The public has had a long held fascination with detectives. Detective see a side of life the average person is never exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop. For twenty five of those years I was catching killers. That's what I did for a living. I was a homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead, I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated. The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some of the content and language might be confronting. That's because no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged. Join me now as I take you into this world. Michelle, Welcome back Part two. It's good to see you smile. Like the subject we're talking about such a heavy, heavy subject. And I think sometimes people are surprised with the name of the guests that we come on here, that we
can still sit here and have a laugh. But you've got to be able to laugh through situations like this just to survive. Yeah, is that a fair.
Fairment of it? It is? And look, I think I know I just have this determination that we know that the nature of abuse is about power and the best way to take someone's power back is to just be indifferent to them and to live a good life. Yeah, in spite of everything. And I just think that that's yeah.
Try Well, in part one, we got a sense of the impact on you and the shock of this situation evolving where your daughter's come to you and reported that she's been sexually abused and that's impacted on another daughter. We're going to talk about the court system, and in our conversations we had the other day, I got the sense called me very perceptive. I've got the sense there was a certain amount of frustrations with the courts. And I think you said something that that's not a justice sysm.
You've worked out courts and not justice system. It's a legal system. I've heard too many victims of crime telling me that exact thing, and I think I share that share that view. But before we before we move in to talk about the process, because it took two and a half years for it to get to court, there was something else in our conversation that we said that Yeah, it impacted on me, just you telling me the story
and it was about. We clarified before the start of the interview that your daughter's happy for us to talk about it, but Pip, your daughter was so affected by it. She's saying that she didn't want to live.
Yeah, yeah, And look, that was the first time she mentioned that she was ten and she didn't just say I don't want to bear live anymore. She told me how she wanted things to go. And you know, as a as a teacher too, like that's one of the first things when you have a kid, say something, you know, oh, do you have a plan? And she did. She had a plan and she was ten, and you know, the impact on her mental health was significant, and you know
it was ongoing. So one of the things that she found really difficult was that with counselors and things like that, when you're waiting so long to go to court. The Sexual Assault Services really about they're amazing counselors, but she had four different ones in two and a half years. So she was sick of people. She already had issues with people leaving her because we'd had you know, Jen had disappeared from her life, and then she had, you know,
these counselors who were meant to be helping her. She'd develop her rapport with them and then they'd go into something else, and you know, that's not their fault, that is not their fault. But we just saw this really steady decline in her mental health and how she was and she was isolated from friends. You know, there was
so much going on for her. Yeah, so just before we went to court in Sydney, so you know, two and a half years later, it was probably about it was the March I think was Easter weekend in twenty sixteen, and she had been completely irrational at the shops. We were at mum and Dad's place in Kutamundra. We've been in the shops. She wanted to buy something that was just probably what I referred to as happy meal, you know, toys like rubbish, and I said no and she carried on.
It was just completely irrational for the situation anyway, I knew were sort of on a backslide. So we we were walking home and we stopped at a corner and she just looked me doad in the iron and she said, I'm so She looked behind and then she looked me down in the iron and said, I'm so sorry. Mum and she went to run out and there was a car coming around the corner and it was just like she was in so much pain. It was just so
much pain. And there was part of me was like, oh, why are we doing this, Like we shouldn't be putting her through this, And then there was another part of me that knew that her personality is that she would go into that whole of you know, I didn't go through with this, and that means that nothing happened and nothing changed. And so it was this we were trying to balance, you know, do we put our kids through this court process or do we not never expecting it
to be what it was. You know, we had a balcony when we were in Sydney, and she couldn't be on that balcony like we weren't allowed to she couldn't be out of our sight. It was pretty Yeah, it was pretty scary.
I can't even comprehend what you're going through as parents, seeing that ten year old going through that type of type of trauma.
Yeah, and even the services you know, at that time, so as I said, the Sexual Assault Service said this is actually beyond descope like this is and I could completely appreciate that I worked in well being, and I was very prepared for them to say that. We went to CAMS, which is the Child Adolescent Mental Health Mental Health Service, and you know, here's this kid who's she just turned eleven at that point, and she was going to CAMS at the same time as there was a
drug and alcohol support group there. So she would turn up in a room full of you know, all of these people who were seeking support for an addiction. It was just, yeah, it was just terrific. It was really bad look and she sort of she struggled with that for probably the next five years. So she was about fifteen,
and you know, things went pretty poorly. Pips really good at describing things, and you know, I've said, you know, she's a great little writer, and she said this one day, you know, I just feel like I'm down in a hole and i can see everyone up there, but I'm just too tired. I'm too tired. Everything was very weighty. You know, she's at the moment, you know, and for the last few years she's just you know, kicking goals.
She's doing really well. She does what she needs to do to be, you know, to live a good life. But it has been tricky, and she's been very open in talking about it, and I think that's really important that she can be like that and she shares that with people. She shared that as part of her story, you know, when she's been, you know, publicly speaking about her story, and I think that, you know, it shows how strong she is and where she's got to.
