Just before nine o'clock last night, the jury returned guilty verdicts against all three defendants.
It was absolute shambles, to tell you the truth, just absolutely really.
Heavant blood on his clothing the day after the alleged attap.
A shallow mud bank and it fits through a river.
Basically, I think most of the people are used to me are good people.
I think a really important question we need to ask is how many Indigenous prisoners in Australia are innocent.
This is Curtain, a podcast where we pull back the blinds to shine a light on the darkest parts of our justice system and ask who are the victims. I'm Amy Maguire and I'm.
Martin Hodgson, a senior advocate for the Foreign Prisoner Support Service. And a warning, this series contains the names of deceased peoples and has distressing content that might upset some listeners. So over the.
Past year of investigating Kevin Henry's case for curtin the podcast, we've had numerous questions post to us by listeners and one of the main ones is how does Kevin Henry think about our investigation? Another one is have we had contact with Kevin Henry now Mardin. You've had regular contact with Kevin. Can you tell me a little bit about his state of mind and what he thinks about the podcast.
Yeah. So I actually spoke to Kevin as recently as Monday this week, and we spoke for over an hour on the telephone. Kevin is really grateful for the podcast and in general the support that it's created. But most of all, I think for Kevin, the big thing has been the hearing week after week, because he listens as
well as everyone else to his innocence being proven. And I think that's a huge thing for any person who's been wrongfully convicted and who's in prison to hear that the facts are coming forward, that more evidence is being found, but also to know that your own family is hearing those things, that your friends are hearing those things, and that the community in general is hearing that. Because for someone in prison, locked away, they don't have a voice,
they don't even know what other people are saying. All they can do is assume the worst. And when you have been found guilty of such a heinous crime and you are an innocent person, it just compounds that trauma. Of all you know is that everyone surely must just think you're one of the worst people on earth, and that is a huge burden to carry. So after twenty six years, for that to start to be lifted from his shoulders is probably the big thing that Kevin takes away from the podcast.
Have you had an insight in to his state of mind, how he's actually feeling now given the progress in his case to actually prove that he was wrongly collected.
Yeah, I mean, it's been an amazing journey this last year or so, from the first time I spoke to Kevin when we were just getting started with this process to now, and I think it's fair to say that his state of mind now is a lot calmer. But having said that, Kevin has always struck me from the very first time I spoke to him as being an incredibly calm, well thought, well considered individual. Kevin doesn't say things that don't need to be said. He's very clear.
This is someone who, to me, from the very first time I spoke to him, was just so clear in his innocence and what is right and wrong. For anyone who knows Kevin or has got to know him over the years will know that when Kevin speaks about things not just his own case, but any case mistreatment of Aboriginal people around Australia just thinks he observes in the daily goings on in prison. His main concern is about whether things are fair and just or not, and it
comes up in absolutely every conversation. And I think that's something that's obviously built a great deal over the years. I think it's probably something that he's always had as part of him as an individual. But whether we're speaking about his own case or things that might be happening in the outside world, Kevin is very much focused on what is right and what is wrong and really what is fair for the people being impacted by the things that are going on in the world, whether that's inside
those walls or whether that's in the broader world. And so Kevin has a calmness in that sense, in that he doesn't really over complicate things. Things are either the way they should be or they're not, and they need to change.
And so.
As much as people can understand, I think that living in jail, spending twenty six years in prison is a horrific experience. And we haven't begun, we haven't begun to touch on the things that have happened to Kevin over those years. But he is a remarkably calm and well measured individual and just a very thoughtful and polite man.
I think he's always spoken about the pride he has in his elders, and I think there's a lot to be proud in who Kevin Henry is and the way he keeps so calm through all of this, Because as everyone goes about their business, some people might not pick up on the podcast for a few weeks here and there, or miss a few episodes. For every decade that's gone by in people's lives, Kevin spent that locked behind bars.
And people can think about the frustration they have when a traffic light turns red or they get home ten minutes too late because of a train, But twenty six years his life has been stopped and put on hold. Most of us get frustrated about very small things. Kevin is remarkably calm and remarkably strong.
