“The Indigenous kids I work with are powerless and voiceless. They are currently legally represented by the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency, or the NT Legal Aid Commission, as it was with all the abused children who appeared in Four Corners’ Australia’s Shame program. For just under ten years, NAAJA has chosen to pursue a policy of not opposing, resisting or even publicly criticising the inhumane carceral policies of the
previous NT Country Liberal Party government or the current NT Labor government.
The German anti-Nazi and martyr, pastor Paul Bonhoeffer said that “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act”. NAAJA’s policy of not publicly criticising and thereby collaborating has been a catastrophic failure and disgrace. The purpose and philosophy of the Close Don Dale NOW! movement is action. This will include direct action and civil disobedience. They say change happens when ordinary people do extraordinary things. It seems it has to be this way.”
John Lawrence, The NT Independent, June 29, 2022
In this and following blog posts, we look at the harm caused by (juvenile) detention; trauma and neurolaw; offenders’ intergenerational trauma; adverse childhood experiences in offenders; the fact that NGOs and government organisations do not sufficiently reach the
offenders; the siloing of NGOs and other organisations; victim trauma; vicarious and other trauma in lawyers police officers and prison workers; disability in offenders; the waxing and waning of political approaches to the problem; sustainable justice; and crime as a public-health issue.
Alice Springs has always been a divided town. The latest great division was caused by the Zach Rolfe murder trial, where an all-white jury decided that the killer of a disabled young black man should walk free. Rolfe’s lawyers successfully omitted damning evidence, of racism and a violent past, that came to light in the coronial inquest that followed.
A Facebook page titled I support Zach Rolfe reports news and opinions that are pro-Rolfe; the page Justice for Walker does the same in favour of the victim. Division in Alice Springs is along the usual lines of political left and political right, and along racial lines.
Our shared stories lie in the arts and sports, where collaboration is successfully achieved, and in the shared trauma that is described in the next few blog posts.
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