July 16, 2025 • 10 mins
Across the last 18 seasons of the Clink, We have had some really raw conversations. This is one of most listen to episodes with Vale Russell Manser.
Brent has known Russell for 25 years. Russell and his Voice of a Survivor charity helped thousands of people who were victims of institutional abuse.
We pay our respects to Russell and his family in this episode by hearing about his journey of redemption from season 1
RIP Brother.
https://thevoiceofasurvivor.com/
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Approche production.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I was up to a good another time, and I
was on a plane going to Perth, and I was
reading a book called Sleepers and they end up making
a movie with Kevin Bacon, and that about about these
kids in an orphanage and they got abused and then
they go on one end. One ends up being a
hitman and one ends up being an attorney, and then
they square up and these priests do and this and
(00:36):
this Blake had been me, why are you reading that for?
I said, And to this day, I don't know why.
I said. I said, it's a bit about my life
store and he said, what do you mean, a bit
about your losses? I'm I'm on a plane going on
a four hour planet flight going to Perth. And I
turn around, said an abuse survivor myself, and you know,
and he said yeah. And he told me about the
Royal Commission Commission into institution responses to child sexual abuse
(00:59):
and he said, maybe you should talk to them, and
I said, what's this all about? And he sat there
for about an hour telling me about So.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
This is like, if you put it into a bit
of a sort of a perspective, it's almost like you
were led to be there speaking of his plate.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Yeah, and I was up to know good too, you
know what I mean? And no one normally when you're
up to no good, when you're on a plane flight
over there, I'm not talking to no one and I
don't know it, just blurted it out.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
I want to leave an imprinting. Anyone's more than you
were over there?
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Yeah, and I'm sitting there, And after I said it,
I was just sort of like numb sort of thing.
What I fucking just say that to this bloke? You know?
Why did I do that? You know? And then he
rambled on about the Royal Commission. And the funny thing is,
you know what happened is I was just a bit rattled,
still back on the drugs, just doing doing bits and
pieces to get by. And then I got pinched up
(01:45):
here in cooland Gatto. I came out of the same
court met way. I just robbed the bank, and I'm
getting chased by all these super citizens. One bloke had
no he is that had been cut off by and
to tour his bike. He up this way. Yes, he
don't tell me he was your fucking he came. He
captured me.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Anyway, I vaguely remember reading a story about this.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
But he punched my head in and he told me
he just saved my life. And he said to me,
he said, you know, he said, mate, he goes he's
doing my cramee with my legs and arms up my back.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
And he obviously hated people because of his own experience that.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I dare say, yeah, outlaw, you might say anyway, but anyway,
he punched my face and then yeah, he done this.
And he's saying to me, he's telling him me a
big story about God and the ring like that. And
I said, if you're selling the God, why are you
fucking jumping on my head? He's got telling you to
(02:45):
do it man. Anyway, you know, and the less right,
you know, mate? It was. I was horrified. And then
I went to Cool and got a police station and
they moved me up to Southport. All the trophy hundred
coppers come in, you know, because they've never seen a
bank rubber before. All these young ones had never seen
a bank robbed before. And I was like a captured
(03:07):
white rhino or a Tasmanian tiger. And they all opened
in the window and they called me in and they said,
maybe would you do a record of interview, and I said, listen, mate,
I haven't seen someone mom walk back into prison going
fucking a record of interview is the best thing over
did you know my old school And I don't do
record any I don't talk to them, but they just
kept on dragging me out. And there was coppers coming
(03:27):
up from Melbourne and I was just because what happens
is them coppers they get like if they can say
we're going to we're going to the gold case to
question someone. And I knew what the rule was, you
know what I mean, all of a sudden being profiled.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
Yeah, yeah, that's that's what it comes down to. The
robbery squad's all around.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Yeah, start looking at habitual offenders, especially habiture the bank robbers.
