I am so proud that I get to welcome our NT people in prison to your very first issue of About Time! This is your newspaper, so please write in and send pictures, stories, poems and whatever else fits.
I know Darwin prison because I was released from there last time back in 2019. It wasn’t my first sentence but I wanted to make sure it was my last!
I was so over that revolving door of prison. I thought I had heaps of friends but they were nowhere to be seen during my prison time. I wanted more, my life was just a revolving door of prison and addiction and I felt an emptiness that I’m sure many of you can relate to.
Once I was released I got an opportunity to speak about what I thought needed to change to stop women from going back to jail at the Reintegration Puzzle Conference. I was the keynote speaker so I spoke in front of hundreds of people about the failures of the system and what I thought was the reason people kept going back to prison.
Stuff like how we get released with no support and get out to nothing. Next minute all the reporters wanted to speak to me and hear from me.
I haven’t really looked back from there. I took any job I could get, which was processing fish at first – it was a crappy job but I had an income. Then a year later I applied for the job I have now and it’s my dream job.
I am so proud that I get to welcome our NT people in prison to your very first issue of About Time! This is your newspaper, so please write in and send pictures, stories, poems and whatever else fits.
I know Darwin prison because I was released from there last time back in 2019. It wasn’t my first sentence but I wanted to make sure it was my last!
I was so over that revolving door of prison. I thought I had heaps of friends but they were nowhere to be seen during my prison time. I wanted more, my life was just a revolving door of prison and addiction and I felt an emptiness that I’m sure many of you can relate to.
Once I was released I got an opportunity to speak about what I thought needed to change to stop women from going back to jail at the Reintegration Puzzle Conference. I was the keynote speaker so I spoke in front of hundreds of people about the failures of the system and what I thought was the reason people kept going back to prison.
Stuff like how we get released with no support and get out to nothing. Next minute all the reporters wanted to speak to me and hear from me.
I haven’t really looked back from there. I took any job I could get, which was processing fish at first – it was a crappy job but I had an income. Then a year later I applied for the job I have now and it’s my dream job.
I work for the Justice Reform Initiative. We want to make systemic change and reduce incarceration – creating a world where disadvantage is no longer met with a default criminal justice system response.
The stuff I have managed to do since my last release still blows my mind. I’ve been part of a few things that have won the human rights award for justice three different years. I have just co-written a book which we hope to have in every women’s jail – it’s called She Is Me.
I was recently invited into the women’s jail in Victoria called Tarrengower to speak to the women for International Women’s Day and to deliver some of the books to the women.
It felt like such a long way away from 2019 when I walked out of Holtz unsure of my future. I spoke to the women at Tarrengower about the ability to be absolutely anything you can imagine once you are released.
I once thought that I would be stuck in the cycle of jail and drugs forever and how wrong I was. I hope that people can read my story and be inspired by my journey and also see that they too can break that cycle of jail and drugs and become anything that you can put your mind to.
There is a big community of people who have been to prison and are now doing amazing stuff and it’s a very, very supportive community where we all try and lift each other up.
Believe it or not, lots of people want to hear what you have to say, I mean we are experts on what works and what doesn’t when it comes to jail, release and programs that do and don’t work.
Everybody has a story to tell and I look forward to hearing from more people from the NT. I had been stuck in the cycle of prison and addiction from the time I was 18 and I am now 45, so it’s never too late to want a different life and to work towards that life that will set you free.
If I can do it I know that you can too. The conditions in prison at the moment would drive me crazy with all the lockdowns and the overcrowding, so if you want a different life please remember it’s never too late, nobody is too far gone.
I look forward to hearing from people in the NT writing into About Time and making the newspaper your own.
I work for the Justice Reform Initiative. We want to make systemic change and reduce incarceration – creating a world where disadvantage is no longer met with a default criminal justice system response.
The stuff I have managed to do since my last release still blows my mind. I’ve been part of a few things that have won the human rights award for justice three different years. I have just co-written a book which we hope to have in every women’s jail – it’s called She Is Me.
I was recently invited into the women’s jail in Victoria called Tarrengower to speak to the women for International Women’s Day and to deliver some of the books to the women.
It felt like such a long way away from 2019 when I walked out of Holtz unsure of my future. I spoke to the women at Tarrengower about the ability to be absolutely anything you can imagine once you are released.
I once thought that I would be stuck in the cycle of jail and drugs forever and how wrong I was. I hope that people can read my story and be inspired by my journey and also see that they too can break that cycle of jail and drugs and become anything that you can put your mind to.
There is a big community of people who have been to prison and are now doing amazing stuff and it’s a very, very supportive community where we all try and lift each other up.
Believe it or not, lots of people want to hear what you have to say, I mean we are experts on what works and what doesn’t when it comes to jail, release and programs that do and don’t work.
Everybody has a story to tell and I look forward to hearing from more people from the NT. I had been stuck in the cycle of prison and addiction from the time I was 18 and I am now 45, so it’s never too late to want a different life and to work towards that life that will set you free.
If I can do it I know that you can too. The conditions in prison at the moment would drive me crazy with all the lockdowns and the overcrowding, so if you want a different life please remember it’s never too late, nobody is too far gone.
I look forward to hearing from people in the NT writing into About Time and making the newspaper your own.
