Operation CSI on pedophilia

An ABC TV Lateline program aired on May 15 exposed a leaked Northern Territory police briefing paper that revealed disturbing cases of sexual abuse and violence against women and children in remote Aboriginal communities.

The crown prosecutor for central Australia, Dr Nannette Rogers, has collected the details over a 15-year period. Dr Rogers details cases of utter depravity and the contents spell out a level of human degradation and suffering that she believes can no longer be tolerated.

They include the rape of a seven-month-old baby as well as the sexual assault and drowning of a girl by an 18-year-old man.

Her paper exposes the extent of the problem and how Indigenous male culture and the web of kinship have helped create a conspiracy of silence. We should not be so naïve as to think child abuse is a Western Australian and Northern Territory specific problem, as this insidious exploitation of children is a national endemic.

Back in 2000 the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women’s Task Force on Violence Report noted, “many families are now trapped in environments where deviance and atrocities have become accepted as normal behaviour.”

Years later the Gordon Inquiry (pdf file 3.92MB) reported, "the statistics paint a frightening picture of what could only be termed an ‘epidemic’ of family violence and child abuse in Aboriginal communities". Co-author Sue Gordon commented: “This is not only by non-Aboriginal predators, but by their very own families. Without both Aboriginal women and Aboriginal men standing up and saying no more family violence and no more child abuse, the future for Aboriginal children will only lie in higher statistics of Aboriginal youth suicide or higher Aboriginal imprisonment rates.”

One of the most poignant points Gordon made in the report was “land and reconciliation are major issues, but without our families and children safe from family violence and child abuse, they are but a hollow gesture for the future”.

I couldn’t agree more.

Surely if John Howard can spend millions of tax payer’s dollars ordering several hundred armed personnel to the Solomon Islands to round up a handful of thugs terrorising their sovereign nation, and have a navy ship sit off the coast as part of a contingency plan, why can’t he spend a couple of million dollars hunting down and ridding Indigenous communities of pedophiles? He can easily do that by taking off $10 million from his $2.2 billion defence budget allocation for the four new C-17 heavy lift aircrafts.

I put a challenge out to politicians and Aboriginal leaders around the nation, especially the National Indigenous Council, to find money to set up an “Indigenous CSI”, for want of a better word, to tackle the heinous crimes of child abuse. This team of special forensic investigators aligned with the federal police would be adequately resourced and on 24-hour call to be sent to any community - urban, rural and remote - at the first reported incidence of child abuse. State police would assist their federal colleagues in all investigations.

What is CSI , I hear you ask?

Nothing terribly original - I borrowed the concept from my favourite television show. Crime Scene Investigation (commonly referred to as CSI) is a popular television series that trails the investigations of a team of forensic scientists as they unravel the circumstances behind mysterious and unusual deaths and crimes.

I don’t care to read another health report on the high incidence of children, some as young as three, contracting sexually transmitted diseases. I would suspect that some community members would be aware of the children at risk and who are harbouring these pedophiles.

The reason we are still discussing this disturbing topic is because some of the pedophiles have never been brought to justice. Don’t feel sorry for the perverts - if found guilty, jail them.

And the next time Treasurer Costello says “go forth and multiply” I hope all partners can proactively do so, if they desire, without the fear of worrying about the potential risk to their child, from predators, that arises from such an outcome.