Te Pae Tawhiti Postgraduate Scholarship for Sarah Croskery-Hewitt
Borrin Foundation Te Pae Tawhiti Postgraduate Scholarship
About Sarah
Sarah was born and raised in the Wairarapa and graduated from Victoria University of Wellington Te Herenga Waka in 2015. Prior to commencing her PhD, Sarah spent five years working in Pōneke and Te Awa Kairangi as a lawyer and law reform coordinator for Community Law. Her Community Law work focused strongly upon gender-based violence issues, including establishing a specialist legal service for migrant women experiencing violence. Sarah has also undertaken several research projects relating to gender-based violence, including authoring the recent Borrin Foundation-funded publication Fighting or Facilitating Family Violence? Immigration Policy and Family Violence in New Zealand. Sarah’s previous research on intoxication and sexual assault received the Law Society’s Hon Rex Mason Prize for Excellence in Legal Writing.
What Sarah is studying
Sarah’s PhD research explores the nature and impact of intoxication evidence in sexual assault trials. Victim and/or perpetrator intoxication is a feature of a very high proportion of sexual assaults and legislative reforms have sought to combat intoxication-involved sexual assault. Despite such reforms, intoxication-involved sexual assault continues to be associated with higher attrition and lower conviction rates. Through an analysis of trial transcripts, Sarah will explore how intoxication evidence is being used in practice in sexual assault trials. Sarah hopes to identify changes to law and practice that would improve access to justice for victims of intoxication-involved sexual assault.
Scholarship amount
$30,000
“The generous support of the Borrin Foundation will allow me to pursue research that I am deeply passionate about. I hope that this research will shed light on the mechanisms behind the ‘reform-resistance’ of sexual assault trials and assist in formulating more effective reform proposals.”
– Sarah Croskery-Hewitt