4533.0 - Directory of Family and Domestic Violence Statistics, 2011  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 22/11/2011   
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Contents >> National Coroner's Information System

NATIONAL CORONER'S INFORMATION SYSTEM (NCIS)


DASHBOARD METADATA

Geographic CoverageFrequencyData Availability
National
New South Wales
Victoria
Queensland
Western Australia
South Australia
Tasmania
ACT
Northern Territory
Regional
LGA
ASGC Remoteness
Other
More than annual
Annual
2-4 yearly
Less than 5 yearly
Once only
Ad hoc
Detailed publication / report publicly available
Data cubes / spreadsheets publicly available
Agency annual report
Customised data - free upon request1
Customised data - charged consultancy1
Not published - may be available on request1
Not publicly available
[1] May be subject to release conditions

DETAILED METADATA

Contact

Data custodian: National Coroners Information System

Contact: n/a

Address: 57-83 Kavanagh Street, Southbank, VIC, 3006

Telephone: 03 9684 4414

Facsimile: 03 9684 4475

Email: ncis@vifm.org

Internet: http://www.ncis.org.au

Publications

http://www.ncis.org.au/web_pages/user_publications.htm

Purpose

To contribute to a reduction in death and injury in the Australian and New Zealand Community by providing information to investigators and researchers about the frequency and nature of deaths reported to Australian and New Zealand Coroners.

Description

The National Coroners Information System (NCIS) is an internet based data storage and retrieval system for Australian coronial cases. It includes information about every death reported to an Australian coroner since July 2000 (January 2001 for Queensland), and for New Zealand since 1 July 2007.

Collection Type

Administrative by-product

Family and Domestic Violence related content (data items collected)

Data Item
Victim
Secondary victim
Offender1
Demographics
Age
1
Sex
1
Indigenous Status
Disability
Country of Birth
Language spoken
Employment
Education
Income
Geography

Residential address
Other

Years in Australia;
Occupation
Personal data item
Services used / referrals to services
counselling
legal
financial
housing

crisis
other
1
Health factors
pregnancy
alcohol use / substance use
mental illness
1
1



FDV-related perceptions
satisfaction with police response
seriousness/ regarded as criminal
whether problem in neighbourhood
feelings of safety / fear
Prior history of victimisation / offending
1
Known outcomes
application for violence order
violence order issued
offender charged
offender went to court
offender found guilty
offender sentence type
child protection involvement
time off work / economic costs
medical treatment received / type
changed routine
other










Other personal data items

Toxicology report, where available;
Activity at time of incident;
Type of incident;
Medical Cause of Death ICD-10 codes
1 Information may be included within attached documentation.

Data Item
Incident1
Location
home
workplace
school/place of education/institution
public place
other





Relationship between parties
married/de facto spouse
current / former partner/boyfriend/girlfriend
parent-child
sibling
other member of household
other relatives
relationships of personal or financial dependency







Weapon use
type of weapon


Mechanism and objects involved in the death (injury type and weapons involved)
Alcohol involved
Substance use involved
2

Physical injury sustained
type of injury

Reported to police
reasons for not reporting

Other
Address of incident and death
1 Some cases also have a full text Police Circumstances, Autopsy and Coronial Finding report attached. These documents can provide qualitative information about context surrounding the incident, offender, nature of relationship between victim and offender, previous incidence of violence, etc.
2 Information may be included within attached documentation.

Definition of Family and Domestic Violence

FDV is not specifically defined within the NCIS database. Possible cases of interest relating to Family and Domestic Violence within the NCIS could include homicides within family or domestic settings; homicide/suicides; suicides predicated by previous abuse; or infant or child neglect resulting in death. History of non-physical types of abuse may be mentioned in the deceased or perpetrator history described in attached documentation.

Identifying these possible cases would need to be done using a variety of different search techniques, and would not be quickly or easily identifiable as a “FDV” related death.

There is current consideration about the addition of a flag to the NCIS to identify family/domestic violence related deaths.

Aspects of FDV captured by the data are:
  • Physical abuse
  • Homicide /suicide
  • Neglect

Relationship to Conceptual Framework for Family and Domestic Violence (Cat. No. 4529.0)

Conceptual Framework Element / Sub-element
Amount of Information Available
None
Some
Detailed
Context
Environmental Factors
Individual pyscho-social factors
Risk
Community prevalence
Community incidence
Understandings and acknowledgments of risk and safety
Incident
Responses
Informal responses
Formal system responses
Impacts/Outcomes
Programs, Research & Evaluation

Collection methodology

Each State and Territory in Australia and the New Zealand government have a licence agreement with the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine that permits the transfer of coronial information for storage and dissemination via the NCIS.

Coronial clerks in each of the coroners offices enter data directly into local case management systems. Data from these case management systems is uploaded to the NCIS on a regular basis (in most cases nightly or weekly). Full text documents are either attached to the local case management systems by the coroners courts, or transferred directly to the NCIS from the originating organisation (eg. Post-mortem reports from the Forensic Science Centre).

The coroners clerks use the information contained within the coronial file as the basis for their data entry.

All information transferred to the NCIS is performed in accordance with State and Federal Privacy legislation.

Access to identifying information will often be restricted until the case has been finalised by a coroner.

For cases reported to a coroner, where a criminal investigation is undertaken, the case will often be put on hold with the coroner’s office until the completion of the criminal process. Cases of suspected or alleged FDV may therefore remain open on the NCIS for a significant period of time from the date of reporting, before a coronial determination is made.


Scope / target population

People whose deaths have been reported to a coroner in Australian States and Territories and New Zealand.

Coverage

This collection includes reported deaths only. The criteria for a reportable death varies according to the Coroners Act in each jurisdiction, however it generally encompasses all sudden; unexpected or unexplained deaths. These include homicides; suicides; child death; industrial fatalities; Motor Vehicle Accidents, Drowning, and most other forms of non-natural death.

Geographic coverage and disaggregation

National

Data are available for:
Australia/New Zealand
State/Territory
City/region
Other - Geocoding is currently available for some years so residential address can be analysed according to boundary tags such as Statistical Division, Statistical Subdivision or Statistical Local Area.

Frequency / Timing

Updated daily/weekly
Ad hoc - external reports are produced on request only

Collection history

Collection commenced: Deaths reported to a coroner from 1 July 2000 (1 Jan 2001 for Queensland)

Breaks in series: no

Other details: n/a

Data availability / Dissemination

Charged consultancies - Private or media organisations are not eligible for direct system access but may ask for statistical data from the system to be produced. A service fee on an hourly rate is applicable.

Direct system access is available to death investigators and approved Third Party users (fee applicable). A Third Party is an Australian or New Zealand individual or organisation with a role or interest in public health and safety or with a statutorily mandated statistical role. This includes Commonwealth, State and Territory government departments and agencies, University research centres, and other research organisations/agencies with a role or interest in public health and safety or death and injury surveillance. Commercial and media organisations are not currently eligible for third party access to the NCIS.

Other data sources held by this agency

n/a

Has this data source changed?
Contact the ABS to report updates or corrections to the information above.



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