Self-harming detainees released from hospital

Six Chinese detainees have been released from hospital after harming themselves yesterday at Sydney's Villawood detention centre.

Five men and two women were taken to Auburn hospital yesterday after one woman tried to commit suicide, and a woman who found her suffered serious chest pains. A number of men also slashed their wrists.

The hospital says one woman has been admitted for observation and the rest of the detainees have been returned to the detention centre.

Refugee advocates say the self-harm incidents have come after 25 Chinese asylum seekers were isolated for two weeks and interviewed by Chinese officials as part of the Federal Government's attempts to deport them.

The Uniting Church says the two incidents are likely to be connected and that those seeking asylum now believe their lives in China would be at risk.

By Injustice posted 19 June 05

Related:

Psychiatrists dismiss Vanstone's call to limit role
Psychiatrists treating mentally-ill Baxter detainees have rejected the Immigration Minister Senator Amanda Vanstone's call for them to restrict their role to the immediate care of patients.

HREOC's deadline on child detainees passes
"We detainees request from human Australian to release us from Nauru cage" Years of waiting took their toll on asylum seekers. There are still two men there! They are suffering. (April 2006).

Tampering with Asylum
HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT THAT AUSTRALIA'S recent policies on asylum seekers are wrong, but don't quite have the statistics to back up your views?

Baxter,'akin to the time in Nazi Germany'
I went to Baxter this Easter just past, and became more aware that this time is akin to the time in Nazi Germany when the concentration camps were being set up.

Asylum seeker denied medical help, court hears
An Iranian asylum seeker was denied access to psychiatric help, despite slashing himself several times inside South Australia's Baxter detention centre, the Federal Court in Adelaide has heard.

Once You've Been to Baxter You Can't Sit on the Fence
I spent this Easter in the desert. I spent this Easter protesting at Baxter detention centre to draw the world's attention to the injustice of Australia's racist and inhumane mandatory detention system and treatment of asylum seekers.

Detention Centres, Solitary Confinement
On Friday night the NSW Council for Civil Liberties awarded Sydney solicitor John Marsden honorary life membership. Julian Burnside was invited to make the speech in Marsden's honour. In the course of his speech, Burnside referred to the unregulated use of solitary confinement in Australia's immigration detention centres, criticising it as inhumane and also as unlawful.

MP urges asylum seekers' release
A federal Coalition MP has called for the release of all asylum seekers being held in immigration detention centres.

Rau ordeal a raw deal
Ms Rau spent time in a Queensland prison and a hospital before being handed to immigration authorities who kept her in detention for another four months.

Australian held in Baxter detention centre
It has been revealed an Australian resident has been locked up in Baxter Detention Centre in South Australia for the past four months. Authorities had been unable to establish her identity since she was found wandering in far north Queensland last September.

Lawyers want Baxter detainee released for treatment !
Lawyers acting for a hunger-striking detainee inside South Australia's Baxter detention centre have asked the Federal Court to order a psychiatric assessment for the man, saying he needs to be in mental health care, not detention.

Baxter protesters 'being denied water, sleep'?
One of the three Iranian men has been on the roof of the gymnasium since Sunday last week, with two others joining him on Tuesday.

Detainees urged to abandon rooftop protest!
Kathy Verran from Rural Australians for Refugees, says one of the men has since come down and has been taken into the management unit. [solitary confinement for Xmas?]

Advocates warn of detention centre riot risk
A prominent refugee advocate warns South Australia's Baxter Detention Centre is on the brink of a major riot. A protest involving about 25 male detainees broke out at the centre on Tuesday, over a new system which is delaying the process of dispensing medication to detainees.

Villawood detainees go on hunger strike
A refugee advocacy group says up to 200 detainees at the Villawood Detention Centre, in Sydney, have begun a hunger strike to draw attention to their situation ahead of the federal election.

Afghan children lose High Court battle against detention
Lawyers have lost their constitutional challenge to the detention of four children at a South Australian immigration centre. Four siblings from Afghanistan, aged between seven and 15, have been in detention since they arrived in Australia in 2001.

Australia's "GITMO" System
Australia's "GITMO" System In June 2002 on the PM program on ABC radio, PHILIP RUDDOCK is quoted as saying: "Well, let me just say, detention centres are not prisons. They are administrative detention.

Senior cleric damns Baxter as 'disgraceful'
A senior world religious figure has called on the Federal Government to scrap its mandatory detention policy after visiting the Baxter detention centre in South Australia's north.

Detention centre media ban criticised
The Howard Government has been criticised in a report by media freedom advocate Reporters Without Borders for stopping journalists covering the conditions in refugee detention centres.

Baxter detainee continues hunger strike
A detainee at the Baxter detention centre near Port Augusta in South Australia has been on a hunger strike for a week. Sri Lankan Zeldon Daggie, 23, says he has been detained since arriving in Australia four years ago.

Democrats to keep up pressure over asylum seekers
The Australian Democrats will maintain their pressure on the next federal government over Australia's treatment of asylum seekers, if the party can retain its strength in the Senate.

Don't rock the Boat Howard!
PRIME Minister John Howard today denied the children overboard affair had swayed the 2001 election? Mr Howard has spent the week defending himself against claims he had been informed that nobody in Defence believed children had been thrown overboard by asylum seekers.

'Child abuse police left me a broken man'

Allegations of incompetence and perjury

UK: Operation Aldgate was supposed to uncover a paedophile ring. In fact it snared innocent people. Now the inquiry is to be investigated amid allegations of incompetence and perjury.

Two years ago Ben Mackay, a former head teacher in Humberside, was accused of indecently assaulting three former pupils of St William's community home school for boys, at Market Weighton. The charge was to have a devastating impact that nearly wrecked the life of the 61-year-old widower.

Mackay had lost his wife to cancer in 1995 and was bringing up his two sons alone.

Following his arrest, he was suspended from his job as a supply teacher in Southsea and remains without work despite the dropping of all charges against him last December, months before his trial was due to begin.

Not surprisingly, Mackay's experiences have left him bitter and angry. Several times during our interview, he broke down recalling details of his ordeal.

"It was the destruction of my past, my present and my future: an enormous disturbance to every aspect of our lives," Mackay said. "My son had to take a year out from his degree course at Oxford to support me."

"I lived in fear and distress of a freak conviction which never left me all that time. It was only the love of my boys which stopped me from taking my own life. They talked of trauma on the part of these former pupils. They have no idea of what it did to us, and I don't think they cared."

Nor was Mackay alone. The cases of four other staff, who were all charged with similar offences, are to be investigated by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. It is to review claims that incompetence by detectives working for the troubled Humberside police service, which was probing cases of alleged child sexual abuse at St William's, wrecked the lives of these five innocent men.

The inquiry team will be composed of officers from an external force, probably West Yorkshire, and will be led by an assistant chief constable. But it will be 'managed,' as opposed to merely 'supervised,' by the new Commission, which means its staff will have day-to-day operational control - a level of involvement reserved for the most serious cases.

Nicholas Long, the complaints commissioner who is overseeing the probe, said, "I take the allegations very seriously, and it is important for all concerned that they are robustly investigated."

He said he was aware that they had arisen from a broader, national context - a long series of police inquiries into so-called 'historical abuse' said to have occurred many years ago in care homes and in residential schools.

The investigation's subject is Operation Aldgate, a Humberside inquiry into alleged abuse in the 1970s and 1980s at St William's, which closed in 1992. Run by a Catholic lay order, the De la Salle brotherhood, it took child offenders, including murderers.

Its former principal, James Carragher, who had already pleaded guilty to similar offences in 1993 and served four years of a seven-year sentence, was convicted and jailed for 14 years last year. Two of his former colleagues were acquitted by juries and the cases against a further three, including Mackay, were dropped.

These men say the police and Crown Prosecution Service pressed ahead with uncorroborated charges which depended entirely on the word of former pupils with convictions for serious crimes of dishonesty and violence, and, in some cases, who were suffering from severe mental illness.

