No laws, no protection, no ethics, no justice…this was Guantanamo Bay, terra nullius under President George W Bush. President Barack Obama’s closing the hellhole will be just the first step in what might be a generation-long bid to rehabilitate America…
Justice Clarke has pilloried virtually all authorities in involved with the Haneef fiasco…but yet again no-one is apparently ‘responsible’ for wholesale incompetence. Buried in the report (pp 285-6) are Australian Federal Police attempts to change the…
Stun guns are not less-than lethal weapons: Australians will die after being shocked by stun guns, CLA’s Bill Rowlings said this week. He was commenting on detailed analysis of 334 deaths after stun gun use in the USA in just over seven years. Amnesty In…
As the Australian Government prepares to sign the Optional Protocol against Torture, the illuminating light of publicity is starting to shine on Australia’s jails. For too long they have been out of site and out of mind, as have been the souls inside. He…
The SA post mortem and coronial inquiry system is creaking under the weight of insufficient forensic experts available, not enough money for adequate professional staff, and paper and filing systems more suited to the 19th century. Average delay for inqu…
CLA has launched a campaign to stop the Rudd Government imposting mandatoring internet filtering – censorship – on adult Australians’ access to the internet. The campaign consists of a new website – http://www.censorfree.com.au/ – and a series of eve…
Australian Mamdouh Habib tells first-hand how the US ‘War on Terror’ became war on any foreigner in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Australia’s Pontius Pilate Government was complicit, in its knowledge and by its silence, as an Australian was kidnapped, detain…
Over just four days in April 2006, two young men died while while being restrained by WA Police (WAPOL) in Perth. At the inquests, the coronial service recommended changes that might avoid such deaths. CLA is monitoring their implementation, which so far…
The Corrections Amendment Act 2008 (Vic) passed in September, which aims to benefit victims of crime , is fatally flawed because it seeks to draw on the payments prisoners receive after their claims for wrongful treatment and abuse at the hands of pris…
Caged like a ‘terrorist’ in Cuba, Brenden Abbott has less dignity than a dog. This emotive article by Rex Jory, of the Advertiser in South Australia, concerns a prisoner in Brisbane, Queensland. A Royal Commission into prisons said Australia’s jails woul…