Oh, most yeah, most definitely. I think the thing that comes across to me you're articulating what she's going through, what you're going through as a family, is that it's not just the crime doesn't stop when the offense has stopped. The crime permeates its way through years and years of their life, if not their whole life. The type of impact that this childhood sexual abuse, the process, the process took two and a half years to get to court.
Now you've made a point to me before that how long is two and a half years in a young person's life, in the child's life, it would seem like a lifetime.
Well, for Rose, it was a third of her life.
The third of a life going through going through this and trying to get justice. And she's probably confused what even justice is about. Let's just stopping this, making this bad man get punished, which would confuse a child. How do you even explain that to a child? But two and a half years it just seems like an extraordinary long time to wait for the matter to go the court. So that's from the point that he's charged. Yep, now in the country town, not sure of the circumstances. Was
he still living within the community. So they've been sexually assaulted, he's been charged, and then his life, for all intents and purposes, is going on unimpeded, and their kids trying to make sense of, well, we told you what this horrible man did to us, Why is he still walking the streets?
And we had to put protections in place around them in terms of if we go to the supermarket and you see leon, these are the things that you need to do and say, you know, prepare them for all of that. You know that we just didn't. You didn't think that that would ever happen, and fortunately we didn't. We didn't ever see it, We didn't ever run into it. And as much as I think it's you know, it was crap that he was out. It was a crap. How do you live a good life when you're facing
those charges? You know, there's part of me that goes, well, you know, you're still sort of he wasn't living a great life. But I did hate that we had to put these things around the girls. And you know, have a bit of a script. I suppose, you know, if we're in bigw and I'm in this section and you've gone to this section and you see him, this is what you have to say, even though there were a vos and things like that in place, you know, to try and it was just, yeah, it was just another layer.
It was just another layer that you had to add.
It's never ending. And you made the point that instead of going to dancing or netball or playing sport in the afternoon, so your children will going to see counselors. Yeah, and then and the recall, the kids would come up with more information than it'd be passed on to the police. It was just never ending.
And I do like if I had my time again, I probably would have I probably would have been more proactive in letting Glenn as a detective know, look, just letting you know this is what's been said, but no one sort of explains that pros And it's definitely no disrespect to the people who were involved in our case because we had a cracking team. And I say that because of the way that they engage with us. But
you just don't know. I probably could have gone back seven eight nine, you know, and multiple times.
Who has told you yea, he did this to me or he did that.
Yeah, But you kind of go, oh, well, it's sort of all we just know that he did it.
Yeah. And as a parent, you're balancing, Okay, we want justice, we want a person accountable, but you're also looking at how how many times are you going to traumatize you the court? Then seeking justice shouldn't be retraumatizing. Tell us about the court experience, break it right down, like, but what people don't understand. They think, Okay, just go to court, you turn up, they tell you to get there at ten o'clock and you'll give your evidence and all be over.
It's nothing like that. You had to come up to Sydney as a family rent a place.
Well was even before that, so you know, we would see his name in the court listening and Brent would go and we had no idea what a mention was like, we just didn't know.
I'd say this cynically, I think the mention is a way forlicens to get extra money. Half the time, I wonder how many mentions can be on my.
Way over seventy mentions? Yeah, like it was. It was just it was hideous and it you know. So we'd go and and Brent would turn up and do a man. There was one particular day that he went to the mansion.
So I just clarify so people do understand what the mention is. That a person has been charged, they're bailed to appear, or they're they're remanded to appear on a certain date. They turn up and the mention is, okay, how's the case coming along? Is a brief going to be served? And it just drags.
On and we need some extra time.
Yeah, the defense, Yeah, will turn up and it was sometimes it's a prosecution. We need some extra time, and so then it gets put back in the list again time and time again from people going through the situation. You're going through. Your life is hinging on what happens on this court matter. Like that, everything that you're doing in life is around what's going to happen in this court matter. And the amount of time go anywhere.
Yeah, you have to stay, you have to be available just in case it becomes more than a mention. Yeah, So you know we had so Brent was going to them and eventually, you know, what what's this mentioned about?
What is that? So you know, it was explained to us exactly what you've just said now, So we stopped going to that and then we so the solicitor who was working the case on behalf of the crown, and I do say our solicitor was Nat and Nat was fabulous and she was on board sort of from the beginning. She could speed read. I thought that was amazing. You know, she was just she was incredible, and she knew the case inside and out. She was probably the most consistent
person from that legal side for us. Obviously there was Glenn. You know, I had Glenn called me one day at school to let me know that he'd received a letter from the solicitor, the defendants solicitor, and you know, I needed to stop telling people what he had done to my children, which I certainly wasn't out there telling the community. It was very targeted, as we talked about earlier, and you know, I, yeah, so he was saying all this and I actually was really cranky about that.
I'd understand why you yeah cranky about that, and I get cranky about that. You're telling you're trying to protect kids.
