'I want to go home but I don’t feel safe there'
The horrific violence which has been out of sight, out of mind and out of Yuendumu
The horrific violence has been out of sight, out of mind and out of Yuendumu. Until now
This is a three-part series revealing the effects of family violence in remote communities through the life of 21-year-old Ruby, who lived at Yuendumu in the same house for a time as Kumanjayi Walker, shot dead by police in 2019.
Warning: This is a confronting story. But it is one that needs to be told.
Chapter 1
Relief, then excitement, washed over Ruby’s face when the number flashed up on the borrowed phone.
It was noon on Friday and the 21-year-old was desperate to see her baby son before the weekend and their first Mother’s Day apart.
But it was “too late”, she was told.
The 10am visit with her 18-month-old had been cancelled because Ruby – not her real name – hadn’t confirmed it the day before.
The young mum’s eyes filled with tears as she silently slumped back in her seat, heartbroken and defeated.
The quiet Warlpiri woman knew that this decision – whether she could see and hold her only child that week – was now, like so much in her life, out of her hands.
She wouldn’t see him for another five days – until Wednesday – but only if she confirmed on Tuesday that she would be there.
That visit right before Mother’s Day was not the first Ruby had missed since her release from prison in late March.
The young Yuendumu woman had no phone, car, money, family or support in Queensland – where her son is living – making it hard to meet her obligations and attend rigidly scheduled meetings.
Ruby ended up in tropical far north Queensland after fleeing the Northern Territory last year, with her boyfriend and their newborn, out of fear for her safety and in search of a fresh start.
Instead, unable to escape her pain and trauma, her life has only spiralled further out of control.
When interviewed on a muggy morning this month, Ruby said she could not “brush off” the daily flashbacks of the horrific abuse that began in her home at Yuendumu.
Ruby was raised in the same house where Kumanjayi Walker stayed with his girlfriend, Rickisha Robertson – Ruby’s cousin – for the final five or so years of his life, before Northern Territory police officer Zachary Rolfe fatally shot him.
House 577 at West Camp is also where Walker threatened two local police officers with an axe just three days before Constable Rolfe’s immediate response team was deployed from Alice Springs to arrest him.
In March, Constable Rolfe was found not guilty of murdering Walker at the remote outback community during that arrest in November 2019.
But the tragic case thrust the troubled town – and its social issues – into the light. Before his death at the age of 19, Walker was the living embodiment of the deep, intergenerational trauma and abuse that is the flip side of Australia’s egalitarian prosperity.
In remote towns like Yuendumu, the greatest tragedy of Walker’s story was how common it is: a baby born in circumstances of substance use and family instability, who himself developed addictions, destructive behaviours and a lengthy criminal history.
In death, Walker was eulogised as a happy person who loved animals and his family.
The revelations that relatives were fed up with his offending and that he had been inflicting horrific acts of violence on his girlfriend prompted some critics to suggest these parts of his story should not have been told.
But it is impossible to tell the story of Indigenous women like Rickisha and Ruby – some of the most disadvantaged and vulnerable people in our society – without revealing the layers of abuse they, and those around them, have endured.
At the conclusion of Constable Rolfe’s trial last month, The Australian newspaper revealed Walker himself had been perpetrating savage, regular and “escalating” domestic violence against Rickisha.
Some of the sickening abuse Walker’s teenage girlfriend suffered included choking, face-biting, bashing her head with a rock, pinching her cheeks, kicking her in the face, dragging her by the hair, hitting her and beating her with a piece of steel.
Documents from 2017 – obtained by The Weekend Australian – showed police believed Rickisha to be unsafe, “unsupported” and at “imminent risk of harm or death” during their volatile relationship.
And it turns out the shocking – and shockingly common – domestic violence Walker inflicted represented just a snapshot of the atrocities that were being committed at house 577 in Yuendumu.
Lonely life without dad
Ruby – who tried to protect her cousin from Walker – was suffering her own hell in that same house at the hands of her father, who was viciously bashing and raping her.
The house belongs to Ruby’s grandparents, Eddie and Lottie Robertson, but Rickisha, uncle Ethan, his partner Janice Burns, their small children, at least three of Ruby’s “sister-cousins” and Walker – when not in jail – also lived there.