Many of them, it's like, you know, thieves that they
have a certain way or a style that they do
things and it becomes a bit of a habit. And
I mean we're all creatures of habit. Yeah, And this
is how a lot of them come.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Underne And they all wanted a piece of me. And
you know, I'll be honest with you, I'd had an ask,
you know, And I got two young kids that were
growing up in the Gold coast without a father, and
all of the guilt that was attached with the abuse
itself and all this stuff just got them and and
I just said, I'm going to the neck. When I
get the nick, I'm going to knock myself. And I
had to plan out and get the coaxial cable off
(04:18):
the TV, hang that up and away I'll go, you know.
And so I eventually got to Arthur Gory in Brisbane
and wake Hole and Brisbane. And the first night I
was there, the co acksl cable wouldn't have fit around
my small toe because someone had just cut it the
pieces and that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
So I leave us back then too, they'd cut them
and just pull the wire through because the plugs on
each end were always used for something.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Else as well, and bungers and that that's right, a.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
Little cop of wine and then you'd spark it up
with it.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Yeah, well it wasn't. And then the next day a
bloke who he come to my own is like like
a ten inch high window by about three inches wide
window in the door of your cell. And he came
up as a blake I never liked before, you know,
And he said to me, and I suspected he was
a sex offender, and I later out he denied it,
but it later came out and watch that he was.
(05:06):
So he came up to me and goes, may I no, man,
you've never seen an idle eye, he said. But made
I know you're a bit crook. He said, you're not
feeling too well, and that this dirty old syringe there.
So you were hanging out, Yeah, I was hanging out.
I came out. It wasn't in a good way, you know,
coming with a habit. Yeah, And i'd come out and
he said to me, he said, mate, I'll give you
a shot. And I fucking leaned up against the window
(05:26):
and I said, no matter how fucking low I felt
about myself, how bad I overfelt against about myself, I
could never take anything from you. You've got nothing offer
me in this life. I said, you are a piece
of shit, scum, fucking dog you are. You're just a
piece of shit. You're a scum, You're a fucking dog.
I don't fucking trust you. I don't like you. And
I said, now fuck off, don't come to me. And
(05:47):
then the cell door came open and I could see
him in his little posse of people bloody and they're
talking to me. I couldn't give a fuck, And I
just said, mate, you're going to stick up for that
fucking grub, I said, I five years Oh, I said,
you know. But then there was a young blake there
and he had all these books out, you know, and
he studied. And I said, what are you doing, man?
He said, I'm doing a psych degree. He used to
tell me about studying. That's the way out of here.
And he's had to took your advice. He said, maybe
(06:09):
she'd take some of your own, you know.
Speaker 4 (06:11):
So this is coming back around in the full sir.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, yeah, and this young fella. And by the end
of that day, there was a few things I was
liking about myself, and the fact that, you know, I
had morals, you know, I weren't going to take no
matter how bad fucking things were, I weren't going to
I weren't going to, you know, accept any hint from
a person like that, you know. And I had a
(06:33):
bit of a goal. I thought, you know, well, if
I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it right,
you know.
Speaker 4 (06:36):
And so what year was this, two thousand and six?
Was it?
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (06:39):
No, no, would have been a bit later than that.
I think it was twenty fourteen, two thousand and fifteen.
I spoke the Royal Commission for the first time. In
twenty fifteen. Yeah, I just decided. I said, you're just
going to one more crack at this life, and you
know if I don't get it right now, because I
just thought, you know, pinched on a bank and I
knew the New South Wales coppers wanted me for a
few others and I've been involved in a few close calls.
(07:00):
That's that's why I ended up in Queensland.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
So you were looking at a big whack again.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You half your life. I would have been getting out
when I was close to sixty. And what happened was,
I'll sit down and I was watching the seven thirty
report on ABC and it come up about the Royal Commission,
and you know, I just I pumped out a little
ladder and I jumped on the phone next day and
I got my friend. I said, can you give me
address to this Royal Commission. I want to write them
a ladder. I just want to test the water a
(07:24):
little bit with this and see how I found in.