And he was another person in the community that we knew. We were connected to this guy, and I was like, well, you chose to defend him. But you know what I did Gary, I asked Glenn, I said, how much does it cost for them to send a letter? And he's like, what do you mean? I said, well, how much does every letter cost? And he said, oh, three hundred more than that. I said, well, every time he sends a letter, can you reply and have a question at the end?
I love that.
I said, if he is found not guilty, at least I will have pleasure in the fact that he's had to pay for it. Because that was the biggest tight asses you've ever met. And you know, I was just like, where do you get your wins? That's where you get your wins?
What a brilliant strategy. I like, I don't think it's illegal.
Yeah anyway, So yeah, all that sort of stuff was happening. So we had NAT and that was based in Sydney. We were in Aubury. We had the barrister. The Crown Barrister was based in Wogga. His name was Vince and he was exceptional with the kids, had a really great manner with them. So we did start the case. They did start the trial in Aubury. They started the trial and I think that was sort of the August. It was. It was nearly two years at that point. So we
went into the courthouse in Aubrey. We did practices. The girls went in there to show you know, where the room was, and that was that was a shit moment, Like for me, I just thought, what am I doing? You Like, this is not like Year ten mock trial. That was my last experience of a court house. It's intimidating, it was, and you know, especially there on a Monday, because there's some interesting characters in the hallways on a Monday.
And we yeah, so we went in and they did their practices and them the day that we went Brent had organized everything with military precision because he likes to you know, be on time and in control, and this was totally outside of our control. But he could organize getting the girls into the courthouse without having to see him, you know, So we had friends lined up and helping
with that. Anyway, we went in and he was sitting across the aisle, you know, he was sitting across the aisle from from us, and I was just looking, thing, where is the protection, Like there is nothing, there's nothing here for these kids. So this man who had, you know, spent all this time making them feel horrible, was across the isle and he was smug. He just sat there and he looked and it was just yuck. Anyway, So it was it was frightening for the kids. Yeah.
Look.
And so my brother actually came along. My brother is seven years younger than me, and he had lived with us for a period of time and knew these people as well, and he sort of he recognized that the kids were scared, and you know, he sort of kept looking at the window of you know, this room that we're in, and he goes, oh, is that him? And I was like, yeah, he's gone, Geezy looks old. I was like, yeah he does, Yeah he does. And I could sort of pick up where he's going. He said, I reckon, he looks a
bit fat too. He's like got old and fat. And I was like, yeah he has. And he's like he's just an old, fat motherfucker like me. Anyway, the girl started giggling, and there was you know, some other people in the room as well at the time. Everyone's sort of giggling, and he was named the motherfucker from therefore, like the girls have never used his name, that's what his name is. And it just was enough to make them feel a little bit powerful.
I understand what you're saying there, and they can they've got control here, they've got your support them. Yeah, we can call it this like what we want to call him because he doesn't deserve any respect.
Yeah, yeah, I get it.
I get so.
You know, that was good and so you take your little wins like that. Unfortunately, for reasons that is, they're too unbelievable and I really don't think people believe it. We ended up not going through with their case in Aubrey. They decided it would be best if it was moved to Sydney.
Who decided that.
So there was a bit of back room banter between the judge and you know, the barristers about a previous case that had been had and one of the barristers the defense barris so he actually was defending a very well known criminal up here in Sydney later in that week, and so if they started the trial, they they wouldn't be able to complete it at that time, and so it was a very good out for the Crown to say, well,
let's not start it. They felt that it would be better if we were not, if we didn't have our trial in that place.
Okay, yeah, yeah, it goes to Sydney. A couple of things about Sydney and these really hit home to me. You're going to move the whole family up here for four or five weeks. I think that we.
Thought we were going to be here for two weeks.
Yeah, it drags on and on the court matter, your daughters are going in and you're basically handing them over to people, and you're not allowed into court while they're giving evidence. One of your daughters was in the witness box for five days or giving evidence for five days and you can't be present.
And that was just during the trial. So we had to have the pre trial because they were trying, they were trying to get the cases separated. So and I don't think people understand that happens a lot, particularly with child sex cases. So what they and it used to be very frequent and unfortunately the Royal Commission sort of one of their recommendations is that this is a process
that's looked at. But what they used to do is say, well, you can't you know, even though these girls or sisters were trying the case separately, because there might have been collusion or concoction or whatever. So they did that fancy word GUARDI one of those, so the trial before the trial, you know, and again had no knowledge of what that was. And so we went to so they came up here
and they had to do that first. So essentially both the girls had to listen to all of their evidence and be cross examined, and myself to action and I sucked. I was really bad in the pre trial before they decided to keep the cases.
Okay, so that they've had an application to separate the separate the trial. So he was charged and probably should I should have clarified that earlier. He was charged. I believe four counts with Rose.
I can't remember.