With their names and addresses published by the media and their lives and careers derailed, the acquitted men say the police failed to make elementary checks which would have shown that the stories told by the supposed victims flew in the face of easily established facts.

One complainant also alleges that a detective who played a central role in Operation Aldgate lied in the witness box, and that his earlier efforts to get Humberside police to investigate this were deliberately stifled.

Several cases have been exposed where 'historical abuse' inquiries have led to wrongful convictions, and a 2002 Commons home affairs committee report said that, without stringent safeguards, they could easily generate miscarriages of justice. Operation Aldgate will be the first such inquiry to be the subject of external investigation.

In a separate development last week, Colin Inglis, the chairman of Humberside Police Authority, was arrested and questioned about claims that he abused children at a Hull children's home in the 1980s.

Inglis, who denies the allegations, last year triggered a constitutional battle with the then Home Secretary, David Blunkett, when he resisted Blunkett's order to fire his chief constable, David Westwood, over his role in the case of the murdered Soham schoolgirls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman.

Humberside had destroyed files on previous sex attacks by the girls' killer, Ian Huntley, so that when he applied for a job at Holly and Jessica's school he appeared to pose no risk. Meanwhile, the force was dubbed one of the country's five worst by Her Majesty's Inspectorate. Westwood was eventually allowed to retire two months ago. His successor, Tim Hollis, appears to share the Commission's view of Operation Aldgate.

In April, days after taking over at Humberside, Hollis took the extraordinary step of phoning Mackay at his home in Southsea, saying he viewed the complaint with concern, and that he would deal with it "with honesty and integrity". Three days earlier Mackay - who had been a teacher at the school from 1974-7 - had sent him a 150-page dossier about his case. According to Mackay's notes of the conversation, he added: "I just wanted to ring you to give you a reply from the heart."

In a later letter to Mackay, Hollis wrote: "I am grateful to you for drawing your concerns to my personal attention. Whilst we cannot turn back the clock, we can take active and positive steps to learn the lessons from this case as they emerge and to ensure that police investigations in such cases are carried out dispassionately and with absolute integrity."

Police documents suggest that Operation Aldgate, which began under Detective Chief Inspector (now Detective Superintendent) Richard Kerman in 2001, was trying to unearth a 'paedophile ring' - evidence not merely of abuse in private by one or more individuals, but of institutionalised abuse where victims were shared. In case after case, historical abuse inquiries into schools and care homes have sought such rings, although none has ever been proven to have existed.

By June 2003, when they arrested Mackay, the officers of Operation Aldgate were convinced that there had been a ring at St William's. Before they interviewed him, they gave a document to his solicitor, saying: "The enquiry has established the systematic and organised abuse of boys by a group of staff." In his complaints dossier, Mackay wrote: 'Such "establishing" was made before hearing the evidence of myself and others accused. It must have been decided that whatever was to be said by the defendants in their interviews was to be discounted as untrue, evasions or lies."

The legal protection given to anyone who alleges they were a victim of sexual crime means that the three men who accused Mackay cannot be named. The first, who was serving life for aggravated burglaries in which he tied up and beat elderly couples in their homes, made only generalised allegations that Mackay had abused him, without saying where, when or how. They were dropped before the rest of the case, after the judge in the trial of the admitted abuser James Carragher told the jury it could not convict on his evidence, because it had been generated through collusion with another former pupil in prison. This pupil was a convicted paedophile.

The second man, who had convictions for burglaries and stealing cars and had been investigated for raping his girlfriend's eight-year-old daughter, claimed he had been sexually assaulted more than 14 times in teaching hours in a walk-in stationery store cupboard in Mackay's classroom. In fact, as Mackay told the police in his interview, no such walk-in cupboards existed anywhere in the school, and the only stationery store had a glass front.

Later, Mackay discovered that a detective watching his interview through a video link had a copy of the school plans, which proved he was telling the truth.

The second man also claimed that Mackay abused him in the bathroom. But at Carragher's trial last autumn, he made the same claim about him, and then was asked if any other teacher had also abused him there. He replied that none had.

A third man, who had been convicted for crimes of violence as a football hooligan, claimed that he had been abused at night during patrols of the dormitory. Mackay was able to trace nine members of the same school house who made statements saying that no such abuse took place. As with all the alleged victims, there was no corroboration of the man's claims.

One of those who was acquitted at trial is Noel Hartnett, who was charged with several physical assaults at the school. At his trial in December 2003 he was able to show that medical records and other evidence disproved former pupils' claims, none of which were corroborated. One man said Hartnett opened a 'second mouth' in his chin with a table-tennis bat. Hartnett's complaint dossier says the trial judge was highly critical of some of the Operation Aldgate officers' work, saying that they had 'not investigated professionally' and 'have not investigated to discover the truth'.

His dossier includes a claim that, when he was interviewed after his arrest, Detective Constable Brian Coates reassured him that the allegations against him were trivial, and would not come to court. Another officer present confirmed this in his evidence, but Coates denied it under oath.

Hartnett says in his dossier that when he complained of Coates's alleged perjury while Westwood was still chief constable, the police failed to take the basic step of obtaining a transcript of the relevant parts of his trial and tried to deal with the matter through 'informal resolution'. The IPCC commissioner, Nicholas Long, said that getting the transcript would be one of the new investigation's first steps.

A factor common in historical abuse cases is that alleged victims have been paid tens of thousands of pounds in compensation, sometimes even when supposed abusers are acquitted. This, the Commons committee said, was liable to taint criminal trials.

In December 2004, after the last Operation Aldgate acquittals, an advert appeared in the prisoners' newspaper Inside Time. Placed by Jordans solicitors of Dewsbury, it asked: 'Were you at St William's care home 1970-88?' The firm, it went on, was coordinating claims by former residents, and it was 'important that potential claimants enforce their legal rights as soon as possible. Especially those who have been contacted by Operation Aldgate at Hull Central police station'.

By David Rose posted 13 June 05

Ed: Seems that unethical lawyers put an ad in 'Inside Time' to encourage prisoners to dog on former schoolteachers for sex abuse. Even if the alleged abuser is aquitted the supposed victim is eligible for compo and so the lawyer can earn a fat fee.

Note that the ad was placed *after* the police investigation was shown to be an utter disaster that ruined the lives of innocent people.

Related:

Jackson jurors deliberate for week without verdict
Jurors in Michael Jackson's 'lies innuendo and exaggeration' sex-abuse trial' have completed a full week of deliberations without reaching a verdict, prolonging the culmination of a trial that should free the pop star.

Jackson waiting for fifth day: Jury
Jurors in pop star Michael Jackson's 'lies innuendo and exaggeration' sex-abuse trial have ended a shortened fifth day of deliberations without reaching a verdict.

Michael Jackson Innocent: Fan Club!!!
They told him don't you ever come around here, don't wanna see your face, you better disappear. The fire's in their eyes and their words are really clear, so beat it... just beat it...

JACKSON TRIAL Or Inquisition
"Ye shall know the TRUTH and the TRUTH shall. William J. Wagener does a weekly Libertarian TV show in Santa Maria since October 1, 2000, which is sometimes bicycled around the nation. Libertarians believe in individual freedoms and rights to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Wagener has been a court "watcher" since 1992 in Santa Maria, and especially of Judge Rodney S. Melville, and his tendency to give Prosecutors leeway, not usually afforded to public defenders, or private defense attorneys.

CHEMICAL CASTRATION FOR MEDIA SLUTS!
NSW: Shadow Justice Minister Andrew Humpherson's call for the NSW government to consider chemical castration for child sex offenders is motivated primarily by the desire to create headlines rather than to actually solve the problem of child sex offending in the community.

Sexual Abuse: Testimony
I'm Debbie Ingraham, and I'm an activist for Restorative Justice. I'm also a former litigant who filed an unsuccessful civil suit against a family member for incest, and a former victim advocate. I bring a 30 year personal perspective of "real life" experiences that come from living with the effects of sexual abuse.