Eddie and Lottie’s adopted sons, Dean and Darren Wilson, also moved back in from time to time. The Robertsons raised the brothers after their biological mother – Lottie’s sister, Diane Wilson – died.
Eddie and Lottie also raised Ruby – Dean’s only daughter – from when she was a baby.
Like Walker, Ruby was born at Alice Springs Hospital – just 10 weeks before him – in late 2000.
She had lived with the Robertsons at Yuendumu, 330km northwest of Alice Springs, for most of her life except for a few short stints in other communities and a year spent studying in Melbourne.
Ruby’s parents were both absent while she was growing up.
“(Life) was all right but a bit lonely because I didn’t have my parents and I always missed them,” she said.
“It was hard for me to see other kids with their parents because I missed mine.”
So when Dean was released on parole in September 2017, Ruby – 17 at the time – was “happy” because she wanted to enjoy a “proper father-daughter relationship” and finally have someone to look after her.
In late September that year, Dean moved back into the Robertsons’ home and lived – for the first time – in the same house as his teenage daughter.
“I was relieved and everything, like I would get to spend time with him and everything, like I’d get to know my father kind of thing, but everything was turned around,” Ruby told The Weekend Australian. “Life’s always not what you expect, you know.”
‘No one told me’
Dean had been serving time for sexual intercourse without consent, deprivation of liberty, causing grievous harm and assaulting a police officer.
But Ruby had not known why her dad was in jail and is now angry that her family had kept her in the dark.
“I’m angry that nobody told me the truth about him, why did he go to jail in the first place,” she said.
“I never knew about it. Nobody told me. That’s why I was disappointed. (He did) the same thing to someone else. Some girl.”
Within a week of his release in 2017, the 34-year-old began terrorising his daughter.
He started subjecting her to regular sexual and domestic violence that would put him back behind bars.
Northern Territory Supreme Court documents reveal the sickening physical assaults were “protracted or prolonged, at times with the use of weapons”, including a cultural stick.
Court documents also reveal Ruby found the courage to testify at her father’s trial despite her fear of him and potential payback from relatives for speaking out.
Two other brave young girls – SB and SW – also gave evidence at Dean’s trial.
‘Didn’t believe me’
Ruby told The Weekend Australian that despite feeling “nervous” and worried what relatives will think about her for speaking out, she wants to share her story to encourage other victims to report abuse to police.
She said the incidents, detailed in the Supreme Court documents, have stripped her of confidence and left her feeling “worthless”.
Ruby said she told a relative – whom The Weekend Australian has chosen not to name – her “jealous” and possessive father had raped her, but they “didn’t want to believe” her.
“Before I went to Alice Springs, I told (a relative) that he took my pants down and what he did but (the relative) didn’t believe me,” she said.
“(They) just stood there really shocked and just looked at me.”
The reality was Dean raped Ruby “whenever he got the chance” and – on multiple occasions – bought her weed before assaulting her.
“But I would just smoke it and act like normal and refuse and everything,” she said.
“But if I refused, I’d get bashed.
“That happened (with the weed) a few times at Yuendumu and Alice Springs.”
Night of terror
The first documented assault – detailed in court documents – occurred in October 2017 after Ruby, SB and SW went to a female friend’s house in Yuendumu one night to watch movies.
When SB and SW arrived at the house, Dean was waiting.
“Where is Ruby, the c..t?” he asked. “If I find her, I’m going to hit her.”
The Warlpiri man also threatened to hit the girls if they didn’t reveal where his daughter was.
He forced them into his car and drove erratically to their friend’s home where he punched Ruby in the face twice before pulling her into his car.
With SB and SW in the back seat, he took the three crying girls back to the house, punching his daughter’s head as he drove.
He then ordered Ruby inside but not before punching her back, striking her legs with a piece of iron, pushing her to the ground and smashing her phone.
Once inside, Dean took his daughter to the middle bedroom where he kept punching her before striking her back and ankles with a cultural stick.
Ruby cried out in pain.
Eventually Dean left the room and his daughter fell asleep.
SW, who had witnessed the assault, went to sleep in the same room.
But it wasn’t over.
After both girls drifted off Dean went back in, woke Ruby up and ordered her to come to his bedroom. “I don’t want to go to that room,” she screamed.
Dean slapped her face, pulled her into his room, punched her face and pushed her onto his bed.
“Be quiet, otherwise people are going to hear you,” he threatened.