Now, other true crime podcast, which is what they've been labeled, they actually put on the person they're talking about, actually on the quick and we've seen that with the most famous of the podcast serial where they talked quite a lot to the case the person behind the case who they were trying to unravel. Why can't we put Kevin Henry on the podcast of This Plantite?
Okay, So most of the true crime podcasts that people listen to, including people in Australia, almost all of them are from the United States, and prisoners in America almost exclusively are able to speak to the media. There's been very few prisoners in the United States who have been banned contact with the media. So even someone like Charles Manson has given multiple interviews, and largely that comes down to the First Amendment right that they have enshrined in
their constitution. In Australia, access to the media for prisoners is largely governed by correctives services in each state and for the most part it's just simply not allowed. So it's not as if we wouldn't like Kevin to be able to speak, but he would be breaking the rules if he did, and so we are going to do nothing that would jeopardize Kevin's bid for freedom a pardon
and parole. And so that's why Kevin doesn't have a voice on this podcast or anywhere else, because in Australia, for the most part, it's just not allowed.
One of the things we haven't really touched on all in the podcast is that over his period in prison wrongfully convicted, over twenty six years, Kevin Henry's actually picked up the pain rush.
Have you got an.
Insight into where that talent for right actually came from or how it has helped him in dale.
It's a really good question, and it's a thing about Kevin that I noticed from our conversations and about speaking to other people. He has many, many talents. Every person you speak to Kevin who has known him at different times of his childhood or when he was a young adult before he was imprisoned, and those who have known him since he was imprisoned, many of them will speak
of different talents. So he was known to be a remarkable horseman, a very very good footballer, and as you asked about, a great artist and someone who's found a lot of comfort in art. Yet I don't think, like a lot of us, when we have success in some area, I think we all speak about the journey of all that or things like that. Kevin is very different in that sense in that he simply talks about the joy
he gets from things. It's never about center centering himself in anything you speak of, it's about the activity itself, and so something like art gives him a chance. It's an escape obviously for many people in prison who take up artistic endeavor, but it's also a way for a lot of Indigenous prisoners to reconnect with culture, to reconnect with country because they've denied those opportunities. You can't walk on your country, you can't sit with your family, you
can't be there. But one thing you can do to get that out and feel that again is to put it down on canvas, pick up a paint brush. And so one thing Kevin has been able to do is to explore art and it's certainly something that he wants to do when he's released. He's very clear on the things he wants to do when he is released. Rugby league is a big part of his life. Art is
a big part of his life. And reconnecting with his community and family and helping younger people probably the three big passions for Kevin and that give him motivation and drive every day.
We were talking about heaven and Kevin, who currently portrail around how women seeing by.
Society, Well, I think it's a very quick rush to judgment on almost everyone's behalf in society. I mean, I would say basically all not Indigenous people see Indigenous man as criminals. And that's part of why Aboriginal people are the most incarcerated people's on earth, the fact that was confirmed in an article this week after it was raised on an episode of Q and A. But when you talk to Kevin, there is not an ounce of criminality
in who he is. And I've spent more than fifteen years dealing with and working with prisoners right around the world, prisoners who have been guilty, some who have been guilty of some of the worst crimes we can imagine, others who are innocent and facing the death penalty. But what's quite unique to Kevin is that he doesn't speak about any of those things that relate to a criminal life.
So for many of my clients who might have been incarcerated for minor crimes early on in their life and then are wrongfully convicted of a love u crime, that time in prison can be one that does, unfortunately bring them closer to criminal elements because they are imprisoned with people who have committed heinous crimes. And it's one of the problems with prisons and what it does to people, but Kevin just does not have an ounce of that
in him. It's not something he speaks about. He is, like I said before, a very calm, fair minded individual who is always focused on what's right and wrong. So you can be speaking about the smallest of issues and he'll be very quick to point out if something's not fair, something's not right. And I think this is so different to the idea that so many people have in Australia about Aboriginal men, that they're violent criminals who can't help themselves.