Rene Rivkin beaten to death by Media and Judge!

POST MORTEM: The pleasure pain syndrome!

RENE Rivkin committed suicide last Sunday; after he was nearly beaten to death by the mainstream media and the Judge who sentenced him, which no doubt had an impact on his marriage, after 32 years.

The 61-year-old stockbroker was found dead in a bedroom in his son's Darling Point Rd penthouse by a relative, understood to be his mother. An ambulance was called at 4.40pm but he was already dead.

Rose Bay police received a call at 5.15pm and cordoned off the seven-storey apartment block while they set up a crime scene. A forensic services unit arrived at 6.20pm.

It is understood Rivkin died of an overdose of prescription pills. The community has learned Rivkin slumped into deep depression less than three weeks ago, after he and his wife Gayle divorced, and after he was nearly beaten to death by the judge who sentenced him and the mainstream media - out to get him.

The high-profile trader had since been living with his 88-year-old mother Rachel at the Darling Point penthouse apartment owned by his son Jordan.

A close family friend said: "Gayle was his support, his whole life and it really hit him hard."

But another close family friend said, " He was publicly shamed and beat up by the mainstream media, using their 'power' and the end result was absolutely devastating for Rivkin. You know, the taller' poppy syndrome, that this country is proud of. He also said, "What was wrong with that judge who sentenced him? A person who's made it deserves better. A Community Service Order would have been more suitable. That's if you actually care about someone's life," he said.

Rivkin's lawyer Greg Walsh said he was devastated by the death. He said he had spoken to Rivkin about four weeks ago and knew he was suicidal.

"He said to me 'You just don't know what it's like to feel the shame. You don't know what it's like feeling shameful all the time. I just want to end it'," Mr Walsh said.

"He was a man who deeply loved his children but felt an overriding sense of shame that he failed them and failed his wife and he was driven by guilt.

"Every time I saw him, most of the time he was crying and talking about killing himself. He was a man in turmoil, it's an absolute tragedy."

Police would not comment on the case but confirmed Rivkin was found dead and could not be revived.

"A 61-year-old male was located deceased in a bedroom in a Darling Point Rd penthouse home in Darling Point by a member of his family," a spokeswoman said.

"There are no suspicious circumstances and the coroner has been informed and a police brief is being prepared."

Rose Bay had a duty officer inspector, a supervisor, a crime manager and a number of detectives at the scene.

In September last year, Rivkin was sent home from weekend detention after Long Bay staff determined the stockbroker was suicidal.

Ten days earlier he was rushed to St Vincent's Hospital after taking an overdose of prescription drugs.

The former flamboyant high-flyer spiralled into depression after being convicted of insider training in May 2002. He was sentenced to nine months' weekend detention at Silverwater jail but collapsed on his second day and was rushed to hospital.

Rivkin did not see the inside of a jail cell for eight months as health problems and mental illness then took their toll. He underwent brain and gall bladder surgery, and was admitted to the Sydney clinic for electro-shock therapy to treat a long running bi-polar disorder. Rivkin's woes mounted as the corporate regulator banned him from managing companies and stripped him of his financial dealer's licence.

Looming over him was the likelihood of criminal charges stemming from an investigation by the corporate regulator ASIC and Australian Federal Police into the so-called Offset Alpine Affair.

Rivkin's psychiatrist Dr Keith Roberts declined to comment.

But our psychiatrist can tell you that Rivkin was pushed to his death by the judge who sentenced him, the media who shamed him (by using their power) the tall poppy killers and last but not least, the Pleasure Pain Syndrome; The more pleasure you have when you've got it, then the more pain you receive when you lose it.

There should be a warning sign on high flyers,

"Don't push me, I'm closer to the edge, I'm trying not to lose my head'.

By PETER GOOSNECK and CHARLES MANSON 3 MAY 05

Related:

Community: Daily Telegraph, you're out of "touch"
This morning the Daily Telegraph has reported that, "judges and Magistrates are out of touch on every crime and penalties should be increased." Turn up for the books? The Daily Telegraph's paid a NSW prisoner $3,000 to go into the prison while doing weekend detention to take a picture of Renee Rivkin. Police failed to lay any charges against the Terror's reporter.

The Daily Telegraph licensed to set up prisoners?
A man who smuggled a mobile phone into a Sydney jail and took pictures of stockbroker Rene Rivkin has been sentenced to 400 hours of community service.

Daily Telegraph asked to pay Jim's Legal Bill
A man has pleaded guilty in a Sydney court to smuggling a mobile phone into Silverwater jail, which was then used to take photographs of convicted insider trader Rene Rivkin.

The Daily Telegraph's prison mates
Who convinced a prisoner on periodic detention to take a mobile phone into prison to take a photo of Rene Rivkin? The prisoner said no and contacted the Daily Terror to say no.

SENTENCING RENE: BRAIN SURGERY OR SUICIDE?
A proper Sentencing Council, such as the one proposed by the Carr Government, would not have sent Rene Rivkin to jail, locked as a slave in a box.

Beam me down Scottie! - We gotta get out of this place
Rene Rivkin may have needed a lesson but did he have to go to jail? The best practice is to divert people like Rivkin away from prison and encourage things like Community Service Orders.

Hep C rife in Victorian jails

More than half the Victorian prison population is infected with the hepatitis C virus, a state government study has found.

The study released by the Department of Justice, [? Department of Law, because there is no justice in prisons], revealed 57 per cent of prisoners had evidence of the hepatitis C infection, compared with one per cent of the general population.

The study, conducted by Melbourne-based epidemiology and social research organisation the Burnet Institute, also showed the prison environment put people at increased risk of contracting blood-borne viruses.

Prisoners were more likely to share a needle and syringe when inside prison than they were outside, the report found.

A second report released by the Justice Department, [? Law Department], found prisoners had higher than average levels of hepatitis A and B, depression, suicidal thoughts and hospitalisation than the rest of the population.

The Victorian Prisoner Health Study, which was conducted by Deloitte Consulting, also revealed a large proportion of the prison population engaged in unsafe behaviour, such as tattooing, drug use, smoking and unsafe sex.

Corrections Victoria said in light of the findings it would target hepatitis in Victorian prisons with an immunisation and education program. [Immunisation with what? Be warned! Put the needle on the Record!]

Corrections Commissioner Kelvin Anderson said the hepatitis B immunisation program would be the first of a number of harm minimisation measures to be implemented in prisons.

But the Victorian Criminal Justice Coalition, has criticised the ability of the criminal justice system, [?Criminal Law System], to deal with pre-existing health problems in the community.

"A more effective use of the community's scarce resources would be to respond to the health needs of vulnerable citizens as they occur rather than increasing the amount of money year by year in incarcerating the mentally ill and those with serious health needs," Victorian Criminal Justice Coalition convenor Father Peter Norden said.

Hepatitis B and C are diseases of the liver and can be spread through blood to blood contact.

By Just Us 17 May 04

Related:

AUSTRALIA: RIOT ACT READ AGAINST INSPECTION TEAM
The secrecy of the unit holding several people charged with terrorist offences, [scapegoats for the Coalition of the Killing's resource war's in the Middle East], here in Australia was confirmed during an attempted community inspection by a delegation from Justice Action. The delegation comprised four women and two men.

Sisters Inside: The power of standing on your own two feet
The old jail, overcrowded and dilapidated, had been simmering with barely contained tension for some time. Many of the 106 women were locked together; two to a cell, in the "bottom" section of the jail behind a gate that prison officers chose to keep shut, restricting the already minimal movement of prisoners and ensuring a tinderbox environment of festering pressures.

Govt stands by child sex offender program
SafeCare offers certain child sex offenders conditional confidentiality if they admit their crime, move out of the home and attend a two-year rehabilitation program run by the agency.

Australian Prisons Message of Solidarity: Greens
The Australian corrections system is appalling and rife with abuse of prisoner's rights. The spiralling numbers of those locked up, now over 23,000, is an indictment on a society which purports to be fair and democratic.

