Investigation reveals continued allegations of abuse inside Don Dale Youth Detention Center

Families have spoken out about horrific allegations of abuse inside Don Dale Youth Detention Centre five years after a royal commission was supposed to reform it. Read their stories.

Five years on from the Royal Commission into the Protection and Detention of Children in the Northern Territory, kids continued to be detained in “cage like” cells inside the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre, according to a recent report.

The Territory Children Commissioner’s 2021 monitoring report, which was one of the 227 recommendations from the royal commission, stated children were “living in a cage-like setting with minimal trauma-informed response from Youth Justice Officers”.

The Territory Labor government accepted all 227 recommendations from the royal commission but just 174 are currently listed as complete, with some of those either rejected or only partially implemented.

Chief Minister Natasha Fyles, who was elected to the top job in May after former chief minister Michael Gunner stepped down, has inherited the promises of her predecessor and maintains her government has “transformed youth justice” in the Northern Territory.

“We have made significant changes putting (Youth Justice) into Territory Families,” Ms Fyles said.

The government has also committed to raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 12, which is likely to pass through NT parliament later this month but it will not come into effect till late 2023.

Chief Minister Natasha Fyles. Picture: (A)manda Parkinson

On the fifth anniversary of the royal commission, the NT News has uncovered horrifying stories of abuse that continue inside Don Dale.

In January, the NT News spoke to a mother who recounted that when she picked up her son outside the gates of Don Dale he was “dishevelled, covered in nits and his arm was mysteriously broken”.

Just two months ago, another mother revealed that when she visited her daughter in Don Dale her arms were wrapped in bandages after she self harmed.

The mother told the NT News she was never contacted by Territory Families.

The department, responsible for youth justice also told the NT News “they would not comment on individual cases”.

In September, the NT News reported that girls were forced to shower without curtains and as recently as this week, a 12-year-old boy revealed he was left in his cell in nothing more than a towel because “there were no pants”.

In June this year, the NT News reported four children self harmed in a single weekend, including one child who ate through the back of their own hand because he was locked in his 3x2m cell for more than 72 hours.

On ABC’s Four Corners program this week, footage of three guards pinning a child to the ground and wrapping their hands around his neck was aired.

The NT Children’s Commission responded saying they found the incident to be excessive and showed unnecessary force.

The NT News understands these incidents are currently under investigation or have been investigated.

Furthermore allegations a guard stood by and watched a 14-year-old’s arm being broken by another inmate in July 2022 are also under review.

When Ms Fyles was asked if her government was aware of any current investigations into excessive use of force at Don Dale, she said she would need to “seek further advice”.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Chief Minister said: “When a complaint is made, it is investigated. These investigations are conducted by the Department of Territory Families and Communities, along with the Children’s Commissioner.”

“When investigations occur they are done so confidentiality.”

These incidents are all despite Territory Families Minister Kate Worden claiming the Territory’s youth justice system had been “reformed”.

“And I am certain, 100 per cent certain, that our whole system is that way, it is reformed,” Ms Worden told media.

She has continuously maintained “the Northern Territory does not have the youth justice system of 2016”.

The royal commission was initially called by the Turnbull government but the recently elected Member for Lingiari Marion Scrymgour expressed deep concern after learning of the abuse continuing inside Don Dale.

“That’s not reform. I just think that if that is what the state of affairs is, then that’s not reform,” she said.

“We should be a better country...five years on, we haven’t learned anything, or we haven’t done anything.”

In Darwin, children as young as 10 are remanded to a decommissioned maximum security adult prison that was repurposed seven years ago after the original Don Dale was closed.

The centre was a headache for successive governments before footage emerged in 2016 of teenagers being tear-gassed and hooded.

Those images were broadcast around the nation and led to the 12-week royal commission, but several recommendations are only partially complete.

Recommendation 21.01 states the government should introduce body-worn cameras, which it marked as complete despite the government only improving “video capture capability throughout detention facilities”.

Ms Fyles said body-worn cameras were not implemented because the Northern Territory government advisory board decided there was adequate surveillance inside the detention centre and body cameras would further traumatise children.

Recommendation 13.02 explicitly states “restraint chairs should be prohibited” and the government has marked that as complete.

But an NT News investigation in February revealed they were still being used in Territory watch houses on children, and continue to be today.

Legislative changes have been marked as complete regarding staffing and powers provided to the Office of the Children Commission but the government’s own monitoring document states the “intent addressed through draft amendments.”

The Office of the Children’s Commission said the legislation had been in the drafting process for years but was yet to be “introduced or passed by parliament”.