 29 May 2019.
1
While not specifying
Corresponding author:
Vanessa Bettinson, Professor of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, De Montfort University Leicester, Leicester, LE1 9BH, UK.
E-mail: vbettinson@dmu.ac.uk
1. BBC News, <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-48459694>.
The Journal of Criminal Law
2020, Vol. 84(1) 3–18
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DOI: 10.1177/0022018319879845
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within the provisions of the offence the term coercive control, the Scottish offence covers the patterns of
behaviour associated with it.
2
One way the two offences differ is in respect of who the coercive or
controlling behaviour can be directed towards. In England and Wales, the offence occurs when the
behaviour can be directed towards a partner or family member.
3
In Scotland, the domestic abuse offence
applies only to those in a current or former intimate relationship.
4
As the concept of coercive control has
developed, in particular from the work of sociologist Evan Stark,
5
another phenomenon has been
generating academic and policy interest in England and Wales called adolescent to parent violence
(APV). Work by Miles and Condry has shown that when adolescents use abusive behaviours at home,
parents eventually seek help from front-line services including the police.
6
Their work has shown that a
criminal justice response is problematic for both the victim and the offender, preferring a holistic multi-
agency response as opposed to convicting adolescents who use violent and abusive behaviours towards
their parents or carers.
7
This article contributes to the current interest in both the criminalisation of
coercive control and the phenomenon of APV by demonstrating the inappropriateness of including APV
under the ambit of the s 76 SCA 2015 offence.
8
We present our findings of a small-scale project designed to discover the understandings of APV by
practitioners in statutory agencies and voluntary organisations in one city-based local authority. An
analysis of the data shows that the behaviours of the young person, the experiences of the parent-victim
and the understanding of APV as a form of domestic violence and abuse (DVA) by practitioners means
there is a very realistic overlap with APV and the elements that make up the criminal offence of coercive
and controlling behaviour. Among the findings, it is significant the extent to which front-line service
staff recognise the use of psychological behaviours and harms and that from a parent’s perspective a
response to APV is not triggered until the police are involved with the family. This corresponds with the
incorporation of psychological harm within the coercive control offence (s 76 Serious Crime Act 2015)
and the focus of government policy to impro ve criminal justice responses to DVA.
9
Thereby, this
warrants a consideration of whether offences designed to address coercive and controlling behaviour
should cover the child/parent relationship. It will be argued that while much of the adolescent’s abuse
towards the parent involves a pattern or ongoing use of abusive behaviours, it generally falls short of the
underlying nature of coercive control as outlined by Stark because the family dynamic differs so greatly
from intimate partner violence. Despite this, we will show that the cases from our research study could
satisfy the elements of the criminal offence under s 76, which in our view is inappropriate and the
Scottish approach is preferred.
Our analysis consists of five parts. First, we explore the concept of coercive control and the justifi-
cation for criminalising it in cases involving current or former intimate relationships. The second part
will outline our small-scale project and some of the relevant findings from it. The third part will explore
the literature on APV, reflecting in particular on the vulnerability of both the parent-victims and
adolescent-perpetrators, and the policy decision to posit APV as a form of DVA. The fourth section
2. Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2019, s 2.
3. Serious Crime Act 2015, s 76(1)(b) and s 76(2).
4. Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2019, s 1.
5. E Stark, Coercive Control: The Entrapment of Women in Personal Life (Oxford, 2007).
6. C Miles and R Condry, ‘Responding to Adolescent to Parent Violence: Challenges for Policy and Practice’ (2015) 55 British
Journal of Criminology 1076; C Miles and R Condry, ‘Adolescent to Parent Violence: The Police Response to Parents
Reporting Violence from Their Children’ (2016) 26(7) Policing and Society 804.
7. See also J Tew and J Nixon, ‘Parent Abuse: Opening Up a Discussion of a Complex Instance of Family Power Relations’ (2010)
9(4) Social Policy and Society 579.
8. Miles and Condry (n 6) 1080 note that the adolescent to parent violence agenda’s prominence may increase ‘with the new
offence in the Serious Crime Act 2015’.
9. HM Government, Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy 2016-2020, March 2016 <https://assets.publishing.service.gov.
uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/522166/VAWG_Strategy_FINAL_PUBLICATION_MASTER_
vRB.PDF>
4The Journal of Criminal Law 84(1)
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