Queensland Child Protection Commission of Inquiry News and Updates
Inquiry a waste, says alleged sex assault victim
December 15, 2012 - 1:10PM
Tony Moore
brisbanetimes.com.au senior reporter
The woman at the centre of a 24-year-old controversy over sex assault allegations at a Brisbane youth detention centre says she is sick of being a "political football" and wants her life back.
The woman says one portion of a two-part $9 million child protection inquiry investigating past care in government-run centres is a waste of taxpayers' money.
For the past fortnight, the woman – allegedly assaulted as a 14-year-old during a John Oxley Youth Centre excursion to Mount Barney on May 24, 1988 – has been a constant figure at Brisbane's new Magistrates Court building, the site of the Queensland government inquiry .
This week her voice repeatedly broke as she retold parts of her story.
"What possibly can they do to make me happy. The only person who can help me is the Lord," she said.
She agreed she had received a $120,000 confidential state government payment, but said the money meant nothing to her.
"That is not going to heal a broken little girl that got lost 25 years ago," she said. "That is a spiritual, personal issue I have to deal with by myself. I have to make sure that that little girl that got destroyed 25 years ago does not get hurt again.
"I want to be left alone. I want to get back to my normal life. Until people came knocking on my door, I had a normal life."
In the past fortnight, documents detailing the alleged sexual assault of the then 14-year-old have been tabled as exhibits, outlining how police, doctors, senior public servants and others were all informed of the matter between May 24, 1988, and June 1988.
No one was charged.
Outside court, the woman said enough was enough.
"I honestly think it is a waste of taxpayers' money, because everybody knew about what happened," she said.
The only other evidence of an alleged sexual assault the inquiry has heard included one witness describing images of "large hands" on the sunburnt back of a former inmate who was said to have been abused near Lake Wivenhoe in 1991.
Today, the woman in the 1988 case, who lives just over the New South Wales border, says carnal knowledge charges should have been brought against the two boys she alleges had sex with her.
The woman said she remembered the incident well and being asked to go and have a shower the night she returned from the excursion.
There are two sets of terms of reference for the inquiry being held by commissioner Tim Carmody.
One looks at the adequacy and appropriateness of government responses into historic child sex abuse in youth detention centres. The other looks at whether there was any criminal conduct associated with those government responses.
Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/inquiry-a-waste-says-alleged-sex-assault-victim-20121215-2bg0f.html#ixzz2F7PyQ1p4
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