cods wrote on Mar 20
th, 2017 at 4:51pm:
thank you for that raven.....sounds a shocker...
I would love to bang the drum to have the case reopened...no child should die without reason....I am appalled there is now a program on TV regarding unsolved murders...I would be ringing this station and asking them how do they get the case of this child before the public..
come on raven its not good enough to talk about this on a small forum like this....
look what happened when Gerard Baden Clay has his charge down graded.. its was NOISE raven just angry NOISE>.
it doesnt matter to me the boy was aboriginal.. it matters he is dead.. just like Daniel....a wicked crime was done...... did you say a community of 800 people..
..
It is just noise and it's not enough to talk about it on small forums, which is why Raven has spent his adult life bringing these issues to people's attention, but the apathy remains.
When white children go missing we rally,
when aboriginal children go missing we turn away.Back in 2014 a red-headed, freckled-faced 11-year-old girl was, thankfully, found safe and sound in a stranger’s house after disappearing from her family home in Bondi.
Michelle Levy had reportedly run away from her family after a fight over a chocolate. In the two days she was missing, her face dominated social media, and found its way into mainstream media as well.
Around 1,000 volunteers mobilised to help search for the girl. People dropped whatever they were doing and joined in. There was something about this case that touched people in a very real way and they reached out to help.
When children go missing, you would hope this is always the sort of response. But the awful truth is that the disappearance of a child doesn’t always garner such attention. We may all be created equal, but in the eyes of the Australian community – and in particular the Australian media – some children are more equal than others, and more worthy of media attention.
The difference is their race, and their financial circumstances.
Three Aboriginal children were murdered from the same mission between 1990 and 1991, and despite there being overwhelming evidence pointing to one person – a non-Indigenous man – he has never been convicted.
In the first crucial days of the kids’ disappearances, they were completely ignored by local police, who told parents that their children had probably gone ‘walkabout’.
In fact, Colleen’s mother, Muriel Craig-Walker, was questioned by police about whether or not she was, in fact, Colleen’s mother, and whether Colleen was even Aboriginal, given her fair complexion.
The only other contact Muriel ever received from police in the original investigation was a phone call weeks after Colleen’s disappearance, to inform her that her daughter had been found on a bus on the way to Brisbane. When Muriel rushed to the police station, she was told it was a case of mistaken identity – the Colleen Walker on the bus was an elderly white nun.
Clinton Speedy-Duroux’s father, Thomas, was told by NSW Attorney General Greg Smith that it was time he got counselling and moved on, but only after Smith first mistakenly called him by the alleged killer’s name.
The families had to protest outside the police station in 1991 simply to get investigators to take notice. Furious about the lack of action, Colleen’s aunty, Elaine Walker asked the local police inspector Bob Moore why he didn’t listen to the community when they gave him information about the killer’s identity.
Inspector Moore’s response was that “you people” had to work with police in solving the crime.
It's this level of apathy that these families have had fight against for 27 years. Raven witnessed one protest in Macquarie Street as people strode through banners with Justice for Bowravill and listening to people yell out "get a job."
So why didn’t Bowraville receive the same level of attention as other cases?
The reason can be found in the testimony of Detective Inspector Gary Jubelin, who headed the second investigation into the case in 1997. Jubelin brought to the case 20 years experience investigating homicides, and he says the Bowraville story can’t be told without mentioning one word: Racism.
He told the parliamentary inquiry in 2014
Quote:I have been investigating crimes for 20 years and I am still shocked by the lack of interest that has been shown in this matter. We have a serial killer and three children were murdered. It has been heartbreaking to see the families suffering. The only time they seem to get things happening is when they attract the media’s attention or when they publicly protest. That is very unfortunate.
The families know the reason. The families told me the reason when I first met them in 1997. They said ‘it’s because we’re Aboriginal’.
At the time when I met the families I did not believe them. Unfortunately, the truth of the matter is, having worked with the families now for the past 18 years, I think they identified the problem.
It is all very nice for society to say that all victims are treated equally. I do not think that is entirely correct.
I am a homicide detective; I am not a do-gooder or a bleeding heart. However race, and to a lesser degree, socioeconomic factors have impacted on the manner in which these matters have been investigated.