There were a lot, okay, charges related to Rose and charges related to Pepper. Yeah, and they tried to separate separate the trial, so that okay, so we've got the trial, you've had the voidier where you've got to give evidence and you go for all the trauma associated with a normal trial anyway, But it's at sake for legal argument to determine. Okay, they're going to be heard together, then
you've got to go through through it again. I correct me if I'm wrong, but I think one of your children was giving evidence and had to give evidence again because the jury member fell asleep.
Yep.
And you can't make this stuff up, but no, this is this happens. Things happened, but.
It was and it was interesting. My youngest sister, she's fierce and she was she was with the girl, she was supporting the girls just outside the room because we weren't able to be there, and she when she came down after we didn't know what had happened. We just knew that they were going to have to impanel a
new jury. And she came down in the lift you know, the back of the Downing Center there and rose like runs out of the lift and you know, jumps and Brent catches her like I haven't just been sitting and listening to like, you know, she just had this beautiful way about her. But what we didn't realize is that another lift had come down at the same time opened up and these people sort of walked down and stopped, and they sort of all ran into one another. You know.
It was one of those moments. And I looked over and Anna looked at them, and she gave them this look like my sister. She gave them this look. I'm like, oh my goodness, what's going on here? And she said get her out of here, get her out of here. And I was like, what are you talking about. She goes one of those motherfuckers just fell asleep, and we got to start over. We didn't know, we didn't know.
A couple of those jury members were actually quite tear particularly when they saw that interaction, I think between Brendan Rose realizing she was just a little girl. Yeah, and because they'd already heard everything so they knew what the case was about, so they would have Yeah.
And the trauma. You said, said to me the other day when we're talking that, how angry you were at the judge And do you want to talk about talk about that?
Yeah? So we as I said, So we did that, and I think that was a few days. I think it was four or five days. And there was also they tried to get a ruling that I couldn't say how I found out about what had happened to the girls, like how it was presented to me. They didn't want me to be able to say the words, and the words are very impactful.
They were trying to stop you, like the first report of this is when your five year old daughter jumps in the bed and tells you what she told you, that that like Leon licking my vagina. They argued to exclude that. Yep, I look at the way of evidence that comes across. It comes across with that, and I just get frustrated with the court system.
Sometimes it's almost like, you know, it hurts our ears to hear that, like it did. Anyway, Fortunately, they did say that we could use that. You know that I could because it provide a context.
Right, and the point that we were talking about was your anger and frustration that the judge and the defense on how your children were true.
So we had as I said that multiple days, so Rose had to listen to her evidence three times and then answer questions. They have a witness support person, so they met that witness support person during the process. We had there was the lady from SAS from Sexual Assault Service in Aubrey came up with us. But because the trial went for so long the funding ran out for her to be there, so she was actually only there,
she wasn't really there while they actually gave evidence. And we also had Maggie who was giving evidence as well because she had been a witness to a number of things. Yeah, so Rose had done this every time the Crown prosecutor, so we want to say him, every time he objected to something, it was like it was overruled. He did not get for the whole trial, not one wrote. You know, Rose was being told she was a liar. She goes they called me a liar, you know, like to all
these things. The language that was you just seven and a.
Half, seven and a half in a witness box at court being called a liar.
Yep, you're a liar.
So you objective to that overall and it.
Just the whole thing, it just went like that. It was just it was so horrible and it was so outside anything that I believed could happen. I felt stupid. I did. I was like, I can't believe they can do this. I'd it just and every time I looked at that man, the defense barrister, they had zero respect for him. I just I could not respect him. He was short too anyway, So we so Rose did that and then Pitt was on for days and she she couldn't speak.
By the end, let traumatized.
She could not speak. She ended up actually with really bad tonsilitis. We had to get a doctor to come to the hotel. She got really really bad tonsilitis. And you know, there were things that happened, like so Janine, who was our witness support person, she they asked Rose seven and a half year old. Rose, who has since been diagnosed with dyslexia, asked her to read from a page on her statement and she couldn't find it, and Janine turned the page to get it for her, and
she was dismissed because she was helping the witness. So the one person that they had a connection with was dismissed because she was helping the witness. Natalie, the solicitor who was talking about she came out of the courtroom one day, Brent sitting there. Pips been on the stand for a couple of days at this point, and she came out really quickly and she said, I've got to go around the back and talk to pitm And Brent
was like, is she okay? And she said no, she's not okay, and Brent said, well, like, what do we do and she said, I don't know. She goes, I'm just going to talk to her. She just, you know, she just needs to answer the questions. If the answers yes, she says yes. If it's no, she says no. If it's I don't know, she says, I don't know. That's all she has to do. She's really upset, and then she rushed off. Well, the defendant's family heard that interaction.
Natalie got rooted and had to do training because of it, like it impacted on her career.
Technically in the lead to tell someone what the novel, what the person in the witness box is saying, but we're talking about a young girl, traumatized young girl, and that it's.
