Hundreds gather at No More violence rally in Adelaide, survivor Stacey Nelan shares her story
Eleven years ago, Stacey Nelan called the police to save her from a man she had once loved. Today, she joined hundreds of people calling for an end to gender based violence.
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Eleven years ago, Stacey Nelan called the police to save her from a man she had once loved.
“I had broken up with him on so many occasions, asking him to leave my home. He wouldn’t leave, and so on that final day when the situation escalated, I knew I needed to call the police to come and save me. There was no other option,” she said.
Standing on the steps of Parliament House on Saturday, Ms Nelan joined hundreds of people who rallied for the end of domestic violence.
One of seventeen Australia-wide over the weekend, the “No More” rally – organised by non-for-profit What Were You Wearing – called for change including investments in primary prevention, trauma-informed training for first responders and reformed bail laws to prioritise victim-survivor safety.
Ms Nelan, who stood and shared her story in front of the crowd, said she had spent three years with a man she never knew had prior convictions against him.
“I found out he had a different name to the one I had known him by,” she said.
“It turned out he had convictions against him for things he’d done to other women in other states, but because he’d changed his name legally, those convictions never followed him.
“That fear and terror is something that you cannot articulate. In the end he went to court and got a good behaviour bond.”
She said that after she started advocating for victim-survivors, other women reached out to her letting her know they’d encountered her abuser on dating apps.
“He was a horrific bully who got his giggles out of what he did,” she said.*
“It took a long time to come to terms with the fact that the man I had loved and given my everything to could do the things that he did. Eleven years down the track, there has been change in many ways, but women are still being killed at greater rates. There’s so much more we need to do to change the way we think. To understand that a sexist joke can end up with a dead woman.”
On the bottom step below Parliament House, 31 hearts with the names of the 24 women and seven children killed by violence already this year lined the ground, but organisers said that number was already outdated.
The 25th woman allegedly murdered in 2025, Talulah Koopman was found with critical stab wounds at a home in Elizabeth on Thursday evening.
Minister for Women and the Prevention of Domestic Violence Katrine Hildyard said the state government was committed to making real change.
“The ongoing prevalence of horrific violence against women, the gender inequality, is absolutely unacceptable,” she said.
“We know we need to do more. Our Royal Commission will be with us in a matter of weeks and this provides us with a once in a generation opportunity to look at our system, and make sure that we get it right.”
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