She tried to get up but he pushed her back down, held her there and raped her.
Afterwards she tried to kick his face and he punched her again.
Alice Springs ordeal
Another night in late 2017, Dean’s brother, Ethan, and his partner, Janice Burns, were watching television in the lounge room with their baby when another savage assault occurred.
The door on the middle bedroom behind them was closed but they could hear Ruby screaming “let me go”.
Janice asked Ethan to help Ruby so he knocked and told his brother, “Hey, open the door. Let the girl go”.
Janice could see Ruby had been hit in the face and scratched.
On another occasion, Dean hit Ruby outside in the yard. Lottie and two other women saw the assault and “growled” at him, according to court documents.
Ruby told The Australian Dean also bashed and raped her “lots of times” in Alice Springs.
Court documents reveal that on December 21, 2017, the pair were in town visiting Dean’s girlfriend when he told Ruby she had to come with him to the shops but instead drove her into the bush.
The teenager – anticipating what would happen – said she was tired and wanted to go home.
“No, let’s just chill for a little while,” her dad insisted.
Once parked in a secluded spot, he touched her legs and breast before telling her to get into the back of the car.
“No, I don’t want to,” she said, panicked.
Short-lived escape
After the rape, he told her to wipe her face so nobody would see that she had been crying but she couldn’t stop the tears.
He threatened that if she kept crying, he would rape her again.
He then drove them back to his girlfriend’s house at Hoppys town camp.
After that incident, Ruby fled to a community outside Alice Springs.
Dean repeatedly called and texted her.
“I ran away from him for five days,” Ruby said.
“I went missing for five days and he was texting me, telling me, ‘I’m sorry and everything, come back please’.”
When she finally answered his call, she reluctantly told him where she was.
He found her at Amoonguna, slapped her face and chastised her for running away. He then drove her to Old Timers Camp in Alice Springs and picked up another man named Terry.
He then directed Terry to drop them off at the Telegraph Station turn-off, about 5km north of Alice Springs.
“He told them other people lies,” Ruby told The Weekend Australian. “He said ‘can you drop us off here first, my wife is drinking here’, but it wasn’t true.”
When the car came to a stop, Ruby tried to run but Dean grabbed her by the shirt and slapped her face.
“He took me out into the bush and started punching me, dragging me on the ground and hitting me with the big rock on my back and my two knees,” she said.
Dean took her to a nearby hill and punched her before hitting her back, ankles and knees with a stick.
He pelted her with rocks and when she fell to the ground, he kicked her in the stomach and dragged her by the hair.
He told her to stop crying, dragged her by the hair again and kicked her face before hitting her head three times with a rock.
He then grabbed a bigger rock and hit her ankles.
Dean told Ruby to take her pants off. She refused. He wrestled them off her. “No, I don’t want to,” she told him.
He took his pants off and told her: “Just do it.”
Ruby said “no” and tried to fight him off. She threw a rock, hitting his shoulder, and kicked his knees.
“I cried so loud so someone could hear me,” she said.
“He just gave up because I was (being so noisy). I was fighting back so he just let me go.”
Dean then took his distraught and shaking daughter to his girlfriend’s house. The next day he drove Ruby back to Yuendumu.
“I couldn’t walk or stand up,” she said.
“I was so scared that I didn’t even think about my pain.
“I walked to Serita and asked her for help.”
Ruby’s aunt, Serita, took her to the medical clinic.
‘Please drop charges’
Court documents state that when doctors examined Ruby, she was limping and exhibiting at least 50 separate bruises and injuries.
Medical staff notified the police.
“The police asked Serita if he’d done anything (sexual) to me,” Ruby said. “I started crying and said ‘yes’. I was frozen for a second because I was scared that he (the policeman) might think that I’m a liar but he believed me because there were bruises everywhere on my body.”
Dean appeared at the police station and begged his daughter to drop the charges.
“He said ‘can you drop the charges please? Can you drop them please?’,” she told The Weekend Australian.
“I was too scared to answer him. I was just shaking and there were tears running down my face and he just ran away.”
Chapter 2 of Ruby's Story: Payback
Ruby was bloodied, badly bruised and could barely walk when she presented to the Yuendumu medical clinic after what would be the final brutal bashing and attempted rape by her dad.
