‘Whatever spirit he had is gone’: Child’s decline in broken system

Exclusive: Jacob* has been in the child safety system since before he was born.

Next month he turns 18 and he’ll mark the milestone by being transferred from youth detention to an adult prison.

Jacob appeared in the Children’s Court of Queensland via videolink from Townsville last Friday to be sentenced for 55 offences that occurred while he was between the ages of 11 and 12, primarily assaults on residential care workers, security guards, and a nurse.

Sitting in the witness box with his head lowered, just shy of becoming an adult but physically already so, with facial hair and wearing a blue singlet, Jacob listened to a summary of how he had lashed out at the people tasked with caring for him as a child.

The assaults included dozens of instances of spitting and one instance where he threw a cup of urine.

In another instance, he threatened to stab someone with a screwdriver.

He had thrown stones that shattered glass doors and kicked holes in walls.

At the time of the offences, Jacob had no prior criminal history, but in the intervening six years, which he had spent invariably in custody or on bail, he had amassed a significant rap sheet, mostly of assaults and breaches of bail.

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The court was told Jacob had come to the attention of the Department of Child Safety while his mother was still pregnant with him and had been diagnosed with foetal alcohol spectrum disorder and an intellectual impairment.

He was placed in the care of his grandmother, before transitioning into the youth residential share homes where his offending began, the prosecution explained.

He had experienced “varying care arrangements”, “childhood maltreatment” and had developed “maladaptive aggression and violence”, the court was told.

He had negative peer relationships and was distanced from schooling.

His lawyer told the court he had now been diagnosed with reactive attachment disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder and described his situation as “soul-destroying”.

“Whatever spirit he had is gone,” his lawyer told the court, referencing a brief time when Jacob had been employed as a landscaper.

“As he goes into prison in a few months, he sees no point in attending therapeutic interventions.

“That is possibly the saddest thing I have read in a pre-sentence report.”

Both the crown prosecutor and Jacob’s lawyer described to Judge Ian Dearden a childhood spent being shuffled from one system to another and submitted his sentence be reflected in time already served.

“He has been remanded in detention for the better part of his young life,” the prosecution told the court.

“He has effectively been institutionalised.”

Dearden agreed his two-year sentence was to be reflected in time already served, given Jacob had now been in custody for well over four years.

“You didn’t have much, if any, choice what happened to you growing up, I can’t change that, and you can’t change that,” Dearden told him.

“You were let down by the adults in your life and because they let you down you ended up in very difficult circumstances and you as a young person, aged 11 and 12, reacted in a way that caused enormous stress, distress, injury to others and damage to property.”

Dearden said Jacob had made “poor choices” but was still a “precious human being” who could make his own decisions about his life when he left prison.

“If you want to make a life you will have to figure out how you will live that life,” Dearden said.

“I can tell you that, but I don’t have to live the life you do when you get out of prison. I don’t pretend that’s going to be easy, it’s not.

“You’ve spent a lot of time in residential homes, you’ve spent a lot of time in custody, you’ve spent a lot of time away from family, a lot of time away from country, my hope for you is that you do not spend your life in adult prison.

“At some stage you will get out, my hope and my wish is that you stay out.”

The case comes as the Queensland government grapples with how to reform a system it has acknowledged is in crisis.

Last year, the government found the “broken out-of-home care system” was failing to protect vulnerable children and facilitating the growth of young criminals and announced a Commission of Inquiry into Child Safety.

That commission handed down its final report just weeks ago, finding the system relied too heavily on residential care, which was growing in scale and cost, facilitated by often unlicensed providers with limited oversight, and should prioritise promoting family-based care, including increasing access to adoption.

The report found “placement instability” was one of the “strongest and most consistent predictors of youth justice involvement for children in out-of-home care”.

It found that children in residential care were being “criminalised through police call-outs” for behaviour that would ordinarily be dealt with by a parent, such as verbal aggression, property damage, emotional dysregulation linked to trauma and refusal to comply with house rules.

The government says it has established a cabinet sub-committee to carefully consider the report’s 52 recommendations.

“The findings lay bare the scale of the crisis we inherited, with vulnerable children failed by a system that became increasingly reliant on residential care instead of supporting families and carers,” Child Safety Minister Amanda Camm said in a statement. 

“The Crisafulli government will continue to take action to fix Labor’s broken child safety system, restore respect for foster and kinship carers, and rebuild a child safety system that puts Queensland children first.”

*Name has been changed.