Rally for Inspection of Terror Unit, the HRMU
On Saturday, 15 May 2004 at 1p.m concerned citizens including families and friends will rally at the High Risk Management Unit, Goulburn Jail to demand entry and inspection of the unit where several people charged with terrorist offences, [scapegoats for the Coalition of the Killing's resource war's in the Middle East], are imprisoned.

Australia: Prisoner Abuse Not Just in Iraq
The shocking revelations of abuse of prisoners by US prison guards in Iraq have been denounced by politicians around the world, including our own Prime Minister. But before he feels confident in criticising prison practices elsewhere, Howard needs to know a few things about prison administration in his own country. Justice Action has exposed similar acts here in Australia, but have had no response from authorities.

Doctor Ron Woodham I presume?
"Corrections Health staff provide medical care. However, its staff's authority is essentially limited to making recommendations to corrective services on treatment. Corrective services staff can then decide what treatment can be given."

Justice Brian Sully subscribes to jail retribution
"The high odds are that you will be found out, tracked down and sent to jail . . .then you will be as much at risk from others as your victim was at risk from you."

I was bashed by colleagues: warden
A prison officer doing his rounds at Parklea jail ended up in the emergency ward claiming he had been beaten unconscious by four colleagues.

Probation and Parole in NSW
I am a prisoner at the Goulburn Prison I refer to the New South Wales Crimes (Administration of Sentences) Act 1999 Sect 135.

At The Ministers Pleasure?
Most of these prisoners are held at the *Governors Pleasure* however, it's more like the *Ministers Pleasure* because the Health Minister holds the key and not the board of professional doctors whom even though recommend release the prisoner's remain locked away for political leverage.

Bronson Blessington speaks out
Hello my name is Bronson Blessington. I am writing this letter to you in the hope that you will be able to give me some assistance. I have been in prison now for 15 and 1/2 years. I was given a life sentence when I was 14 years old.

A review of psychiatry, law and politics in Victoria
If non-expert appraisals of 'normal behavior' can be condoned, it nonetheless has to be the case that the behavior under scrutiny takes place in a 'normal' environment, in which a human being can be expected to function normally.

PRISON 'THIS INDEFINITE IDEA'
My name is Steve and I'm at Palen Creek Prison Farm near Rathdowney in Queensland. I was the subject on an "Intelligence Report" written by a QLD prison officer in 1996.

20 Million for trial and no Legal Aid to appeal?
Why don't we want to know the truth? Because the government, police, lower-courts and the prison including the Prisoners Legal Service have decided what the truth is for us! Without getting to the end of the appeal process where the case has been professionally put before judges so they can impartially and objectively interpret the law.

Violent prisoners in anger-control trial?
Prisoners with a history of murder, sex attacks, bashings and stabbings are taking courses in anger management to control their *primal urge* to violence. But is there a *primal urge to violence* and if there is then where did it come from?

NSW Prisoner Hunger Strike: Ivan Milat day 28
Hello, I hope all is fine with you. Thank you for the letter dated 8th March, received today 12th, very inspiring. Forgive me for that incoherent eight pager I wrote out, what had occurred. I was three-four days into this protest, no eating any food.

HRMU: Harm-U for Hicks, Habib?
At the HRMU there are no minimum standard guidelines adhered to and security of the prison over-rules the prisoner's medical needs. Prisoners are self-harming because of the environment they are kept in already.

Today Paedophiles TOMORROW You!
This legislation came to the for during the campaign for the State election in March 2003, Carr announced a plan to introduce child sex offender orders in New South Wales, to restrict the movement of convicted paedophiles in places frequented by children.

Obituary: Garry Nye born 3/4/52 died 1/3/04
On July 24 1991, in a massive operation that traumatised his children and destroyed his house, NSW police arrested him for the murder of criminal Ray Thurgar, using a discredited informer's flimsy evidence.

Cheney's bid for review denied
Cheney asked the court to appoint a judge to review his case, claiming he had been "verballed" by police and "loaded up". But Justice Jeff Shaw said last week there was "no real evidence of police corruption and Cheney, who had a long criminal career, had been convicted on "powerful circumstantial evidence".[?]

MILAT WAS FRAMED FOR TOURISM $$$$$
The bodies of seven backpackers were discovered at the Belanglo Forest in 1992. The victims were German, British and Australian origin. Australia at the time of the discoveries was well advanced in its bid for the Olympic Games to be held here in year 2000.

NSW Prisoner Hunger Strike: Ivan Milat
It looks like Premier Carr's anti Milat Campaign is working well again, his application to the Judge in chambers to seek an order to be allowed to orally argue his appeal to the High Court was refused.

Brett Collins: Speech to Nagle Symposium 25 years on
I was serving 17 years, was in segregation and had served five of the almost ten I eventually did. The prison movement outside had made the Royal Commission aware of the plight I was in as one of the prisoner organisers. That attention meant I was safer from that time on. Although two years later I was returned to Grafton with the classification of intractable.

REPORT CARD ON NSW PRISONS
Ending the 'institutionalised bash' now replaced by the institutionalised 'solitary confinement' cave their heads in bash. Former Royal Commissioner Justice John Nagle and Professor Tony Vinson are the keynote speakers at a seminar this week marking 25 years since the landmark Nagle Report into NSW prisons.

Jails the new asylums?
QUENTIN DEMPSTER: Asylum seekers -- no, not what you think -- but those who are so disillusioned with the current approach of our mental health system that they believe we should go back to the old ways and rebuild the asylums.

Inside Out Community Forum
Inside Out Association of NSW Incorporated is a newly formed initiative aiming towards developing genuine educational, rehabilitative, and re-integrative programs and assistance packages for prisoners and others effected by the criminal justice system, [criminal law system.]

Government justice not personal justice
Mr Collins said that, " No one is entitled to add to the court sentence to wreak personal vengeance on the offender, this is government justice not personal justice."

Risk Assessment Tools: Justice Health
As I mentioned at the time, there are indeed a large range of actuarial tools for making such assessments, but a review of the literature shows that their ability to predict dangerousness in any one individual is next to zero (or as the Macarthur Study puts it, "the unaided abilities of mental health professionals to perform this task are modest at best"

Experts: The Prisoner's Dilemma
[One] reason we are so-so scientists is that our brains were shaped for fitness [to the peopled environment], not for truth. Sometimes the truth is adaptive, but sometimes it is not. Conflicts of interest are inherent to the human condition, and we are apt to want our version of the truth, rather than the truth itself, to prevail.

Ron Woodham my faithful Commissioner?
The Departments have all the senior legal staff, they have the brightest minds in the country and others who are willing to get their hands dirty to get the job done. They have the law and legislation which they can do with as they will, and a budget to blow your minds!

Sentencing: Violent crime and practical outcomes
It's about just deserts, time to stop and reflect, to gain insight into your offending behaviour, to learn more ideas, retribution for the victims, and to set an example for the community.

The Nagle Report 25 years on
On 25 February 2004 the Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales and the Centre for Health Research in Criminal Justice will be co-hosting a seminar to celebrate the Nagle Royal Commission. The seminar will be held in Parliament House, Macquarie Street Sydney, from 5.00pm. Entry will be free, but seating will be limited.

Practicably Perfect
Do you remember your first driving lesson? You were to steer as close to the curb when parking 'practicably' not perfectly or practically. Why? Because we are not as perfect as Premier Bob Carr wants to be seen. The degree of our mistakes depends on our experience and reflects on our upbringing and sometimes the lack of it.

Defining JA Mentoring
Mentoring is not a new concept. Justice Action graduated its first class of Mentors in December 2003. A good idea has legs of its own, and so the concept of one-on-one support for vulnerable people finding their way in society is now being taken seriously.

Call for royal commission into NSW prison health system
Mr Tony Ross a social justice activist said yesterday that a royal commission into the health system in NSW should be wide reaching to ensure that the Corrections Health Service, [Prisons Health Service], is also exposed because of reported widespread cover ups in the prisons health system.