The remote area nurses notified local police who took the teenager to Alice Springs to provide a formal statement.
Soon after – in January 2018 – Ruby’s dad Dean Wilson was arrested, charged and taken into custody where he remained until his trial in the Supreme Court at Alice Springs in November 2019.
Ruby, two 13-year-old girls who had witnessed her repeated and protracted assaults, and her aunt Serita Ross all gave evidence.
Terrified of seeing her father, Ruby – then 17 – testified from a vulnerable witness box.
“It was really hard (to give evidence),” she said.
“I couldn’t even face him.
“I didn’t want to see him. I didn’t even want to take a glance at him.”
At the weekend The Australian newspaper revealed that Ruby’s father had brutally bashed and raped her, when she was a teenager, after being released from prison in September 2017 and moving into the Yuendumu home where she lived with her grandparents.
The 21-year-old this month said during an interview in Far North Queensland – where she now lives – that she hadn’t wanted to send her dad back to jail but feared that if he remained free, he would murder her.
“I couldn’t just let him get away with it,” she said.
“I was too scared, like I was really trapped. I couldn’t walk anywhere, not even to the shops or anything, without him coming with me.
“I didn’t want him in jail because he’s my dad and I just got him back but I was just too scared that one day he might kill me or something.”
During his trial, Wilson admitted to much of the physical violence but denied the sexual offending.
“It is likely you had mixed motivations for the physical assaults at the time,” Judge Jenny Blokland said during sentencing.
“Overall, you have used what apparent discipline rights you thought you could exercise over your biological daughter to control her, or at least control elements of her lifestyle.
“There is a substantial deal of irony in your claims about your rights to discipline her, given you had so little to do with her upbringing.”
Speaking about one night when Dean had assaulted Ruby at Yuendumu, Judge Blokland said the abuse had been protracted, prolonged and involved the use of weapons.
“After a terrifying drive home, you continued the assaults at (Ruby’s) home, compromising her safety and security, much of it in front of the two younger (girls),” she said.
“You showed no mercy when (Ruby) called for help or showed distress.
“The blows were directed to vulnerable parts of her body.
“She was your daughter and could have expected to be protected by you. This was the opposite of protection.”
Judge Blokland said Dean’s final assault on Ruby, in bushland outside Alice Springs in early 2018, was “in the higher range of aggravated assaults that may be comprehended”.
“The use of the rock and a number of assaults … in an isolated area for the purpose of effecting a rape on your daughter means this must be regarded as a higher end level of assault,” she said.
“In terms of the attempted rape, it was – overall – a violent, indecent, frightening event which took place in an isolated area.
“(Ruby) had to fight you off and threaten to call the police before you would stop.”
Judge Blokland described Ruby as a “well-behaved, well-adapted young person” who – before the assaults – “was a happy girl with lots of friends” and wanted to be an artist or a nurse.
“She feels great shame because you are her father and you should not have offended against her,” she said.
“She now feels she cannot trust people and feels haunted by all of the circumstances which surrounded the offending and its consequences.”
The Supreme Court judge said Ruby now “feels trapped and feels she cannot go anywhere”.
“She cannot go back to Yuendumu where she grew up, as it no longer feels like home, and she has certain apprehensions about your family as well,” she said.
“Although the attitude of the family cannot be sheeted home to you in sentencing, it is a consequence of the offending that (Ruby) can no longer rely on parts of the extended family due to their mixed loyalties to you.”
The fallout
On December 3, 2019 – following his five-day trial – Dean was found guilty on all six counts of physically and sexually assaulting his daughter, and attempting to rape her.
The next day Dean’s brother Darren Wilson armed himself with an axe and “marched angrily down the main road at Yuendumu” looking for those who had “got my brother locked up”.
Specifically, Darren sought “payback” against Ruby’s aunt Serita who had taken the teenager to receive medical treatment and supported her niece in speaking to police.
Serita’s aunt Teresa had also supported Serita and Ruby – telling both of the younger women “not to be afraid and to be strong” – in giving evidence at Dean’s trial.
So the day after Dean’s conviction – December 4, 2019 – Darren went straight to the Yuendumu Primary School where Serita worked and, after finding her in the staff kitchen, kicked down the door and threatened to kill her with the axe.
Community chaos
Before Darren reached the school, Yuendumu resident Steven Kelly spotted him storming down the street and yelled out, “Hey, are you all, right?”