Just and she wasn't saying what she was saying. She was just saying. She wasn't saying anything. And the jide actually ruled well no, because she used the word if. She didn't give that she didn't give the answers to the question she said if, and also she didn't say what any of it but what happened. And I didn't realize this at the time. I was at the motel, Pips out the back of the courthouse waiting to go in.
No one knew this was going on, because the next morning, you know, there was this and Nat was sort of sitting there and Brent went to talk to her and she was like no, like, I can't talk to you. And then they all got caught as witnesses in this side show that was happening while Pip's sitting in the back waiting anyway, and then Brent wasn't like Brent wasn't allowed to talk to Pip, like it was just all this.
It was just absolute rubbish. And I ended up on the Friday, so she'd gone all week, and on the Friday they said, look, they're trying to they're trying to get the charges dropped. They're saying that Pip's not answering enough questions. And I said, all right, no worries. I said, well, Glenn, I want you to go in there right now, and I want them charged with the emotional abuse of my daughter. And he sort of looked at me and he's like he's like, you're not I would if I could. And
that's what they're doing. That's what they're doing in there. They're abusing my children. Anyway, Obviously that didn't happen, So that happened. I actually then went back to our hotel, my cousin. We had twenty two people in and out of that courtroom the whole time we were there. Were so well supported, and when I say in and out, no one was in there with the kids. They all
sat outside with us. But I went home and did a chronology of what had happened since we'd arrived in Sydney, so we were up to the end of week three, I think at that point, and i'd have said that if the charges were dropped, I was happy to go trial by media. I'm fine with that. And i'd actually been in contact with somebody from the media during the week and anyway, so that sort of I don't know if that prompted anything, but I think everything got a bit faster after that.
I don't like to be accountable, and look, I don't want you to feed into my anger about some things I see at court. But what you've just described there, I just from a parent's point of view, I can't even comprehend the anger and the frustration you must feel when we haven't done anything wrong. My daughters certainly haven't done anything wrong. Why we've been treated like that? And it's all very well, And I know this sounds very opinionated,
but it's all very well. When these defense barriss are saying, well, everyone's got a right to a defense and all that, but there's a way in which you can defend people. I agree, everyone does have a right to defense, but there's a way in which you can defend people so their legal rights are met.
I think it took its toll on him, the defense barrister. I watched his demeanor change over that period of time, but he still went there with the intention to break the children. That was the quickest way to get the case to be done.
If we're talking kids, we're not talking adults in there or beating up on the police officer or someone in the witness box. We're talking about kids that have come forward to the court because they've been sexually assaulted. It
needs protection. Okay, I'm angry. You were angry and upset, understandably, but you actually did something like the advocacy from it, and we're going to move into that because I think it's very significant the things that flowed on from your anger and I'm sure other people's angers and frustrations of the system that's just not set up to support children.
No, that's it.
No circumstances. So he was convicted only of what he did or can I ask you, and you're again only speculating, I suppose on why he wasn't convicted of what happened with Rose.
So I know that there was a question that came back from the jury during that when they were deliberating, and the question was if it mattered if she got the time wrong, like, you know, if the time frame wasn't right, but she'd said what had happened, you know, did that matter if they were sure that it had happened,
And the judge said that that was reasonable doubt. Yeah, So yeah, that that that's hard, Like it's hard, and I think that's Roses found that hard as she's got older to She didn't know until we did the justice shouldn't hurt, which we'll talk about. She didn't know that he wasn't convicted for charges on her. So when we did the victim impact statement, we did one for pimp and we did one for her too, even though we didn't get it. Yeah, I just wanted her to know that it mattered.
When the guilty verdict came down. How did you feel personally? How did the family feel?
That was a weird day. This is my question that I last you a couple of years ago because we went to your show at the Endmore Theater, and my question for you was, how do you balance the elation of a guilty verdict with the feelings of the family when nothing's changed. So we were at home and the girls were at school. You know, the girls had gone back to school. My uncle and my cousin stayed up. Well, they lived in Sydney, so they went We came home.
Brent went up the first day and then nothing happened. So he came back home and they were at the courthouse and I got the phone call from my uncle to say he's been found guilty of seven out of eight charges. And I was like okay, And then I was singing where's Brent? Like he was picking the girls up from school and I didn't know, you know, where
he was or where he would be. I was worried that it would be not guilty and he'd be picking the girls up from school because I did worry how he would cope with that anyway, So that happened, and then my cousin then rang me. He stayed in for the whole thing, and he got bail. He was found guilty of child sex offenses and he got bail, so
he was allowed to walk out of the courthouse that day. Anyway, a lot of our friends came over, the people who'd been supporting us during the trial that you know, the years proceeding. Glenn the detective came over and a couple of people bought bottles of champagne. And I was sitting at the table and everyone was kind of jovial, and I do not begrudge to anyone of that at all. Actually, I couldn't sit there.
Yep.
It just confirmed when I knew already.
And yeah, when's what's the celebrate?
No, that's all right. And you know who came out, Glenn, Yeah, yeah, because he knew.
