Domestic violence advocates are calling for dating apps to perform more background checks on users following the alleged murder of Dannielle Finlay-Jones.
Police charged Ashley Gaddie with her murder on Wednesday, after a 12-hour standoff at Fletcher’s Lookout in the Blue Mountains.
The Daily Mail reported Finlay-Jones and Gaddie met on a dating app and went to a pub on Saturday with mates before returning to one friends’ home in Cranebrook.
According to the publication, Finlay-Jones and Gaddie stayed the night. She was found dead the next day with severe head injuries.
At the time of the alleged murder, Gaddie was serving a community corrections order for separate domestic violence offences. As reported by 9News, over the past six years he has had Apprehended Violence Orders taken out against him by five separate women.
Full Stop Australia chief executive Hayley Foster said dating apps should perform security screenings and identity checks on users to ensure domestic violence offenders aren’t allowed to make profiles.
“We could do that through regulation federally, or we could do that by calling on dating app providers to take the lead and actually do this themselves,” she said, per 9News.
“They really just need to use the same software that everyone else does when they check someone has ID to make sure that we can track people if there are issues.”
Foster said dating app reforms should work in a similar way to the sex offender registry. Under the Sex Offender Registration Act 2004, certain offenders who have committed sexual offences must inform cops of their whereabouts and provide specific personal details for a period of time.
“When you are going on a dating app you are putting yourself in a vulnerable situation, but we all want to meet someone,” she said.
“We already have a sex offender register in this country and that makes it really easy to do those checks to make sure we are not putting children, in particular, in harm’s way in vulnerable environments.
“But we also need to do that for domestic and family violence.”
eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said dating apps have a responsibility to ensure their platforms are safe.
“That includes responding to reports about online harassment and image-based abuse more quickly, and taking proactive steps to prevent users who have been removed for predatory online behaviour from reappearing on their sites with new accounts and aliases,” she said, per the ABC.
Per news.com.au, Dannielle Finlay-Jones worked for the NSW Department of Education and was its Director of Female Football. A soccer fan, she was a much-loved member of Sydney’s soccer community and encouraged dozens of women to play the sport.
“Some 25 years ago, when I started out at Ramsgate RSL Football Club, as a female footballer, we didn’t have female-only teams so I was playing with the boys up until I was 12-years-old,’ she said in a speech last year, per the publication.
“Fast forward to today and we have fielded female-only teams from under six all the way through to all-aged women. What an achievement.
“We continue to make strides within the community and push forward to promote female footballers. Go the girls.”
Help is available.
If you require immediate assistance, please call 000.
If you’d like to speak to someone about domestic violence, please call the 1800 Respect hotline on 1800 737 732 or chat online.
Under 25? You can reach Kids Helpline at 1800 55 1800 or chat online.
