JUSTICE FOR ALL ANNEX 1: AUSTRIA SOCIAL NET CONFERENCE I. DESCRIPTION AND OVERVIEW The Social Net Conference (SNC) offers a defendant who has committed a criminal offence the opportunity to develop a plan for the future together with their social network (in the context of criminal proceedings), which includes solutions to problems for the time after detention/being subject to preventive measures and is intended to prevent further criminal offences. It is aimed at avoiding detention/being subject to preventive measures or shortening it. SOCIAL NET AND COORDINATION A SNC is coordinated by an employee of the association “Neustart” (the central probation service in Austria), involving the social environment of the person concerned in overcoming their crisis and dealing with their conflicts. Coordinators are specially trained persons and are only responsible for preparing the SNC, moderating it and drawing up the future plan. Their role is clearly distinct from that of probation officers. The aim is to help the person concerned to lead a life that enables them to refrain from committing punishable acts in the future. Who is part of this social network must be assessed on a case-by-case basis and includes family members, friends and other reference persons. The person concerned is responsible for selecting these persons. If the person concerned does not have a social network, a SNC cannot be carried out. In addition to the social network, probation officers and, if necessary, other helpers, therapists, employees of care facilities, etc. also take part. However, their role is to be distinguished from that of the social network. PLAN CREATION, TOPICS AND TEMPLATE The relevant topics of the SNC include the residential stay (whether in the family home, assisted living, in an extra-mural facility or in one’s own flat), a personal future and security plan for the execution loosening, and a plan for life in freedom for the time after release. The latter, among other things, deals with the future professional career, which includes suggestions regarding the compliance with orders/instructions and the handling of crises, an "emergency plan" (who takes over what in case of a crisis), the daily structure as well as the meaningful planning of leisure time and the maintenance of social contacts.489 This future plan is then to be submitted to the court and provides an improved basis for decision-making on conditional suspension of the measure or conditional release. The aim of the SNC is to promote the application of non-custodial measures and thus to shorten the duration of deprivation of liberty.490 The implementation of the future plan is accompanied, monitored and reported back to the court as part of the probation service. Furthermore, follow-up conferences can be organised to ensure that the person concerned receives the necessary support and to identify possible challenges, etc. At present, it is possible to convene a SNC in two cases with regard to persons with intellectual and/or psychosocial disabilities who are subject to preventive measures: Refraining from pre-trial preventive measure: A person with an intellectual and/or psychosocial disability who is urgently suspected of a criminal offence, is to be temporarily placed in a forensic therapeutic centre, if there are sufficient grounds to assume that the requirements for being subjected to preventive measures in accordance with Art 21 (1) or (2) of the Austrian Criminal Code and one or more grounds for detention within the meaning of Art 172 (2) and (6) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (grounds for imposing pre-trial detention) are met.491 However, the court may refrain from the pre-trial preventive measure if its purpose can also be achieved by treating and caring for the person concerned without such placement.492 Before deciding to temporary refrain from execution of the pre-trial preventive measure, the court may (since the introduction of the new reform law)493 instruct the head of a probation service to conduct a social net conference,494 and to present a plan for the application of alternative measures.495 117