This week in Perth the Senate Inquiry into Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) will hear from the families of Aboriginal women murdered in Western Australia. WA has a very high rate of Indigenous women falling victim to murder - coming second only to the Northern Territory.
According to research by the Telethon Kids Institute, an Aboriginal mother in WA is 17.5 times more likely to be murdered than a non-Aboriginal mother. If this level of violence, murder, was happening to non-Indigenous women, mothers even, would there be so little attention and response by the state?
Every family has been impacted. We know violence is connected to colonisation that permitted widespread rape and murder of Indigenous women and girls as part of its genocidal process. Our ancient lore and culture were violated, and peoples were cruelly dispossessed of lands and forced to work for white pastoralists. Aboriginal children were stolen from mothers just for being born of mixed race, abused by the church and state, with violence turned inwards and intergenerational.
It's important to know that perpetrators, men who murder Aboriginal women and girls, are both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal men.
We have still yet to face our history of colonial violence. How many people today know that British settler Charles Bussell shot and killed a seven-year-old Noongar girl, Cummagoot, at point blank range? I was shocked myself to learn about this crime, not at school or university, but from official colonial records unearthed.
Bussell was excused by a jury of his peers who deemed the shooting "accidental", fined him just one shilling (10 cents), and sent him on his way while Cummagoot was erased from white history books and cruelly forgotten.
Today, the family of Noongar woman Stacey Thorne, who was murdered in Boddington in 2007, are fighting to make sure she and her unborn baby are not forgotten. Stacey was a respected teacher aide, loved by children at her school and 22 weeks pregnant when murdered. We can't imagine her final hours, she was looking forward to being a mother when brutally slain, stabbed 21 times before she collapsed on a neighbour's lawn as she ran for help.
Scott Austic was originally convicted of Stacey's murder. The prosecution argued that he killed Stacey because he didn't want her to have his baby. Austic served 12 years in prison for Stacey's murder but was released in 2021 when a Supreme Court jury acquitted him of the charge, agreeing with an earlier court finding that the police had fabricated the case against him. The Attorney General John Quigley is now considering an application by Austic for compensation.
Austic was supported by Malcolm McCusker QC, a former governor and senior barrister who suggested in the 7NEWS program Framed, broadcast prior to Austic's successful appeal, that evidence of another suspect - the murderer - was kept from the jury that convicted Austic, referring to bloody footprints in Stacey's home. However, six of the 18 footprints found could not be analysed - and could not be attributed to any individual. The remainder of 12 footprints were identified as Stacey's.
On 17 August 2021, the Hon Rosetta (Rosie) Sahanna from Broome, Member of the Legislative Council and first Aboriginal woman appointed to the WA Upper House, tabled our petition (supported by 2,123 signatures) in parliament:
"We the undersigned support the calls of the Thorne family for justice for Stacey, a Noongar woman murdered in Boddington on 9th of December 2007. To this day no one has been held to account for her horrific murder.
Aboriginal (First Nations) women in West Australia are at a high risk of murder, and as mothers are 17.5 times more likely to be the victim of homicide. There is also racism by the criminal justice system, leaving them and their children vulnerable. Perpetrators may offend with impunity. Aboriginal women also suffer high rates of disability linked to this violence they are subjected to.
We therefore ask the Legislative Council to recommend that the Government:
- Release the 2013 Corruption and Crime Commission report into Stacey Thorne’s murder.
- Acknowledge violence against and murder of First Nations women.
- Inquire into the deaths and disappearances of First Nations women in WA.
- Investigate the media reporting of First Nations women’s deaths.
- Commit to addressing structural and systemic discrimination that disadvantages and impedes First Nations women’s access to legal services, victim supports and justice.”
The WA government didn't respond to our petition – although we later learnt from WA Police that a further investigation was underway, reportedly addressing the forensic evidence.
The federal Senate Inquiry in MMIWG underway is significant, but little will ultimately change if state governments continue to marginalise Indigenous women, failing to hear our voices.
Clearly, the two investigations into Stacey Thorne's murder by the CCC are a matter of public interest and the reports must now be publicly released. Justice deserves no less. The Thorne family respectfully request the Attorney General release these reports into Stacey's murder.
We have further requested the WA Police offer a reward for information leading to a conviction for the murder of Stacey Thorne and look forward to WAPOL's response.
Say Her Name. Justice for Stacey Thorne!
Dr Hannah McGlade is a Kurin Minang human rights expert, law academic and member of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