I mean, it's an absurd racist stereotype. And yet here is a man Kevin Henry, accused of these horrific crimes which we know he didn't do, who's been in a brutal institution for twenty six years, and yet that can't break who he is either. So I think, if anything, we often celebrate those who achieve great success as here are the people that defy the stereotype. But I don't think that's a clever way or an accurate way to
do it at all. Kevin is someone from a remote area who was in a big regional town, a man of little literacy, certainly a man of no fame until we created this podcast. Who has been subjected to the worst thing any human can be subjected to, which is brutal treatment and the deprivation of their liberty, and yet truth, justice, love for his family and his friends and just what's fair is at the very heart of who he is.
He is the antithesis of what society says aboriginal men are, and yet he is just one of thousands who are like that and yet treated as brutal criminals. And I think if people want to look at what a great, strong black man can be, you don't have to look at the people on the footy posters, look at Kevin Henry, because he has overcome far more and been deprived of everything and yet remains who he is, and he's someone who I think is a remarkable, remarkable individual.
About any influence.
Yeah, it's a really good question, which is that how does any individual in the justice system, whether they're judges, jury members, and in this case what we're dealing with now, parole boards, get past those biases that they have that when they see an aboriginal man or woman before them, that there's these automatic assumptions that people make. And I think it would be silly to assume that people whose society gives great responsibility to such as parole boards can
somehow automatically look past those biases and that racism. And the truth is they don't. Aboriginal people are on remand far and away at much much higher numbers than any other group in Australian society. So that is judgments being made by individuals. In that case, judges Aboriginal people far and away exceed their sentences because of denial of parole by figures in the thousands of percentages over all of
Nonindigenous Australia. And you either have to decide that that is because those parole boards or judges or juries are not giving that Aboriginal person a fair hearing based on the fact that they are Aboriginal, or that Aboriginal people are somehow intrinsically criminal. Well, we know the second one
is just not true. So it's just a fact of the system we are dealing with that this racism exists, and it continues to deprive Aboriginal men and women of a right to parole, of a right to liberty that they are entitled to. And it happens purely because they're black. And so when people are deciding will someone re offend, will someone reintegrate into the community, Well, does someone have
good prospects for work, further education contributing to society. Many Aboriginal prisoners, just like Kevin, will undertake many courses, will rehabilitate, will turn their life around in relations to drug and alcohol, and yet despite all the evidence and hard work they put in, are denied by parole boards year after year. And I think we can say quite convincingly that this has to be only because they are Aboriginal, and the facts bear that out absolutely.
A none other where is so.
Right now as we speak, all the paperwork has been done, all the files are in, All the work that myself and some of Kevin's wonderful legal team have done is finished in terms of what needs to be done for the parole board. And what I can say is that in the next couple of days, the Parole Board of Queensland will meet and decide the fate of Kevin Henry. And until that decision is made, there's not a lot more we can do. So, as people can imagine, it's
a very nervous weight for Kevin. It's a very nervous weight for his family and for all of who have fought for Kevin, who have shown his innocence, who have shown beyond even his innocence, that there is no need to keep Kevin Henry in prison one more day. That he belongs in his community, he belongs on his country, he belongs with his family. He poses no threat to society because he never committed this crime in the first place.
So when weighing up has he rehabilitated, Kevin has made huge changes in his life, and I have no doubt he's a stronger man, a wiser man, a much more well rounded man than he was when he went to prison twenty six years ago. But when he went to prison, he hadn't committed this crime anyway, So those issues of rehabilitation,
as far as I'm concerned, go out the window. I think if Kevin is given a fair hearing, if the facts are examined, if everything is looked at that's been put in place, that would allow Kevin to return to his family, to engage in the community with his art, to follow through his passion for rugby league, for people to see everything that Kevin Henry offers, the potential of a life that was snatched away, not of his doing, when he was just a young man. They were realized
that releasing Kevin is the right thing to do. When we wait and there's no way of giving people any indication of which way it may or may not go, I wish I knew, and I think a fairer system would allow us to know which way something might go. I think it's quite cruel that someone can do everything asked of them and yet still sit there not knowing
whether liberty will be granted to them. But in the next few days the State of Queensland will make that decision about the fate of Kevin Henry, and we will update everyone as soon as we know. But again, we can only hope that the Parole Board looks at everything that's been put before them, considers the man that he is, Kevin Henry, and releases him to his family and his community where he belongs.
Is like that.
