Evil

This is the ground floor of an interconnecting block of flats where we had to stake out a paedophile one day. It was the most disgusting case I had ever heard of. In one of these flats they raped a three-year-old boy and when he died as a result of this mistreatment they tried to revive him by putting live exposed wires on to him in an attempt to jolt him awake. That poor kid. This was all apparently watched by the six year old sister. The perpetrator was already in jail, long may he rot, the person we were chasing was the person who's flat it was; the person police were having troubhle fingering becasuse he was the organiser, he liked to watch. These people, this incident, was beyond disgusting. And here he was, living at taxpayers expense, on the dole, in public housing, living in the same unit where the horror had occurred.

It took us all day but we got him, myself, who some days could hardly be more sardonic after years on the road, and another photographer who is equally as difficult to inspire. And when we got him - it took us about eight hours of careful staking out - we were practically high fiving each other. We pursued him down the street. We had all the classic shots; him running, him lashing out. He was an ordinary looking little guy, looked more like a Greek peasant.

And one of the mums that we co-opted into helping us; already off her head at nine o'clock in the morning, said to us: yeh, but I think Keith, for that was his name, I think Keith feels sorry for what happened. Then she drawls, what was he supposed to have done. It had already been on every news channel, every newspaper, every radio station; as one of the most appalling cases Sydney had ever seen. Yeeeaaaah, what do you think he did? And then she goes on; yeh, I thought there was something odd about him. He's always talking to my four year old, and you know how kids have a sixth sense, well he doesn't like him.

For Christ's sake, you're letting your four year old talk to someone who was in the flat, who must have watched, as a three year old boy was raped and killed?!! Just unbelievable. This is what they mean when they talk about the collapse of the under-classes; there's nothing left, there's no moral basis, they're off their heads 24/7 and it's all funded for by the taxpayer. They don't have to get themselves together; someone will always pick up the pieces.

This case shocked me through and through. As a separated father, and as someone who had seen an awful lot of documentation on false sexual abuse allegations, the standard bread and butter fare of our disgraceful family court system, I had come to believe that almost all of these cases were simply false allegations. There was nothing false about this one, which was sickening beyond belief. And while the taxpayer funds all this; the traffic flows by as if nothing had ever happened. And the mother who let these guys care for her kids while she had a break; from all reports she couldn't have cared less; thought the kid was obnoxious anyway. These kids had been repeatedly reported to the auhorities; who did nothing. Some things in life defy understanding. Some things in life can only be explained by one word: evil.

NEWS:

LAST NIGHT at 1 a.m., Israeli Defence Forces bombed the town of Qana in southern Lebanon. The buildings, which were reduced to rubble, housed refugees who had fled from other villages and cities, such as Tyre, which had been bombarded by the IDF over the past 18 days.
Fifty-four civilians have been reportedly killed, 37 of them children.
While Israeli spokespersons regret the loss of civilian lives, they maintain that Qana was being used by the Hezbollah to launch rocket attacks into northern Israel and that enough warnings had been given to innocent civilians by way of air-dropped pamphlets.