RT – Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has launched an inquiry following a video broadcast on national TV which showed children being teargassed and strapped to chairs at a detention center that has been likened to Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.
I know that the guards sound awful with their giggling and they are probably the usual goons holding these positions, but I have known people who worked with these kids. I know how they can get and those kids sounded pretty revved up. I remember being stunned at the tales I heard. Gas could have been the only means possible at the time. Does Australia have its police etc trained in Tel Aviv like everyone else in NATO?
Comparing this to Abu Ghraib is overdoing it greatly.
These kids are not Palestinian children locked up for nothing in a jail and system where they don’t speak the language.
It may be wrong… it needs to be addressed…. but there are real Abu Ghraibs.
As someone who actually has worked with these sorts of kids (well over 15 years ago now) although not in the juvenile justice system (kid prison) I can say that I didn’t see anything in this that I have a problem with. Capsicum spraying (not tear gas) an armed violent criminal then cuffing him and washing the capsicum spray off him is sensible the alternative would have seen both groups being injured possibly fatally for a guard. The restrained violent criminal with a hood on looks bad but the hood was on him because he kept spitting on the guards he was restrained because he was violent and had most likely just injured one of the guards after he injured another inmate. I don’t know the particulars of these cases but I know enough from experience that what I’ve said is spot on.
In order for a juvenile to go to prison in Australia they have to have accumulated a very long and colourful rap sheet, make no mistake about it those children are violent criminals that have ruined the lives of many people in order to have been locked up. What it takes for a juvenile to be sent to gaol; several armed robberies (usually with a knife), several assaults (sometimes sexual), burglaries, car theft, malicious damage to property (lots of those) as well a string of minor offences. Under 18s have to either murder or rape someone to get locked up on a 1st offence in Australia. Having 15-30 broken good behaviour bonds for the list of offences I’ve listed above, before being locked up is typical.