“They put my brother in for 20 years,” Darren shot back.
“They told liar stories about him.
“I’m going to the school. I’m going to hit Serita,” he said before lifting his shirt to show Mr Kelly the axe tucked into his pants.
Mr Kelly – knowing Darren’s violent history – immediately feared for Serita.
When Darren reached the primary school, he – through a window – spotted the 32-year-old in the breakfast room.
“Stand there. Wait,” he angrily yelled at her.
Terrified, Serita started banging on the door and begging her colleague – identified in court only as AB – to open it.
She then rushed into the adjoining room and tried to close the door behind her, but Darren kicked it open.
“I’m going to kill you. You got my brother locked up,” he yelled as he pulled the axe out from under his shirt.
“My brother, he’s in jail. You mob been put him in jail for 20 years,” he accused her.
AB jumped in front of Serita to try to protect her while Darren repeatedly threatened to kill her.
“I’m going to kill you,” he yelled.
“I’m going to kill you right here.”
The 39-year-old – who has a lengthy criminal history for violent offences – then “forcefully swung the axe” over the top of AB and struck Serita on the back of the head with it.
As blood gushed from her wound, Serita pulled her mobile phone from her pocket to call the police.
Serita – terrified and screaming – then tried to block her face with her arms and mobile phone as Darren again swung the axe but this time towards her face.
He smashed her phone and Serita somehow escaped from the room.
Supreme Court documents state that Serita “ran for her life” to the primary school’s main office while AB tried to block Darren from chasing her.
A teacher gave Serita, who could not stop shaking, a towel to stem the bleeding from her head.
She took off her blood-soaked T-shirt and put on a clean one so as to not scare the students who saw her.
Darren then left the school grounds in search of 62-year-old Teresa.
“Where’s Teresa?” he yelled.
“I’m gonna kill her.”
Serita’s daughter heard about what had happened and phoned Teresa to warn her that Darren was on his way to her work.
Court documents reveal that Teresa was “frightened for her life”.
She immediately left work, collected her children and grandchildren, took them home and locked all of the doors.
Police arrested Darren later that day.
Darren's journey
Court documents reveal Darren made a “spontaneous admission” to police that he hit Serita on the head with an axe because she had accused his brother of rape.
However, he refused to tell police where the axe was because he was afraid they would obtain his fingerprints from it and charge him with other offences.
In 2020 Darren pleaded guilty to causing harm to Serita, threatening to kill Teresa and possession of a controlled weapon in a public place.
Serita said, in her first written victim impact statement, that she was “so scared for my life”.
“I thought he was going to kill me for real,” she wrote.
Serita said she still “can’t stop shaking” from the incident and worrying about what would happen to her kids if he kills her.
“I’m scared, if he gets out, he will try to kill me again,” she said.
“He tried to kill me because I gave evidence against his brother, who raped his own daughter.
“He’s blaming me for Dean going to jail.”
In her second victim impact statement, Serita said she had lost a lot of blood and was still experiencing severe pain.
“My head is really sore,” she wrote.
“I have lots of pain when I lay down and the shower stings it.
“It’s paining all the time.”
The 32-year-old said the attack had left her fearful, shocked and unable to return to work.
“I can’t sleep, because I keep thinking, ‘What if he killed me? What would happen to my kids?’,” she wrote.
“I gave evidence to help my niece. I didn’t tell any lies about his brother, Dean.
“His brother did the wrong thing. Not my fault. He should get 5 years’ jail for trying to kill me.”
During sentencing Justice Judith Kelly said Darren – who was “clearly a very dangerous person” due to his lengthy criminal history of violent offences – had intended to cause Serita life-threatening injuries or injuries that would be long standing.
“These offences strike at the very heart of the administration of justice, because the reason that you were trying to seriously injure Serita and the reason you threatened to kill Teresa was because they had given evidence here, in a court of law, in the Supreme Court, under a subpoena,” Justice Kelly said.
“They were obliged to give that evidence and gave truthful evidence.”
Justice Kelly said the offences were “made more serious” for a number of reasons including that his victim, Serita, was female.
“This seems to be a pattern with you; assaulting women; a very unhealthy pattern,” she said.
“She is an extended family member of yours. You attacked her while she was at work.
