There has been a "remarkable" blow out in the time it takes for cases to be finalised in the NSW Local Courts, with data showing the COVID-19 pandemic significantly hampered court operations.
Victims of crime now face an average wait time of up to nine months before having their case finalised, NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics & Research released on Thursday shows.
"We have seen this remarkable increase in the time it's taking matters to proceed through the Local Court," Executive Director of BOCSAR Jackie Fitzgerald said.
NSW Local Court data is analysed by BOCSAR every six months, and is generally "steady as she goes", Ms Fitzgerald added.
The pandemic had drastically impacted the operations of the courts, with coronavirus causing intermittent shut downs of hearings, and online equipment causing delays.
The data looks at contested hearings, where those charged with a crime enter a plea of not guilty, and measures the time from arrest to when the matter is finalised in court.
In contested matters, defendants needed to appear in court with a lawyer, along with a victim, witnesses, and a number of other people attending, which made them difficult to list with pandemic restrictions.
"It looks like as a result of interruptions that we've seen from COVID, the court has been unable to do as many of these defended hearings as it did pre COVID,"Ms Fitzgerald said.
"It means we've had an increasing backlog of these matters and the consequently the time to finalise them has blown out."
The delays have particularly affected domestic violence cases, where one third of hearings are contested, and wait times have grown to nine months in the most recent financial year, up from five months in 2017/2018.
The average time taken to finalise a defended hearing, where the accused pleads not guilty, grew by 41 per cent in 2021/2022, with those involved now waiting an average of nine months to finalise.
This is up from a median arrest to finalisation period of about six months before the pandemic, in 2018/2019.
Victims of domestic violence faced a particularly long wait, with about a third of defended hearings going to court.
The average time has blown out to nine months, up from five months in 2017/2018.
Having matters dealt with quickly is an ideal outcome for all parties, Ms Fitzgerald said.
"A tenet of the criminal justice system is that swift justice is ideal," she said.
"Having a court matter pending, whether you're a victim or an offender, it weighs on your mind."
