This past weekend, thousands took to the streets across Australia, demanding an end to violence against women. The energy was powerful, the message clear: enough is enough.
And yet, as we read about a female prisoner who has settled with the NSW government after allegedly being sexually abused for years by a senior prison guard, one truth is impossible to ignore—this case is not an outlier. This is not one bad officer. This is the system working exactly as it was designed.
Prisons are sites of routine and systemic violence, and those employed to run them wield unchecked power with impunity. Sexual abuse by prison officers is not a rare occurrence—it is an inevitable consequence of a system built on absolute control over the most powerless. Women inside are subjected to strip searches, arbitrary punishments, deprivation of basic rights, and, as we see in this case, sexual coercion and abuse. Officers dictate every moment of a prisoner’s existence—when they can eat, when they can see their children, whether they are allowed a phone call. The threat of retaliation looms large. A ‘bad case note’ can mean the loss of parole. A complaint against an officer can mean punishment, solitary confinement, or worse.
Prison officer Wayne Astill was found guilty of 27 charges of aggravated sexual and indecent assault. The NSW government itself admitted that he should never have been employed in the first place. But how many others like him remain inside, protected by a culture that views incarcerated women as disposable? It is not enough to remove one predator when the entire structure enables the abuse. The NSW government has changed the law to criminalise sexual relationships between officers and inmates, but that does nothing to address the power imbalance that makes prisons inherently violent places.
This is not just about sexual violence—it is about the broader reality of carceral violence against women. The state disappears women into prisons, and when they are abused, it looks the other way. Women have died in custody as a direct result of police and prison violence. Veronica Nelson died in a Victorian prison cell after being denied medical care. Aunty Sherry Tilberoo was found dead in a Brisbane watch house, alone. Aunty Tanya Day died after being arrested for public drunkenness—a crime that should never have existed. Selesa Tafaifa died next to the toilet in her cell after being denied another phone call to her family. These deaths are not anomalies. They are the result of a system that punishes poverty, criminalises survival, and disappears women into cells where the violence of the state continues behind locked doors.
For Aboriginal women, the violence of the carceral system is an extension of the broader crisis of murdered and disappeared Indigenous women. Police rarely treat the disappearances of Aboriginal women with urgency. They fail to investigate, they fail to protect, they fail to care. The same state that ignores disappeared Aboriginal women is the one that locks them up at record rates, and then subjects them to violence behind bars.
We must ask ourselves: why is the violence of the state not part of the national conversation on violence against women? Why do we march for justice for women in their homes, on the streets, but not in prison cells? This, too, is gendered violence. This, too, kills.
If we are serious about ending violence against women, we must demand an end to the carceral system that disappears and brutalises them. We must take to the streets not only for the violence we can see, but for the violence the state hides.
Women in prisons deserve our outrage. They deserve our solidarity. And most of all, they deserve freedom. Free Her.
If you or someone you know is experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, domestic, family or sexual violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732, text 0458 737 732 or visit 1800RESPECT.org.au for online chat and video call services.
If you are concerned about your behaviour or use of violence, you can contact the Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491 or visit http://www.ntv.org.au.
Feeling worried or no good? No shame, no judgement, safe place to yarn. Speak to a 13YARN Crisis Supporter, call 13 92 76. This service is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.