“She was at work in a primary school on a school day. There were little kids around. They should not be exposed to that sort of thing.”
Justice Kelly said Darren’s attack with a deadly weapon was “determined”.
“You kept going after her. You kicked the door down to get at her. You kept threatening her and you hit at her more than once with the axe,” she said.
“You aimed at a particularly vulnerable part of her body, like her head and face.
“Goodness knows what would have happened if that mobile phone had not got in the way.
“She thought she was going to die.”
Darren’s threat to kill Teresa was also made more serious by a number of factors, Justice Kelly said.
“It is likely to have the effect of frightening people into not wanting to give evidence in serious sex offence cases against children, and possibly other violent offences as well,” she said.
“The threat to kill is made more serious, obviously, by the fact that you said it with an axe in your hand, after you had just used that axe to attack somebody else.
“And again, that it is that threat to the administration of justice.”
In November 2020 Justice Kelly sentenced Darren to a total term of imprisonment for 10 years with a non-parole period of five years for his attack on Serita and threat to kill Teresa.
Dean was sentenced last May to 18 years in prison with a non-parole period of 15 years for abusing his daughter Ruby.
In an exclusive interview with incoming Alice Springs Country Liberal senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, for a documentary Senator Price is making called Yimi Junga, Serita said she feels safe now that Darren is locked up, but that “his mother wants to fight me”.
“And many other people in his family were threatening to beat me up,” she said
“They are still threatening me at Yuendumu.”
Meanwhile, up in Far North Queensland, Ruby’s life has spiralled out of control.
Chapter 3 of Ruby's Story: 'I want to go home but I don’t feel safe there'
When police arrested her dad for repeatedly bashing and raping her, Ruby should have finally felt free. Instead, she was banished from her community in a disturbingly common story.
When police arrested Dean Wilson for repeatedly bashing and raping his daughter Ruby, the teenager should have finally felt free.
Instead, the 17-year-old was forced from her home in Yuendumu by community members who supported the perpetrator and blamed her for having him locked up. “Everybody just kept giving me dirty (looks) and didn’t believe me,” she said.
Ruby – not her real name – told The Australian newspaper that when she returned to Yuendumu after providing her police statement in Alice Springs about her father’s abuse, she no longer felt safe moving around the community and had to “stay in the one place”.
A close relative even told her that “Dean wants to forgive me” for finally reporting him to the police following months of horrific abuse. “I was thinking, like ‘What do you mean? I don’t get it?’,” she said. “I don’t want him to forgive me. I want him to admit it and say sorry … he should be the one saying sorry to me.”
Ruby’s father had bashed and raped her after being released on parole in September 2017 and moving into the Yuendumu home where the teenager lived with her grandparents.
After Ruby endured four months of hell, Wilson was finally arrested in January 2018 after a particularly vicious beating and attempted rape that left his daughter limping and exhibiting more than 50 separate injuries.
When Ruby’s aunt took her to the medical clinic, police were notified and Wilson was arrested.
Almost two years later, Ruby testified against her father in the Northern Territory Supreme Court at Alice Springs.
Following the five-day trial in November 2019, the jury found Wilson guilty on all six counts of physically and sexually assaulting her and attempting to rape her at various locations in Yuendumu and Alice Springs.
In her victim impact statement from January 2020 – two years after his arrest – Ruby said she felt “sad and lost and angry all the time”.
In May 2020, judge Jenny Blokland sentenced Wilson to 18 years in prison.
Ruby in May told The Australian her father’s abuse has left her feeling lost, lonely and worthless. “He’s the one who is supposed to protect me and everything,” she said. “He’s supposed to protect me from people like that. But you can’t always trust people, even if they’re your real family.”
After the trial, Ruby felt abandoned and unsupported at Yuendumu. She also feared for her safety at the remote outback community, 330km northwest of Alice Springs, after her aunt was attacked with an axe in retaliation for giving evidence at her father’s trial.
“I really want to go back home but, at the same time, I don’t feel safe there,” she said.
It’s a common story. In June, an NT Supreme Court judge said Indigenous sexual assault victims were being banished from their communities as punishment for reporting abuse. Justice Blokland, who presided over Wilson’s trial, made the remarks during the sentencing hearing in a separate sexual assault case.