And they are well in two weeks of me posting
the letter, I get called for a legal visit and
he's the Royal Commission. They said, we're here to hear
your story. And I told him a little bit of
pete about it and then banged. Straight after it become
a tryal. My councilor and these people, and I'm just going, wow,
you know what I mean. And these people wanted to
hear my story. They didn't want they they weren't telling
me to shut up. They wanted to hear it. They
(07:45):
were genuine they wanted to hear. And so about two
weeks later it was official. We got my we recorded
my my story of abuse. It was the first time
I told it in its entirety.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
You know, I do solemnly, sincerely and truly declare and
affirm that the evidence I shall given this Royal Commission
that'll be the truth, the whole trip, and nothing but
the trip.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
I started trauma counting on a regular basis. I started
off weekly and went to fortnite, and then went to monthly.
And I had this amazing trauma councilor you know who,
you know. I think it's about seven or eight years later.
I'm still in contact with today early now and then
that's rare. That's rare to have that that one count connection. Yeah,
she was an amazing woman. I'll tell you what. I
wouldn't even know what she looks like. I've only ever
(08:28):
spoke to her on.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
The phone, so you've never been in the same room.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Never been in the same room. But she she you know,
she helped change my life, you know what I mean.
I'm blessed. I'm blessed that had happened. And you know,
I went to court, I got sentenced. I've got a
pretty good result for Robin that bank five with the
two with no back date. So I was going to
have to do three years. And and then I went
up to Marriborough Prison in Queensland. I guess you know,
(08:55):
I started to be you know, I don't know, an
advocate for the Royal Commission. I started on you Blake
stories because I started to be able to see things
in people. I realized the more I told my own
story of abuse, the better I was getting.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
Yep, it's actually healing.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
It become cathartic for me. And you know, I'd be
five or six places I said, this is what's happened
to me. I'm talking to Royal commission at the moment,
and I'm getting traumaccounts and things are starting to change
for me, you know, my whole outlook on life starting
to change because I'm starting to realize all these things
I had about myself, I shouldn't. I don't own them.
They belong to perpetrate. Its greatest tool is the silence
and shame of the survivor themselves.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
You know, I think to us us, have you and
I had touched on this subject before and you used
a certain term which I've used since our conversation, and
it was you were carrying a backpack. Yeah, look, carrying
a backpack of somebody else's wrongs.
Speaker 4 (09:48):
Yeah, shame, shame and embarrassment and.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
That hate too. I think, you know, we kept all
that hate pack off and yeah and handed back to
its rifle and that was the word sorry. Yeah, it
took that when I took, you know, And that's what
I talk about today. I talk about, you know, I
carried all this stuff that didn't belong to me, mate,
and that just didn't know I was so I had
so much hate on myself. I had so much shame
and guilt, like you know what I mean, there's a
(10:12):
lot of things attached to you know, abuse survivors that
that you know what I mean, there's some really horrible
things that you left with, but when you tell your
story for the first time, that's quite liberating. That was
for me. It didn't feel comfortable, but the more and
more I told it, like you know, I tell it
on a daily basis that I ain't about ten times
a day.
Approche production.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
I was up to a good another time, and I
was on a plane going to Perth, and I was
reading a book called Sleepers and they end up making
a movie with Kevin Bacon, and that about about these
kids in an orphanage and they got abused and then
they go on one end. One ends up being a
hitman and one ends up being an attorney, and then
they square up and these priests do and this and
(00:36):
this Blake had been me, why are you reading that for?
I said, And to this day, I don't know why.
I said. I said, it's a bit about my life
store and he said, what do you mean, a bit
about your losses? I'm I'm on a plane going on
a four hour planet flight going to Perth. And I
turn around, said an abuse survivor myself, and you know,
and he said yeah. And he told me about the
Royal Commission Commission into institution responses to child sexual abuse
(00:59):
and he said, maybe you should talk to them, and
I said, what's this all about? And he sat there
for about an hour telling me about So.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
This is like, if you put it into a bit
of a sort of a perspective, it's almost like you
were led to be there speaking of his plate.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Yeah, and I was up to know good too, you
know what I mean? And no one normally when you're
up to no good, when you're on a plane flight
over there, I'm not talking to no one and I
don't know it, just blurted it out.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
I want to leave an imprinting. Anyone's more than you
were over there?