Yeah, I think, yeah. I liked the fact that. And one good thing that came from it, you had a good officer that could understand that there's not a celebration and yeah, I people, and we're being critical of the justice system or legal systems. You quite rightly say it's not perfect. There's failings and we understand you need checks and balances, but we're talking about protecting kids and kids should be protected and the rights of the accused. I
fully understand that. I get it all, but again, look at the offense and with the sentencing, Like he came out and by what did he get sentenced?
So it was three years, nine months and two and a half years with parole, so he was out two and a half years.
Here I concede that. You know, it's not much of a concession. That's obvious. Judges have you know, they take a lot of things in the consideration. They're smart, smart people.
I just think the courts need to reflect. The courts are there to serve the community, people who have heard the story of how one man's actions for his own let's break it down, his own sex gratification and the impact on how many lives he's are harmed and how many lives he is You know, what he's done is people are going to carry that for the rest of their lives. How much money has been spent on him and three and a half or what was it, three
years and two and a half. Yeah, I never from a cops point of view, I never bought into the actual sentencing. But I would imagine with you, with everything you've been through, you've just described the story you described, was just getting to the end of the court matter, and there's your two and a half years, there's your three years sentence. Your family's been sentenced.
So it was look and it was a bit heartening. And he he did appeal his conviction, and he appealed it on the basis that Pipped inn't answer all the questions. There were three appeal judges, and I've seen the documents around that, and there it was a little bit of hope for me, you know, as everyday citizen that they were quite professionally damning of some of the decisions that were made during the trial, including the fact that some
of Rose's charges had been dropped. Yeah, both before the trial and during the trial.
The courts are a complex matter. I suppose the one thing I take away from your experience is I didn't really appreciate how traumatic it is on the kids. When you break it down, you're living with them, you're raising them, and what they're going through at that age, and I can't even comprehend what would be going through their mind.
In this well, even for Mags like she was a star witness. You know, in the end she was able to just get in there and say and basically put him in the places where you know, the other two had said. So. Yeah, but it was four weeks. She waited four weeks for that.
You said you felt you didn't go well in the witness box. I feel pressure going in the witness box. I can't even comprehend what.
Let me say, I didn't the first time around. So in that pre trial, and unfortunately they gave me too much time to read my statements for the main trial because I could write it off by heart. So when they were saying, well, you said this, I was like, no, on page four, I actually said that, So it was probably you know it was I didn't realize that you had to memorize it.
Well, that was an old, old skill that those tourn detectives we learned verbatim and you had to You couldn't refer to your statement, so you learned the whole whole of your evidence. But it shouldn't really come down to a memory test like that. And yeah, I gain. I don't like beating up on the legal system because you need it and you need the checks and balances and I understand that, but I just hate seeing kids traumatize.
Let's move on something. If anything positive comes from this, and sadly it's come after your children, but setting up something that's going to change, And I just want to read this as an article that's been written about the type of work that you've done. So the Millthorpes advocacy efforts were integral in expanding the Child's Sexual Offense's Evidence Program to every district court and police district in regional
New South Wales in twenty twenty three. The program allows young people to pre record their evidence, including examination, cross examination and re examination in front of a judge and lawyers without the jury present. This is done in the timely manner, allowing victims to move more quickly into the healing part of their journey. You've contributed to that. It's
pretty powerful. Do you want to break it down what that actually means and what the improvements are so people don't have to get through what you and your daughters went through.
Yeah, that's it and look it was so Glenn had actually mentioned during the trial that they were doing a pilot program, so kids were given what was called a witness intermediary, so somebody who would be there when they were giving their evidence to police, So breaking down some of those communication barriers, so I said earlier, you know, for Rose, she didn't even understand some of the things were happening, the language and all that sort of thing.
So it was the idea is that you're getting best evidence from the kids because they've got this person there who can help explain questions and those sorts of things. And then so they quarter pointed, then what happens, so that's all recorded within six months of that statement happening. There's a quarter appointed solicitor who will cross examine the children with the witness intermediary part of that process again, and then they record and that is what is presented
to court. So instead of kids going and spending three four five days on the stand, they're doing this instead. And you know, for us, it was this no brainer that you've got somebody there who can help the kids participate equitably in the process. Because they've got their language needs being met, they can move into that, As I said, the survivor state more quickly, because you know, they're hanging in his victimhoods. You know, for a number of years as it turned.
Out, feeling the pressure of happened to provide the evidence at court.