CONS COMMIT CRIMES IN HASTE, NOW CAN REPENT AT LAWTEY Yes some peasants were out of work, hungry and desperate and had to find a way to feed their families, as they were not born with silver spoons in their mouths, Lord. They just robbed from the rich and gave to poor.

Australian prisoners numbers have increased by 50% over past 10 years In the past 10 years, the prisoner population in Australia increased by nearly 50% from 15,866 in 1993 to 23,555 in 2003, according to figures released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). This increase has exceeded the 15% growth in the Australian adult population in the same period.

NSW Police Association wants sentencing powers?
NSW Police Association president Ian Ball said Inspector Borland now feared for his safety because of a 63 year old man being released from prison after doing a quick 18 for manslaughter.

Conditions in the HRMU
Justice Action is trying to obtain documents on behalf of prisoners held in the Goulburn High Risk Management Unit (HRMU) from the Federal Attorney General's Department, Corrective Services Minister's Conference regarding the process described below, in which the Standard Guidelines for Corrections in Australia were adopted. This documentation will help explain the justification for the conditions in the HRMU.

Man wrongly imprisoned awarded $1m
A Sydney man who was acquitted of murder has won more than $1 million in damages for wrongful arrest and imprisonment. The New South Wales Supreme Court has agreed with Garry Raymond Nye's said that the charge was maliciously laid.

Forensic Hospital at Long Bay
NSW should reject the government decision to set up a secure forensic hospital at Long Bay - or in any place where it can be influenced by the Department of Corrective Services (DCS) (or probably Corrections Health Service (CHS) for that matter).

NSW leaves nation behind in rate and cost of jailing people
NSW not only has the most prisoners of any Australian state but also has the most violent prisoners, among the highest rates of recidivism and an increasingly expensive prison system, a Auditor-General's report says.

HRMU Solitary Confinement And Stopping Violence
I refer to your article on the (HRMU) HIGH RISK MANAGEMENT UNIT AT GOULBURN, TOTAL ABUSE OF POWER:

Database clears up crimes but not used to clear up miscarriages?
NSW Police Minister John Watkins said at the launch of a Sydney conference of international forensic experts meeting to mark 100 years of fingerprinting in NSW.

But there are Keys!
Charles Dickens said, "Life is a secret and you haven't got the key." "And you never will have."

NSW PRISONS: A TOTAL ABUSE OF POWER
We the inmates, [prisoners], at the High Risk Management Unit at Goulburn Correctional Centre, would like to ask you for help in receiving equal treatment and opportunities as other inmates, [prisoners], throughout the system. As we are told that we are not in a segregation units, [solitary confinement units], but we are treated as though we are in one.

Should Pauline Hanson have gone to gaol in the first place?: Carmen Lawrence For example, the cost of running the NSW prison system is over $530 million each year and rising. In addition, the government spends around $90 million per year on building and maintaining prisons.

WHEN THE PUNISHMENT IS THE CRIME AND PLANTING THE SEED The brutality and savagery at Grafton jail that went on for 34 years with people getting their legs and arms broken running the gauntlet through a line of prison guards with batons. Some of those prisoners who were sent to jail for non-violence and punished went on to commit some of the most heinous crimes of the century.

WHY WE SHOULD OPPOSE HOME DETENTION
The ACT Government has drafted a new Bill to implement Home Detention This very discriminatory type of sentence also punishes the family. It is questionable that it has been successful anywhere it has been tried.

Justice Kirby concerned at self-representation
High Court judge Michael Kirby says Australia's justice system is weakened by the increasing number of people representing themselves in court. Justice Kirby says he agrees with One Nation founder Pauline Hanson's concerns about the high cost of legal advice.

A veil of secrecy makes justice in jail a different kind from court justice
Although Queensland courts mete out justice, that justice ends at the gates of the Queensland prisons system where a bureaucratic and politically expedient doctrine of "out of sight - out of mind" takes control.

Hanson: I no longer support mandatory sentencing
One Nation Party founder Pauline Hanson has revealed she contemplated suicide while serving an 11-week jail term in Brisbane. Miss Hanson told about her time in jail and her future plans.

A Question of Innocence
Minister Chris Ellison: Yes we’re watching the progress of this project in NSW with great interest. This has been raised at the Standing Committee of Attorneys General and a working group is looking at this very question. I think we have to have a considered response to this proposal and on a national basis, we would need to have the cooperation of the states and territories.

Children of Prisoners' Support Group
Children of Prisoner's welcomes Ann Symonds as our first Patron at this years AGM and screening of "The Space in Between" video , and will have a visual display to demonstrate the invisible population of children effected by parental incarceration.

REMAND PRISONER BAIL REFUSED, THEN SHOT AND KILLED IN CUSTODY A Melbourne court has been told a prisoner was shot dead as he tried to escape from a hospital. The Melbourne Magistrates Court has been told remand prisoner Garry Whyte was receiving treatment at St Vincent's hospital in May last year, when he tried to escape.

NSW Corrections Health Service: Response
Prisoner: MRRC Long Bay: Corrective Health Services [Prison Health Service] in NSW fares only slightly better than CHS in the US. Force often takes the place of real medical care and custodial staff [guards] in fact must approve all CHS medical decisions.

Solitary Confinement: Our very own Alcatraz
Solitary confinement only makes prisoners more violent and inhumane, writes convicted armed robber Bernie Matthews. They were countless. Grafton floggings were routine and didn't require a reason. Everything at Grafton was routine a mindless, never-ending routine of isolation and solitary confinement that was punctuated by a screw's baton, boot or fist. The prison system called it rehabilitation.

The Sentencing (crime of murder) and parole reform act 2003
We wish for each and every prisoner to be brought in front of a Judge to have closure on their sentences, a fixed non-parole period on an individual basis, to give these people a chance to be able to rehabilitate and to stop them being used as Political Prisoners.

Prisoners as citizens and duty of care
For a long time now most learned people have been aware of the book Prisoners as Citizens. The Victorian Opposition is outraged at a confidential payout won by a prisoner injured while playing table tennis at the Melbourne Remand Centre because they can't afford the book?

Long Bay: Corrections Health Services in NSW prisons
Firstly, to call the Prison Health Service a Corrections Health Services is the first identified mistake. Nice names don't take the place of the type of service, they only attempt to cover up for a bad service, when the service is out the door....

Home detention for people who make mistakes
LEARNERS are getting home detention sentences by the State Government diverting people from the anti-social prison system.

MULTICULTURAL SISTERS INSIDE
Sisters Inside is a community organisation that works with women in prison, pre and post release. We challenge the injustices that impact on women in prison, their children and families.

NSW Terrorist Minister leads the way
New South Wales is hosting a two-day conference of state and territory prisons ministers on how to detain terrorists [scapegoats for the Coalition of the Killing's resource war's in the Middle East.]

MENTAL ILLNESS AMONG NEW SOUTH WALES PRISONERS
Anecdotal evidence from staff working in the New South Wales correctional system [prison system] has always suggested a high prevalence of mental illness among the prisoner population.

Yatala Labour Prison Adelaide Going Backwoods: response
Thank you and your team for your support. I have been trying to write you back. However the person has now stopped me from using the computers and education centre and the typewriter has been broken.

On the treatment of prisoners at the NSW HRMU
Prisoners sister's letter from her brother: Following our phone conversation some weeks ago I would like to set out a few points on the treatment of prisoners in the High Risk Management Unit at Goulburn (Super Max) (Guantanamo Bay).

Review of Justice Ministers claims about conditions at HRMU
Minister for Justice John Hatzistergos stated on 15 July 2003 concerning the prisoners at the High Risk Management Unit at Goulbourn.[Prisoners held in solitary confinement and tortured endlessly in a Supermax Prison at Goulburn.]

