Australia's Shame
| "Australia's Shame" | |
|---|---|
| Four Corners episode | |
Official graphic for the episode, depicting the inside of a BMU cell at the Don Dale Juvenile Detention Centre
|
|
| Written by | Caro Meldrum-Hanna Elise Worthington |
| Narrated by | Caro Meldrum-Hanna |
| Presented by | Sarah Ferguson |
| Produced by | Mary Fallon Sally Neighbour (exc.) |
| Cinematography by | Erik Havnen |
| Editing by | Michael Nettleship |
| Original air date | July 25, 2016 |
| Running time | 51 minutes |
"Australia's Shame" is the title of an episode of the long-running Australian investigative journalism and current affairs program Four Corners, which aired on the ABC on 25 July 2016. Written by ABC journalists Caro Meldrum-Hanna and Elise Worthington, and reported by Meldrum-Hanna, the episode depicted the treatment of minors at the Don Dale Juvenile Detention Centre, located in the Northern Territory. Accompanied with graphic footage, the episode documented the experiences of individuals as they stayed at the centre's "Behavioural Management Unit" (BMU) maximum security cells, set in a timeline from 2010 to 2015. It featured interviews with Northern Territory Minister for Correctional Services John Elferink, various lawyers, and both former Northern Territory Children's Commissioner Dr. Howard Bath and current Commissioner Colleen Gwynne.
"Australia's Shame" follows the experiences of Jake Roper, Ethan Austral, Kenny Rogan and Dylan Voller at the Don Dale Juvenile Detention Centre, a maximum security prison located in Berrimah, Northern Territory. The episode cold opens with footage of a shirtless Voller, strapped and cuffed to a mechanical restraint chair, with his head covered by a spit mask. Presenter Sarah Ferguson introduces the episode by explaining to the viewer, "the image you've just seen isn't from Guantanamo Bay or Abu Ghraib, but Australia in 2015." After the traditional introduction, the episode, narrated and reported by Caro Meldrum-Hanna, begins with footage of the Behavioural Management Unit (BMU) cells at the Don Dale Juvenile Detention Centre in August 2014, when Roper breaks free from his cell and starts attempting to break out of the building with dis-attached light fixtures, while his cellmates watch on. Meldrum-Hanna explains that Roper had been kept in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, for 15 days straight, describing Roper as "having lost all sense of time" and "deeply distressed". Prison authorities are then seen spraying tear gas into the room, affecting Roper and all his cell mates, before all being dragged outside, held on the ground, and sprayed with water.
...
Wikipedia