The Prisoners Of Australia

Gives voice to a diverse range of viewpoints on the debate on prisoners' rights, with contributions from prisoners, human rights activists, academics, criminal justice policy makers and practitioners.

Welcome to Long Bay, Australia's hardest prison. For the first time, guards and inmates of the notorious South Sydney facility reveal what really goes on behind its towering concrete walls. Opened in 1909, Long Bay Jail, originally a women's reformatory, has a dark and extraordinary history. From ghosts to legendary prisoners, there has been an infamous collection of Long Bay "guests," including the formidable Neddy Smith, convicted rapists the Skaf brothers, and shamed entrepreneur Rene Rivkin. Former inmates Rodney Adler, Graham "Abo" Henry, Tom Domican, John Elias, and others tell all about the brutal reality of life behind bars. And "Mr Big" Ian Hall Saxon finally comes clean about his prison escape, which baffled the nation. Delve into the personal accounts of the prison guards, Long Bay's unsung heroes, as they open up about their experiences dealing with some of the most dangerous men in the country.

Imprisoned people have always been vulnerable and in need of human rights protections. The slow but steady growth in the protection of imprisoned people’s rights over recent decades in Australia has mostly come from incremental change to prison legislation and common law principles. A radical influence is about to disrupt this slow change. Australian prisons and other closed environments will soon be subject to international inspections by the United Nations Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture (SPT). This is because the Australian Government ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (OPCAT) in December 2017. Australia’s international human rights law obligations as they apply to prisons are complex and stem from multiple Treaties. This book distils these obligations into five prerequisites for compliance, consistent with the preventive focus of the OPCAT. They are: reduce reliance on imprisonment align domestic legislation with Australia’s international human rights law obligations shift the focus of imprisonment to the goal of rehabilitation and restoration support prison staff to treat imprisoned people in a human rights–consistent manner ensure decent physical conditions in all prisons. Attention to each of these five areas will help all levels of Australian government and prison managers take the steps required to move towards compliance. Human-rights led prison reform is necessary both to improve the lives of imprisoned people and for Australia to achieve compliance with the international human rights legal obligations to which it has voluntarily committed itself.

These are the true and uncensored accounts of Australia's hardest inmates, from Australia's hardest inmates. Martin Bryant--who killed 35 people and injured another 23 at Port Arthur in 1996--is a 160kg slob who trades sex for chocolate in Risdon Prison. Twenty years after Australia's worst massacre, his blond hair is gone, and so is his self-righteous smirk . . . but he is as evil as ever, showing no remorse for the crimes that shook the nation. He is just one of the killers in the rogues' gallery of Australia's Toughest Prisons: Inmates. You will meet the alleged hitman and undisputed hardman called "Goldie", feared by both prisoners and guards alike. John Reginald Killick will tell you how he really escaped from Silverwater Jail in a helicopter and survived Pentridge Prison's notorious "Hell Block." And former Rugby League star Craig Field will tell you his incredible story of how one wrong pub punch landed him in prison limbo. From the rise of ISIS gangs, the lethal underground drug and tobacco trade, and the threat of contraband phones, to shiv fights, brawls, and white-collar criminal beat-downs, the secret lives of Australia's most dangerous men will be on full display. Award-winning author and journalist James Phelps reveals the horror of life inside Australia's most notorious prisons, including Grafton, Cessnock, Pentridge, Minda, Risdon, Silverwater, and Lithgow.

For months during 1943 there was no night in Hellfire Pass. By the light of flares, carbide lamps and bamboo fires, men near-naked and skeletal cut a passage through stone to make way for a railway. Among these men were some of the 22,000 Australian soldiers taken prisoner by the Japanese during World War II. In camps across Asia and the Pacific, they struggled, died, and survived with a little help from their mates. 'Hellfire' was researched in Australia, Japan and across South-East Asia. It draws on 50 first-person interviews, ranging from former prisoners to an old Mon villager deep in the Burmese jungle, and from Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew to veterans of the Imperial Japanese Army. The result is a tour de force, a powerful and searing history of the prisoners of the Japanese.

Surviving the Great War is the first detailed analysis of Australians in German captivity in WW1. By placing the hardships of prisoners of war in a broader social and military content, this book adds a new dimension to the national wartime experience and challenges popular representations of Australia's involvement in the First World War.