Lithgow Prison: This is no Irish joke!
Allow me to introduce myself to you my name is John Smith I am writing to you for your help in regards to Corrective Services Jail at Lithgow, I am a prisoner at this centre and I am serving a long sentence. I originally came from Ireland a number of years ago.

Lithgow prisoners speak out about rations
Some new issues have arisen today. A senior officer called me to the office, as they usually do to inform me of all new local orders etc concerning prisoners. The deputy governor has cut back funds for stores. Officers have been told they will issue only the following: One Toilet roll per week per prisoner One Toothbrush per month One plastic disposable spoon, fork, knife per day prisoner exchange only.

NSW PRISON CORRUPTION AT THE HRMU
The High Risk Management Unit at Goulburn [Solitary Confinement Supermax, Torture, Gulag,] alleged to have been the first Australian jail of the 21st century and the most secure in the Southern Hemisphere (it was claimed in an article SMH 14 May 2001).

The Daily Telegraph licensed to set up prisoners?
A man who smuggled a mobile phone into a Sydney jail and took pictures of stockbroker Rene Rivkin has been sentenced to 400 hours of community service.

International Prisoners Justice Day 2003
Justice Action, Prisoners Action Group and others celebrated this year's IPJD by visiting Silverwater Jail Complex and talking to the visitors as they went in and came out. We handed out copies of the media release and Framed to the visitors (who took them inside!) and showed our support for prisoners and their families, talking through the loud hailer so prisoners inside would be aware of our presence.

Weak NSW Government suspends Innocence Panel
The DNA evidence panel is under investigation and the New South Wales Innocence Panel's operations have been suspended and a review of how it works ordered.

Is Prison Obsolete?
Eileen is a senior lecturer in the School of Social Work UNSW where she teaches and researches in the areas of social policy and social development. She has been the chief researcher, and has also collaborated on projects and publications regarding prisons, the criminal justice system and women, public and social housing and indigenous matters. She has recently completed major research on ex-prisoners, accommodation and social reintegration. Eileen has been active in using research to argue for policy change in the NSW criminal justice field for some years.

Escape proof but not so the prisoners mind
Fewer prisoners escape from prison these days because they're "cemented in" by materials that do not break and by legislation that can keep prisoners in jail until they die. All new prisons are virtually unbreakable. Built out of products like perspex, concrete and steel that have no flexibility and ensure that the prisoners of today take the full brunt of all Department of Corrective Services institutional failures.

Parents on the inside leave children on the edge
They have been dubbed the forgotten generation - the innocent casualties of their parents' crimes. New research shows that in 2001 14,500 NSW children had a parent in jail. And 60,000 NSW children under 16 have experienced the incarceration of a parent, more than half enduring the trauma of separation before they turn five.

New video to create empathy in violent criminals?
Violent offenders in New South Wales prisons will be the audience for a new video put together by the victims of crime group, Enough is Enough, but nothing from the ex-prisoners, support groups, like Justice Action, because they don't rate?

Junee Prison, NSW Parliament and Noble Cause Corruption
I have not been charged with any offence. The first thing I knew was when they (the Intel officer) at Junee had me called to reception. I was then told that I was going to segregation for good order and discipline.

Beyond Bars: Sentencing reform
A spokesperson Dr Tim Anderson said, " The law reform commission was too gutless on this a few years back but re-introducing remissions (perhaps under another name) would be a valuable move best wishes".

The Australian Institute of Criminology has released the National Deaths in Custody Program annual report for 2002 Between January and December 2002, there was a total of 69 deaths in custody in Australia. There were 50 deaths in prison custody and 19 deaths in police custody and custody-related police operations.

Yatala Labour Prison Adelaide Going Backwoods
I'm a prisoner in south Australia (Adelaide), Yatala Labour Prison, I'm 39 years old with only two and a half years spent in the community since the age of 13. I came into the adult prison system in 1985; I was released in 1998 only to re-offend. I'm now doing 30 years with a 16-year non-parole period, as it's truth in sentencing in our state and there is no remission. My release date is 2016.

Inspector General of Corrective Services Debate
Below is our response to Justice Minister Hatzistergos' comments in a debate in Parliament on July 2, 2003 regarding the impending decision about the future of the Inspector General of Corrective Services in NSW.

Hatzistergos: The Daily Telegraph's prison mates
Who convinced a prisoner on periodic detention to take a mobile phone into prison to take a photo of Rene Rivkin? The prisoner said no and contacted the Daily Terror to say no.

PRISONERS OFFER OF RECONCILIATION
Premier Bob Carr, Deputy Premier Andrew Refshauge, Senator Aden Ridgeway, and other community representatives have been invited to receive the message from the men of "The Hole.

Goulburn Solitary Confinement: Midnight Special
If you ever go to Goulburn HRMU yeah, you better walk right, you'd better not breathe and sure thing better not fight. The next thing you know the SCU gonna arrest you and Rotten Ron send you down and you can bet your bottom dollar Lord, you'll be chaingang bound.

Carr defends prison handling of political PRISONER
Bob Carr should be ashamed of himself after giving the prisons Commissioner Rotten Ron Woodham another filthy job setting up Phuong Ngo as one of the most dangerous prisoners in the State.

How the QLD Dangerous Prisoners Act failed the first test
What is dangerous? Everyone is dangerous naturally it really depends on how far a person is pushed. Standing on a mountaintop with someone walking you backwoods towards the edge would promote fight or flight and if there is nowhere to fly but over the edge you may choose to respond. When a person breaks the law they lack social skills or are repressed into breaking the law.

Prison rehab programs in 'disarray': Opp
The New South Wales Opposition says rehabilitation in the state's prisons is in disarray. But the states prisons could never rehabilitate in the first place. So how can it be in disarray? The space station as it is known cannot rehabilitate because it's only a dot on the community map, as it were, in relation to how people were raised.

RESPONSE TO REVIEW OF INSPECTOR GENERAL OF PRISONS
Justice Action calls for the retention of the office of Inspector General and a restructure of the legislation making it truly independent.

Old bureaucrats to say whether they felt there should be an effective inspector of bureaucrats?
JA is urgently working on a response to the 31 page review of the position of the Inspector General of Corrective Services position released by the Minister on10/6/03.

High Risk Management Unit (HRMU) INSPECTION
This letter is to request permission for an independent inspection team to examine the 75-cell HRMU at Goulburn Jail. The proposed inspection team consists of specialist doctors, jurists, members of the Corrections Health Service Consumer Council and prisoners representatives.

MJA - BBCD Outbreaks in NSW prisons
Seems some of our friends in & around Corrections Health Service (CHS) were able to take advantage of a couple of recognised cases of needle sharing by HIV positive prisoners to gather data for a study.

Intractables
As an ex-Grafton intractable (1971-1975) and the only living ex-prisoner to have served the longest time inside Katingal (1975-1978) I feel qualified to offer the following personal observations:

Intolerable Conditions of Prisoners at Goulburn's HRMU
We wish to with respect, level a serious complaint against the Chief Executive Officer, Corrections Health Services, Dr Richard Matthews.

NSW death in custody, false imprisonment, and assault
Knight's case sparked headlines after it emerged that his suicide in John Moroney Correctional Centre [prison] in Sydney on January 22 occurred 18 days after his official release date.

Victorian (Australia) Juvenile Deaths in Custody & Post-Release has just been published on the British Journal of Medicine Quotes (BJM): "The risk of death was nine times higher in male offenders than in the reference Victorian male population. Although the estimate is unstable because of the small number of deaths, female offenders seemed to be about 40 times more likely to die than the reference Victorian female population."

The Criminal Law (Rehabilitation of Offenders) Act 1986 Qld
The Criminal Law (Rehabilitation of Offenders) Act 1986 (Qld), requires that any person who has committed an offence which is less than 10 years old or which resulted in a prison sentence of more than 30 months, must disclose that offence if requested eg. for employment purposes. If a criminal record is disclosed in a job application, it is unlikely that person will be given the job.