That's it and then they can kind of move on. And the thing is that it's been independently reviewed a couple of times now and the review process has said that both sides of the law, so you know, prosecutors and defenders have said that it is not breaching the rights of the you know, the perpetrated to a fair trial. And so you know, it was his no brainer that was happening in Sydney Newcastle. So it came out to
Australia in twenty fifteen. It was reviewed in twenty eighteen, and in twenty eighteen they said it would be expanded across the state and it wasn't. And I was watching and it wasn't expanded. And so I had been writing letters to the Attorney General a number of times. Every school holidays was my letter writing time. And you know, we got up to twenty twenty two and I was still getting the exact same letter back from them. And
we're very sorry that this has happened. We have this, this and this in process, and I'm telling you that doesn't work, and you know, with no intention of it to be expanded. So the girls wanted to do a fundraiser. So Rose wanted to do it. She wanted to write
around Australia. I don't know how much it was outruistic or whether she just wanted to get out of school, like still had the juries out, but she yeah, she wanted to raise money for Brave Hearts, the child sexual assault advocacy group, and so she wanted to do that and I said, well, if you're going to do that and you wanted to raise some awareness about something, what would you do. And the two of them were sitting together at the time, and they both said court is shit,
both of them. And so we talked about this program and said this is something that could be available. Do you think that would help? And the girl said yes, And I said, well, why don't we raise awareness for that? But then at that moment where oh, Roses only she was thirteen turning fourteen at the time, and I thought she can't you know, I looked into the legal side of it, and I'm thinking, she can't tell her a story. So when I told her that, she was pretty pissed off.
And then I wrote some emails and I was emailing different organizations trying to find out more about the legal side of it. I emailed Nina for now yeah previous, very impressive voice, she's amazing, and I knew she'd been involved in the let Us Speak campaign, so I just emailed her. I did not expect to get anything back from her, but in my email I said, this is us, this is what's happened. There is a solution. This is
a solution, and they're not doing it anyway. Probably an hour later I got an email back, can I give you a call? And then this thing started. So we went through it and we talked to her. I said, and I had seen our local member at the time, justin Clancy in Aubrey, and he was really supportive of trying to get a petition through Parliament so that they would have to debate it. You need twenty thousand signatures and it just wasn't happening quick enough for me or
for any of us. And the petition was that the Child Sexual Assault Evidence Scheme is extended to include all children in regional New South Wales because it wasn't right anyway. So Nina got on board and we started talking. Something that she said to me, that's always stuck with me, and she said, the process of telling the story needs to be better than the story. And the way that she cared for our children and our family is exceptional. She's just an amazing survivor advocate and I just think
she's exceptional. And she yeah. So the story came out. The Justice Shouldn't Hurt campaign was born, I think the first day after the Girl's launchestory. And it wasn't that easy, like we had to go through court, and you know, fortunately News Court helped us with that so that Rose could tell her story, and she did write a really powerful letter to the court and she did say I had a man telling me for a long time that I wasn't allowed to talk and I wasn't allowed to
tell my story. Then I went to court and I had men standing in front of me telling me that I had that I had to tell my story. And now you're telling me that I'm allowed to tell my story again, you know.
And so sometimes it needs a clarity of a young mind to break down what this is about. How do you argue against the logic of a child that's it those statements?
And so they did. They told the story and that first day there were I think they got we got twenty five thousand signatures. I think on the first day. It was sixty nine thousand by the end of the year. So it launched in the November and then on the first of February we came up to Sydney and Dominique Perrete. At the time he announced bipartisan agreement that it would be expanded across in New South Wales. So sixty four point three million dollars was promised to have Witness into
me year. He's available in every court in South Wales.
Wow. Yeah, And just the way that you explained that, it just seems like a no brainer too, doesn't it.
How that was what people said, So anyone that was commenting, and you know, we were a little bit worried about, you know, some of the things that would come out, and again, you know, the majority of people are amazing and speak really you know, it's a no brainer. I reckon. That was said so many times, it's a no brainer.
Why are they not doing this? But and when we did, you know, have a meeting with the premiere at the time, he you know, he had lots of kids and you could see he was as a dad was actually disappointed that he didn't know about it, And Brent, you know, he's like, you don't know what you don't know, and it doesn't matter where you are or what you do, Like even as a police officer, it'd be people in the police that don't know.
As I said, I was involved in these type of investigations. But yeah, hearing it firsthand from someone like yourself and relaying what your children went through and understanding that you look at it and go what sort of society are we that we retraumatize children in this way? So and like, well, firstly, congratulate you, congratulate your girls and Nina and everyone else
involved in the campaign. What an important, important change that's been made to help people so they don't have to go through what you and your daughters went.
Yeah, and you know Nina is sort of now doing more advocacy in that space too, with the next sort of wave of justice shouldn't hurt, as you've heard, and I think Nina powersource.
I walked away after she was seeing in that chair that you're sitting in after having her on the podcast, and I was just amazed at how strong and passionate she was and how articulate she could explain explain things. So, yeah, you teamed up with a good person there. The type of impact it has on your girls when they're victims of child sexual abuse like that, even the way that they looked at or reacted around their grandfathers or other men within your family and the whole it steals away
some of their child or doesn't it. It does been victims of that type of abuse.
Yeah, it does. But I think I contacted a group, Vocal Victims of Crime Advocacy League. They're based out of Newcastle.
