Gary Jubelin reveals the anguish of growing up with a father who failed to control his temper

Former top NSW homicide detective Gary Jubelin grew up scared of his father but he learnt to forgive him before his death. Don’t miss exclusive extracts from Jubelin’s explosive autobiography “I Catch Killers” via News Corp websites and papers this weekend.

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A young boy twists in agony as his father holds his arms behind his back, willing the boy to beg for mercy and stop the pain.

But Gary Jubelin, aged five, will not give in to his father Kevin. Not now, not ever.

“My father is a bully. You can dress it up, say that he’s a hard man or whatever, or that it’s just the way men are,” Jubelin writes in his memoir I Catch Killers.

“But I’ve seen him control his temper when he wants to. He chooses to let it control him at home.”

Kevin Jubelin, born in 1936, was a tradie who rose to be a senior bureaucrat as general manager of the NSW Building Services Corporation and raised his family in North Epping.

Gary Jubelin with his dad on the day he passed out of the police academy in 1985.

He focused much of his attention on the spirited and occasionally defiant eldest boy Gary.

Kevin was smart and charming: but his parenting is a thread through the memoir, co-written with journalist Dan Box.

Ultimately, Jubelin reveals he learned to stand up to his father, to appreciate that Kevin’s hardness was an attempt to make his son tough enough to survive in a man’s world, and to forgive him before his death in 2017.

Bonus “I Catch Killers” podcast: Gary Jubelin’s most searing interview ever, introducing his explosive new book.

DON’T MISS OUT: This weekend the Saturday and Sunday Telegraphs will be publishing EXCLUSIVE extracts from Gary Jubelin’s autobiography: “I Catch Killers: The Life and Many Deaths of a Homicide Detective”.

Gary Juebline with his sister Karen in 1964.

“I know that he loves me, but neither of us never says ‘I love you’ to the other. Instead, I learn my lessons. Don’t show weakness. Swallow your anger and resentment. Let them burn inside you.”

In an interview with The Saturday Telegraph, Jubelin says he grew up determined to be a different kind of dad; one who frequently lavished “I love you” moments on son Jake and daughter Gemma, while also running backyard boot camps to keep them on their toes.

As an adult I am most proud of my relationship with my children, says Gary Jubelin.

“There’s going to be knocks. We’re all gonna get bruises and cuts. And I don’t think you’re doing your job as a parent if you create an environment where the kids think everything’s just going to be perfect for them their whole life,” Jubelin said.

“So I’m happy with the way Jake and Gemma are. It was just a theory, I didn’t know. But the values that I instilled in them from a very young age, I think have played out into adulthood. So I’m very proud of them.”

Jake, who served in Afghanistan with the Australian Army and Gemma, now embarking upon her own career in policing, showed up at every day of their Dad’s court hearings over recent months.

I Catch Killers by Gary Jubelin is out on August 20.

Jubelin said he’s grateful for the resilience he learnt through being scared of his dad.

“He lost his mother when he was very young; eight years old. And I was his first son. And I like to think it’s about him teaching me; preparing me for the world. And I think that’s what parenthood is about, preparing your children to survive in the world. He saw the need to make me tough, and I didn’t see it at the time. It didn’t seem too good at the time. But he’s given me resilience.

“Without that discipline, I think there’s a very real chance I could have gone off the rails and probably not turned out the way I have.”

The Life and Many Deaths of a Homicide Detective, is published by HarperCollins Australia on Thursday, August 20 in paperback, e-book and audio. Pre-order your signed copy at Booktopia.