NSW Serious Offenders Review Council
In response to a letter we have received from Mr K C who has said that he is serving 24 years and 10 months commencing on 29/8/1991 with his earliest release date being 28/6/2016 with 4 years parole and full time 28/6/2020. He said that he contacted the Serious Offenders Review Council in writing but received no response.

Justice Action's complaints about ACM to the NSW Ombudsman fell on deaf ears The Federal Government is reviewing allegations that the company it pays to run Australia's detention centres the same company who runs Junee Jail in NSW has fraudulently reduced staffing levels in at least one centre to increase its profits.

Token Parole Board reforms silent on Govt bungle
The Carr governments token reforms of the Parole Board are minimalist and still fail to explain the election cover-up of mismanagement, which contributed to an inmate's [a prisoners] death.

PAROLE BOARD REWARDED? FOR DEADLY MISTAKE
The Justice Minister has released government reforms to the Parole Board following the death of an aboriginal inmate, which was due to a Parole Board error.

Sentencing innovation breaks vicious circle of jail terms
"Three months' jail for one punch in a pub fight is too much," said the victim. The victim's comment counted because he and the offender, Robert Bolt, a Nowra Aborigine, were making history in the first case of circle sentencing, a new way of deciding punishment for indigenous offenders.

Letter from the mother of a prisoner on remand at the High Risk Management Unit Goulburn Correctional Centre I am writing to give you permission to make any inquiries on my behalf as I am invalid pensioner who doesn't drive and been only well enough to travel by train once in 15 months to see my son Scott Simpson. I have enclosed a copy of Scott's letter and also a copy of gaol papers form I have to fill out and wait to see if I'm allowed in to see him. He doesn't get any visits. He is in the Supermax and deprived of any privileges not even legal Aid will fund a solicitor to see him in Goulburn.

WA Jail trade in 'sex for favours'
THE West Australian Government has ordered an inquiry into claims guards at Perth's main women's prison are trading favours for sex, and encouraging inmates to form lesbian relationships.

NSW prisons over-crowded. Gov't orders investigation into death in custody
In January this year, a 23-year-old Aboriginal prisoner was found hanging in his cell in a Sydney jail 18 days after he was due to be released.

Yes Minister: 'Justice Action meets John Hatzistergos Justice Mininster' We have taken a few days to pass this on, as we wanted clarification of the minister's statement about the purposes of imprisonment before publishing it.

Beyond Bars Alliance colleagues
There are certainly problems with the IG's terms of reference and the position is not nearly as strong as it should or could be but it should not be lost it should be strengthened (along the lines of the UK IG of Prisons) to provide an independent voice to the Parliament regarding activities and processes that otherwise happen behind prison walls.

Submissions for Review of Inspector General
There is a very serious attack happening on the office of the NSW Inspector General of Corrective Services. A secret and flawed review is taking place at this moment, and we call upon all individuals and organisations interested in the area to make their views known.

Two thirds of a billion dollars and DCS can't work out what authority they have? "Two thirds of a billion dollars of taxpayers money and the Department of Corrective Services can't work out what authority they have to hold the people who are in jail."

Australia: Private Prisons, Junee NSW
When I got to Junee I was given nothing except bed linen. That's it! No clothing. I had to put my name down for clothing, which they said I could get on Saturday. When I went down to get my clothing on Saturday I was told they had nothing but I was told that I could buy what I wanted on their monthly buy-up. In the mean time I got rashes between my legs from the dirty clothes I had on.

Justice Action meets with new Minister for Justice
John Hatzistergos Minister for Justice is meeting with Brett Collins and Justice Action today at 11:30 a.m.

ARUNTA PHONE SYSTEM: IDC Lithgow Prison
The prisoners of Lithgow Correctional Centre have requested that the Lithgow Inmate Development Committee write to you on their behalf and ask that the phone systems heavy burden upon the prisoners at this institution and their families be reviewed. I will outline the problems.

Health problems denied in prison
Lithgow Correctional Centre (IDC) Inmate Development Committee "Currently there are 72 inmates on the doctors waiting list with only one doctor coming fortnightly and usually on a weekend".

NSW Prisons Inmate Development Committee speaks out
I am writing on behalf of the IDC Inmate Development Committee in area 3, MSPC at Long Bay. Area 3 is where, the Department is congregating minimum-security offenders within maximum-security walls whilst awaiting mandatory programs at Cubit (Sex Offenders Program).

THE GULAG TREATMENT - The Trauma Of Court Appearances When Incarcerated Prisoner transport vehicle 10th January 2003 It's about 4.40am, very darkoutside and although I'm expecting it, it is still intrusive when my dreams are interrupted by the sound of my name, it is the officer checking that I'm awake ready to face the long day ahead.

Sir David Longland Correctional Centre
If it were possible to characterize the term B Block attitude in a modern dictionary, it would read something like "demeanor of inhabitance" or "state of mind or behaviour of occupants".

SIR DAVID LONGLAND CORRECTIONAL CENTRE QLD - CELLS IN B BLOCK The cells in B Block are like no other in any Queensland prison. After Mr. Cooper was severally embarrassed by the Abbott and Co escape on 4th November 1997, he visited B Block and the surrounding grounds. It was that visit, by Cooper, that set in motion a plan (up the ante) to make sure security in B Block would never embarrass him again. It was like closing the gate after the horse has bolted.

Inspector General Ignored On Womens Prison
Four months after a report from the Inspector General on Mulawa Correctional Centre, key recommendations involving safety and welfare of prisoners and staff have been ignored. Kathryn Armstrong (former chair of Inmate Development Committee) and Annabel Walsh, released from Mulawa Womens Prison in February, have produced an independent report confirming the findings of the Inspector General.

Distribution of: 'How to Votes in prisons'?
Justice Action have received information from Andrew Burke of the NSW Greens that they have enquired with the Department of Corrective Services as to the procedure for distributing their How To Votes in prisons in the period before the election.

Getting Justice Wrong DPP make full admissions
Back in May 2001 Nicholas Cowdery QC made an error at law by giving a speech called Getting Justice Wrong at the University of New England, Armidale Thursday, 31 May 2001. Sir Frank Kitto, Lecture now published at the DPP website. At page six, paragraph 3 under the heading:

NSW ELECTION 2003: VOTE 1 GREENS
Inspector-General: The Greens believe that the role of the Inspector-General is crucial to the proper functioning of the prison system. It has never been more important to have a powerful watchdog role than today. Section 3.11 of our Criminal Justice Policy commits the Greens to "strengthening the role of the Inspector-General of Prisons."

Long Bay Prison: The latest inside story
Private food purchases called Buy-Ups that normally take care of the prisoners additional food nutrition in Jail has been changed.

Doing time even harder: 146 prisoners far from home
The United States, however, has detained without trial about 650 men from 43 countries. They include Australians David Hicks and Mamdouh Habib, who are held at the Guantanamo Bay naval base as part of the sweep against global terrorism [scapegoats for the Coalition of the Killing's, pre-emptive strikes, occupation and genocide for resources in the Middle East.]

Human Rights 'Framed'
Here is a quick report on our Human Rights Commission approach on Framed (the quarterly magazine of Justice Action) being banned from all NSW prisons. After 42 issues went in.

Prison Privatisation: Death camps looming in NSW
I asked for the identification of the person I was speaking to and was told that I was not entitled to that information. I needed to verify the call and asked for a name or number to register my call because I was asked to get those details by my coordinator.The person refused to identify themselves either by name or number. I asked to be transferred to a senior person and was refused. The person I spoke to then hung up the phone.

Corrections Victoria and criminal acts: SCS-4\320 UPDATE
You have stated "Section 30 of the Corrections Act 1986 and the Information Privacy Act 2000, restricts the release of confidential information regarding prisoners, I therefore am unable to provide any information regarding this matter."

Death camps looming in Victoria
A letter was received on 15 January 03 from SCS-4\320 a remand prisoner in Victoria's Barwon Prison I later found out that the prisoner was in the Acacia High Security Unit.

