community protection

community protection

(Australia) incarceration for the protection of the state, as opposed, for example, for a crime or mental illness. It has entered the legal lexicon courtesy of the State of Victoria, which passed the Community Protection Act 1990 with a view to continuing the incarceration of a very dangerous prisoner whose sentence had come to an end. The prisoner was named in the Act and the Act was designed to expire in a year to give the authorities some time to decide how to deal with someone who was not mad but likely to be very bad; even in prison he had committed 15 assaults and mutilated his body.