Well, Unfortunately, as we've discussed in the past, the Parole Board is somewhat hamstrung by the fact that they have to consider the final verdict in Kevin Henry's trial. So Kevin was found guilty and although we know his innocent, so we know and have presented a great deal of evidence to prove his innocence, and I should say we have a great deal more information as to Kevin's innocence and their strategic reasons why we haven't released that to
the public yet. The Parole Board can certainly take into account many of those issues in determining whether he is a threat to society. So they might have to base their assumptions on a wrong verdict, and they are hamstrung in that sense, but they are not hamstrung from the
facts that have come out over the years. They're not hamstrung by the fact that there is this weight of evidence as to who Kevin Henry is as a man, and that's stuff that has been brought up by those who have written on behalf of Kevin Henry individual Psychi Trist's reports, reports that are done on behalf of corrective services, who have outlined Kevin's good prospects for success in the community.
And I don't think it's acceptable for the Parole Board to simply hide behind a guilty verdict from a flawed decision twenty six years ago. We do understand that legislation that does impede them in some ways, but that can't be the only excuse and it shouldn't be the measure of the man, which is this one ill conceived and
unjust verdict that was handed down twenty six years ago. Now, the other thing to consider too is that, like myself, Amy came to this case without knowing Kevin Henry personally either. So I guess, Amy, what have you learnt about who Heaven is and what's been your thoughts and feelings on coming to know Kevin Henry throughout this process?
I guess when when we both again investigating and Heaven had Henry in case that the man he was actually took second complain.
To the great and not after it.
So we were pretty much fighting because of the principle, because of that this is man and tendally one hundred big thousands of average men and we were not today could would have been locked up for crimes as they didn't do. But over the course of this this podcast, learning what Kevin and Harry like, learning what his family is like and the being, and then about just how your cover the song.
The Man has taken san and age.
I think because we're not not just fighting the principle for humanity and when by writing is someone who is not deserved and had deserved the right to the rest of these days with the free freedom and with the sense that justices that would have bailed.
And I think that's a bigiggest thing.
My let.
Is a fail.
He really loves his community, he loves his time.
Country, and I think, you know, he was given him a chance.
He could have really had had a great life.
He was at the time he was convicted, he was on his way to laugh employment.
We don't really know where he would have ended up, you know.
I think that the really sad thing that he was really stupid of any sort of opportunity to do that. And then we talked a lot about how aboriginal man I think, and it's fundamentally is so very different about average women. The majority of about average man accolutely are And so I really really feel that as this podcast is, you know, fundamentally about can Evan, who is the justice that really evolved the whole community?
And I get I really came in the moment aiming for me as well. I think despite having worked with a lot of prisoners over the years, so many of these cases, as you said, it starts as an investigation both of us coming at it from different angles to look into what happened once we saw this huge injustice, to try and bring justice to Kevin, but you just can't help but be drawn in by the man and his family and who he is as a human being.
And that's a process I think we've both gone through throughout this journey of whether we're doing tackling it forensically as a journalist or from the legal perspective, that more and more it's been about us too being drawn to Kevin and his family and a personal insight into the injustice that's committed against all Aboriginal people who are treated
this way by the justice system. And I really do hope people take that away what you said about Kevin too, that whenever you hear about stats about the incarceration rates of Aboriginal Ontario Strait Island men and women and children, forget the pure numbers. They're shocking. We all know that, Remember that every single one of them stands for a
person like Kevin Henry and his family. Think about what Amy said about being stripped of his potential of who knows what he could achieved, And think about yourself where you draw pride and what keeps you going about the things you have achieved and how that brings pride to your family, and if you've got children, how they're achieved
brings you pride. And they are all these things you can celebrate, from small little things to what happens at weekend sport, to employment and having children and great friendships and adventures we share. Kevin's been robbed of all of that, and every Aboriginal and Terrestraight Islander person and family who is going through this or has been through it, has
been robbed of that. And so when the parole Board meets in the next couple of days, they can decide whether that crime against Kevin Henry, just like it's a crime committed against so many Aboriginal and entires Strait Islander people, will continue, or whether it will end, and finally Kevin will get some chance to live out his potential a free man, as he always should have been