An order from a judge in Oamaru District Court to offer a defendant grief counselling left the probation service with little choice. During the sentencing last week of a man, convicted of making photocopies of a prescription, who said he was affected by grief, Judge Joanna Maze ordered the probation service to make grief counselling available to the man. "I don’t really care what you’re funded for, if I make a decision you’re going to have to find some [way]." A Department of Corrections spokesman this week reiterated that grief counselling was not a service it undertook with offenders, but said probation officers would work to manage the conditions set by the courts. The spokesman would not say how often judges ordered the department to do something it was not funded to do.

Source: Otago Daily Times October 14, 2016 17:03 UTC