The first Selden Society lecture for 2025, Recasting the law on a more merciful basis: Juvenile Justice then and Now, will explore the youth crime crisis in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Presented by Dr Robyn Blewer, the lecture will discuss how a compassionate approach to juvenile justice was encouraged and how children’s courts were established across the country.
It will explore the age of criminal responsibility, detention of children in watchhouses, and the housing crisis.
Dr Blewer is a lecturer at Griffith Law School, specialising in criminal trial procedure and vulnerable witness testimony. She completed a Master of Criminology and Criminal Justice in 2012, and her doctoral research focused on Australia’s child witness law as part of The Prosecution Project.
In 2019, she became Director of the Griffith University Innocence Project. She also teaches Criminal Law courses and has experience in commercial litigation and volunteering with Salvos Legal Humanitarian.
The free lecture, hosted by the Supreme Court Library Queensland, will be held on Thursday, 8 May, at 5.30pm at the Banco Court, Queen Elizabeth II Courts of Law, Level 3, 415 George Street, Brisbane.
The library on behalf of the Selden Society – Australian Chapter hosts an annual program of lectures featuring prominent and renowned guest speakers covering a range of topics focused on legal heritage.
Register to attend the lecture, including refreshments and networking in the Portrait Gallery afterwards, or for livestream registration details and link visit www.sclqld.org.au/selden.
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