She said the victim in that case had, like Ruby, been forced to leave the remote community where she had grown up. “We may be witnessing the emergence of a trend which sees victims of sexual assault being incidentally punished in their home communities through a form of banishment,” she said. “I feel it is something community leaders need to seriously reflect on.”
After Wilson’s arrest, Ruby met her boyfriend, whose father is from Yuendumu, and gave birth to their son in November 2020.
“Ever since I had my baby, I was happy but I couldn’t just brush off my memories, they’re still haunting me,” she said. “I tried to distract myself with things and I got into weed really bad back home.
“It was just sometimes it would calm me down and make me forget things but I tried to leave that.”
Before long, Ruby’s relationship with her boyfriend became volatile. Despite this, the young couple took their baby and moved to far north Queensland, where Ruby’s boyfriend had grown up, in search of a new beginning and better life. Yet their trip from the Red Centre to the tropical north was turbulent.
When they reached Mount Isa in early June, both were arrested for fighting. In October, following months of volatility, Ruby was charged with one count of obstructing a police officer and one count of seriously assaulting a public officer. In November, she was charged with two counts of failing to appear in court. On December 10, she was arrested and taken into custody.
“I wasn’t in my right mind cos I’m still going through this (trauma),” she said. “That just put me back to that part where everything happened to me and I tried defending myself but then the police wouldn’t listen to my side of the (story) and still locked me up.”
The day Ruby was arrested, her boyfriend was charged with possessing drug utensils. A few days later, he pleaded guilty in the Mareeba Magistrates Court to eight driving and drug-related offences, spanning a period from April to December 2021.
The 22-year-old had convictions recorded, his driver’s licence disqualified and drug utensils seized. He also copped $2500 in fines which, the court has since heard, he was unable or unwilling to pay.
Meanwhile, Ruby remained in custody for four months before her matters were dealt with in the Mareeba Magistrates Court in March. Represented by criminal lawyer Jaci Soles from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services, she pleaded guilty.
On March 25, magistrate Thomas Braes sentenced her to 12 months in prison for obstructing a police officer and 12 months in prison for seriously assaulting a public officer. Noting that she had already spent 105 days in custody, he immediately released her on 18 months’ parole.
As a part of parole conditions, she was ordered to submit to a psychological or psychiatric evaluation. Ruby told The Australian she was diagnosed with PTSD and depression as a result of her father’s abuse.
“They think I can’t control my mental issues,” she said.
A doctor prescribed antidepressants for her.
“They’re not helping,” she said. “It just gives me headaches.”
Ruby has seen her son only a handful of times since being released from prison but cherishes the weekly hour-long visits.
“First, he was shy but then he started remembering us,” she said.
“On Wednesday, I called out his name … and he turned around and crawled to me.”
During her last visit, he fell asleep in her lap.
Every week, when Ruby sees him, she notices how much the 18-month-old has grown.
He recently took his first steps and Ruby suspects he will soon be stringing sentences together.
She said being separated from him was “really hard” but he seemed to be safe, happy, well cared for and surrounded by other kids.
She said he looked healthy, was eating a lot and not suffering from any health issues.
Her boyfriend has been trying to get a job.
After growing up fatherless, Ruby wants to keep the family unit intact at all costs.
The 21-year-old said she felt unwelcome where she was staying with her boyfriend’s aunt but had nowhere else to go. “It just feels like everyone is blaming me for everything,” she said.
“I’ve got so many emotions running through me every day and I always feel like I’m not worth anything.
“Everything just puts me down.
“It’s just my life’s been hard and still is hard.”
Ruby – who does not have a phone, car, job, family, friends or support in far north Queensland – feels adrift.
“It’s been lonely,” she said. “I just feel lost all the time and I miss my family. I just want a home to stay in and a good family.”
Ruby also wants a job, “something easy to start with” but eventually in childcare so she can be reunited with her son.
“I miss him so much,” she said.
“Firstly I really want a job and a house to live in with him.
“I’ve never had my own place and even when living with family, I’ve never had my own room.”
The young woman, who has changed her surname since her father’s trial, still entertains returning to the Territory to be closer to kin but says staying in Queensland would “probably be better”.
And even if she felt safe to return to Yuendumu, she can’t go back. “I feel like people there are too judgmental,” she said.
“I can’t face those memories.
“It’s hard to forget what happened to me.
“I just want a happy life and wanna be free.”
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