I got in contact with the lady from there. I can't remember her name, and I wish I could, because she was very She said to me, you know, you go from victim to survivor, and then you survive and then you thrive, and then you thrive and then you inspire and way put and you know, I've seen them move through that and again, like they are kids, and they do have messy rooms and sometimes they're you know, really really upset me.
Do you want me to give a share that?
But you know the majority of the time they are living really good life. Some people think that because we've done this advocacy work, that we are living in this space. This is not a place that we ever thought we would be. Annoys me when people say it. The thing is that that you can't know something and then in good conscience not do something about it if you've got the capacity, and we could, so we did. My kids
have mostly good days. I watched Rose, you know, the nearly you know, sixteen and a half year old writing different waves of her journey because her understanding has changed over time about what happened, and you know what that means, and you know that that's been an interesting journey to watch. But most days are good. That's the reality. Most days
are good. We've had people step up in our life, and we've had people step out, and that's okay because I think when you are passionate about something and you know it's right, then you've just got to do it.
You made a comment earlier on that sometimes you've got to screen that allow us to get things done. And I think what you articulated there is that you've experienced it. You had the so that you had the energy, you had the passion, had the ability to make a difference. And I think the world is a better place when people like you you step up. But the thing that I've seen a scene about you and our communications is
that you're not going through life as a victim. You're making making the difference and you can still laugh and you come in here, you can laugh, you can cry, but yeah, you're still experiencing life. But I think the kids have been fortunate to have someone like yourself and Brent aren't. They're they're supporting them, and it looks like you've got through this or getting through it, I should say as a family.
Yeah, Oh look, I don't get it right all the time. I can tell you that I don't, but I don't know.
That's what Brent was, So.
I I why would you give someone like that more power?
Yeah? I like your avitude.
Yeah, I've deliberately chosen not to hate because that's a really strong emotion that takes a lot of energy. I don't think I can forgive, but I can be indifferent.
The difference are very powerful, Yeah.
And I think that's what I need to do my kids. Rose. Rose is very forgiving because she's a if you don't forgive, you don't grow type person. And I love that about her. But she won't forget. Yeah, everyone's on a different journey, but we all have made a really deliberate choice to live a good life.
That's that's I don't want to use the word revenge, but that's the way that you you're insignificant, put put in the past. Now you've got some other things that you're working on too. Yeah, Gluton, Gluton for punishment. Are you you looking at running running for parliament?
I am. Yeah. Someone said to me today at the airport, a parent of an ex student. He said, oh, what are you up? Chair said, I've decided to run for parliament. He goes, oh, are you doing local government? Oh no, I went straight straight to the top anyway. He's like, what are you doing? So we live in Pharah. I
was like, yeah, we do anyway. So look, I I there was a tweet that somebody put out last year that was really not nice and didn't reflect me as a person or anybody that I knew, and was really unrelatable. And I'll just look at federal politics at the moment and go, there's no there's no teachers in there, there's no police in there. Well there are, but they were a really long long time ago. There's no regular people who.
You know.
Wanted to just make sure that people are thriving and regional communities get overlooked. They do, and regional equity is a real issue. And this, you know, the Justice Shouldn't Hurt campaign, and seeing what we had to do to get justice, you know, it was glaringly obvious that there's things that are missed out on because of our regional location. And we live in inner city, so you know, for people further out west and you know, in more remote areas,
they're missing out on things. And I don't think that's fair.
That's fair. Now going in the politics, Well, you've shown that you've got the got the energy, and you've got the capacity and the sense of justice. So I don't
think that's a bad starting point in the politics. And I take on board what you're saying that people that people in touch with what goes on in communities from a regional point of view, but also teaching, and there's a lot and we're going off off track a little bit here, but so much in the media at the moment about youth crime and different things and the way
to deal with youth crime. I've always thought, on law and all the issues, put money into education, because I think education can do so much good pointing people in the right direction. And if you do get in politics, this is just a theory. So you can take this one into we want to get tough on crime, Let's look at how much crime emanates from child sexual abuse. Let's look at how many people are in prison because there abuse and as children and have ended up in prison.
So how do we really fight fight crime? Well, let's fight something that causes a lot of crime. It's it's not a theory, it's the statistics are out there. It's ridiculous. It's ridiculous, and we've got to look at things like that. But anyway, where what's the seat you run for?
So Fara? So it's one hundred and twenty six thousand square kilometers yep, yeah, just east of Auburry, Gingerlic sort of and then all the way to South Astralian border up through Griffith and places like that. Danili Quinn Yeah, so yeah, I.
Know the areas I've been down, yeah in my policing days and different things down that way. So oh look, good good luck to here you and I want to say too, thank you, not just thanks for coming on the podcast that's given, but the fact that you have made a difference in the justice system, and it takes people taking a stand, and what your daughters have stood up to. And I said to you, I'm not sure if I said it on the podcast, but I'll say it.
I know I said it to you off Mike. The way that your girls are presenting themselves like full credit to full credit to should.
Be proud of them. I am. I am. Yeah, good stuff, all right, thanks very much, Thank you.