Take crime talk beyond the bars:'lobby group'
A coalition of academics, crime experts, welfare and church groups is preparing to launch an intensive pre-election campaign aimed at refocusing the attention of NSW politicians from harsh sentencing reforms to crime prevention strategies.

Six weeks, six months, six years: inmates have little chance of making fresh start More than 15,500 people are released from NSW prisons each year, twice the number of 20 years ago. But new research shows many ex-prisoners find it impossible to reintegrate into society and, months after release, are worse off than before they went to jail.

NSW A-G moves to stop criminals and ex-criminals selling stories
From next month criminals or ex-criminals who try to profit (earn a living for paid work, like writing a book etc..) from their crimes in New South Wales will have the proceeds confiscated.

NSW Govt criticised over criminal justice record
Key criminal justice groups have described the New South Wales Government's record on justice issues as a "disappointing performance".

APPOINTMENT OF KLOK IS: 'DECLARATION OF WAR'
The decision of the Carr government to appoint John Jacob Klok as the new Assistant Commissioner for Corrective Services in charge of security represents a statement of contempt to all those concerned about law and justice in NSW.

Prisoners Representatives Excommunicated
Ron Woodham, Commissioner Corrective Services stated "[this Department] does not recognise Justice Action as an advocate on correctional centre issues." He has ordered a ban on all Justice Action material inside the NSW prison system. This resulted from a request for the approval of the latest edition of Framed (the Magazine of Justice Action) to be distributed throughout NSW prisons as has occurred for the past ten years.

Dept of Corrective Services: Rotten Ron Woodham on the ropes
This is The Freeedom Of Speech and The Press in a goldfish-bowl! Herr Goebells has spoken. Zieg Heil! (Which means, actually: "aim-for health!" incidentally)Apologies for not making meetings ... my first experiences with Woodham (then a -screw-gestapo-minor-with-a-friendly-dog - AND YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS WHEN EVEN HIS DOG DOESN`T LIKE HIM?)

At the Minister's Pleasure The case of Michael Kelly
Michael is caught up in a particularly cruel version of the game of Cat and Mouse. Because he is classified as a forensic patient under the Mental Heath Act of NSW, the Minister for Health is his master, not the Minister for Corrective Services. And the Minister for health will not let him go.

EX-PRISONER UNEMPLOYMENT: SENTENCED FOR LIFE
Name remove by request served time in prison decades ago. Shes still being punished today. According to commonwealth and state legislation, ex-prisoners applying for jobs must declare any conviction that fits into the following categories: less than 10 years old, more than 10 years old but served more than 30 months in prison.

ARE YOU INNOCENT?
The Australian Law Reform Commission had recommended that the Innocence Panel be independent and have the power to investigate alleged miscarriages of justice.

RESTORING TRUE JUSTICE:
Australian prisons are fast becoming the new asylums of the third millennium. The prison industry is booming, while Australia spends far less on mental health services than similar countries.

Medical records Alex Mitchell's lost world
Perhaps we can get your medical report and spew it around publicly so you can see how it feels. But surely we do not have to go that far. And of course we are law-abiding citizens and I should think it would be enough to remind you of your ethics to report at all.

NSW Department of Corrective Services attack right to privacy
Corrective Services Minister Richard Amery has a problem attacking prisoners right to privacy.It seems to us that a civil society is best served when social justice laws are applied to all people regardless of their circumstances. Once government starts making exceptions which disadvantage certain groups and individuals, such laws are meaningless.

Litigants are drowning: in the High Court
There were so many self represented litigants appearing in the High Court that more than half of its registry staff's time was taken up in dealing with them. The "go it alone" litigants have to take on tasks well above their qualified league causing them stress. This growing problem cannot be left unchecked.

Everyone wants to get out of 'jail' but 'Framed' wants life: Rotten Ron on the ropes On 2 May 2002, Justice Action received a faxed letter from Manager of DCS Operations Support Branch saying that, in his view, articles in Framed edition #42 'lack balance and integrity' and he is therefore 'not prepared to recommend this issue of Framed for placement in to correctional centre libraries.' Prisoners and those concerned about prisoner issues have very few sources of information.

Methadone addicts formed within: 'NSW Prisons'
The New South Wales Opposition has accused the State Government of turning jailed heroin users into Methadone addicts.

Murder charge first for DNA data bank link, but not the same as solving the murder Mass DNA testing of prisoners has [allegedly] led to the first NSW case of a person being charged with a previously unsolved murder as a result of a controversial gene-matching data bank.

Prisoners can prove innocence for $20?
Les Kennedy Daily Telegraph reported today that" Prisoners who believe that DNA will prove they were wrongly convicted will have the chance to prove their innocence for a mere $20 administration fee. The move comes 20 months after NSW inmates were asked to provide DNA for comparison with a databank of DNA from unsolved crime scenes for possible convictions.

NSW opposition pledges review of detention laws
A spokesperson for Justice Action Ms Anal Advice said " NSW Prisons are a sex offence if you have been raped, bashed and squatted down to be strip searched. People should be diverted from going there at all material times".

Civil libertarians condemn planned changes to prisoners' privacy rights The New South Wales Government is using a recent case involving [framed] serial killer Ivan Milat to justify its decision to remove the privacy rights of prisoners. But really just another attack on Ivan Milat from Parliament House.

The punishment: Is the 'crime'
The punishment is the crime according to retired chief Justice of the Family Court of Australia Justice Alistair Nicholson. "Smacking a child ought to be seen as assault".

NSW prisons - primary industry bailed up!
In many quiet regional centres around NSW there is a new primary industry shaping up. It has something to do with Bail but not with bales. The minister for Agriculture Richard Amery who also has the prisons portfolio is now committed to farming prisoners.

Black Nexus
The Separation of Powers Doctrine is nowcontaminated witharangeofcolours, now leaving us with a black shirt on a once blue bridge that crossed that thin blue line. The 'Amery and Woodham show'.

Prison Mind Games-Do they exist?
Directives are given inside the prison system that are not consistent with the law in NSW. And not in the good interests of the health and well being of the prisoners.

The Government is likely to abolish the Inspector General of Corrective Services position The Mulawa inspection report recommendations below strictly illustrate how important he is.

Chronology - A History of Australian Prisons
[Allegedly:] The events that have shaped NSW prisons - from convict days through royal commissions, to the Supermax of today. [I say allegedly because no one should trust Four Corners [Walls], why? Because they spill out the propaganda of the day for the Government, whether it be wrong or right. A government that lies and has no remorse about it.]

Justice Action
Justice Action is a community based organisation of criminal justice activists. We are prisoners, academics, victims of crime, ex-prisoners, lawyers and general community members. We believe that meaningful change depends upon free exchange of information and community responsibility.

Beyond Bars Alliance colleagues
I imagine all of you received Justice Action's email yesterday regarding the position of Inspector General of Corrective Services.

Community Restorative Centre
NSW spends more than half a billion tax dollars a year on prisons. It costs $60,000 to keep someone in maximum security for a year: more than double the minimum wage. CRC looks for and implements better solutions to the high social and economic costs of crime.

Sisters Inside Inc
Sisters Inside Inc. is an independent community organisation, which exists to advocate for the human rights of women in the criminal justice system, and to address gaps in the services available to them. We work alongside women in prison in determining the best way to fulfil these roles.

Smart Justice
Smart Justice does not support any party but calls for investment in prevention, alternatives to custody and initiatives that tackle the causes of crime. It is important to dispel the myths about 'law and order' and promote real solutions to crime and violence.

Shine For Kids
What happens for a young person who has a parent in prison?There are a lot of consequences for children or young people who have a parent in prison. During Groupwork the kids themselves have identified as being:

Children of Prisoners' Support Group
Children of Prisoner's welcomes Ann Symonds as our first Patron at this years AGM and screening of "The Space in Between" video , and will have a visual display to demonstrate the invisible population of children effected by parental incarceration.