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Yeah, and I'm sitting there, And after I said it,
I was just sort of like numb sort of thing.
What I fucking just say that to this bloke? You know?
Why did I do that? You know? And then he
rambled on about the Royal Commission. And the funny thing is,
you know what happened is I was just a bit rattled,
still back on the drugs, just doing doing bits and
pieces to get by. And then I got pinched up
(01:45):
here in cooland Gatto. I came out of the same
court met way. I just robbed the bank, and I'm
getting chased by all these super citizens. One bloke had
no he is that had been cut off by and
to tour his bike. He up this way. Yes, he
don't tell me he was your fucking he came. He
captured me.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Anyway, I vaguely remember reading a story about this.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
But he punched my head in and he told me
he just saved my life. And he said to me,
he said, you know, he said, mate, he goes he's
doing my cramee with my legs and arms up my back.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
And he obviously hated people because of his own experience that.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I dare say, yeah, outlaw, you might say anyway, but anyway,
he punched my face and then yeah, he done this.
And he's saying to me, he's telling him me a
big story about God and the ring like that. And
I said, if you're selling the God, why are you
fucking jumping on my head? He's got telling you to
(02:45):
do it man. Anyway, you know, and the less right,
you know, mate? It was. I was horrified. And then
I went to Cool and got a police station and
they moved me up to Southport. All the trophy hundred
coppers come in, you know, because they've never seen a
bank rubber before. All these young ones had never seen
a bank robbed before. And I was like a captured
(03:07):
white rhino or a Tasmanian tiger. And they all opened
in the window and they called me in and they said,
maybe would you do a record of interview, and I said, listen, mate,
I haven't seen someone mom walk back into prison going
fucking a record of interview is the best thing over
did you know my old school And I don't do
record any I don't talk to them, but they just
kept on dragging me out. And there was coppers coming
(03:27):
up from Melbourne and I was just because what happens
is them coppers they get like if they can say
we're going to we're going to the gold case to
question someone. And I knew what the rule was, you
know what I mean, all of a sudden being profiled.
Speaker 4 (03:38):
Yeah, yeah, that's that's what it comes down to. The
robbery squad's all around.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Yeah, start looking at habitual offenders, especially habiture the bank robbers.
Many of them, it's like, you know, thieves that they
have a certain way or a style that they do
things and it becomes a bit of a habit. And
I mean we're all creatures of habit. Yeah, And this
is how a lot of them come.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Underne And they all wanted a piece of me. And
you know, I'll be honest with you, I'd had an ask,
you know, And I got two young kids that were
growing up in the Gold coast without a father, and
all of the guilt that was attached with the abuse
itself and all this stuff just got them and and
I just said, I'm going to the neck. When I
get the nick, I'm going to knock myself. And I
had to plan out and get the coaxial cable off
(04:18):
the TV, hang that up and away I'll go, you know.
And so I eventually got to Arthur Gory in Brisbane
and wake Hole and Brisbane. And the first night I
was there, the co acksl cable wouldn't have fit around
my small toe because someone had just cut it the
pieces and that sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
So I leave us back then too, they'd cut them
and just pull the wire through because the plugs on
each end were always used for something.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Else as well, and bungers and that that's right, a.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
Little cop of wine and then you'd spark it up
with it.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Yeah, well it wasn't. And then the next day a
bloke who he come to my own is like like
a ten inch high window by about three inches wide
window in the door of your cell. And he came
up as a blake I never liked before, you know,
And he said to me, and I suspected he was
a sex offender, and I later out he denied it,
but it later came out and watch that he was.
(05:06):
So he came up to me and goes, may I no, man,
you've never seen an idle eye, he said. But made
I know you're a bit crook. He said, you're not
feeling too well, and that this dirty old syringe there.
So you were hanging out, Yeah, I was hanging out.
I came out. It wasn't in a good way, you know,
coming with a habit. Yeah, And i'd come out and
he said to me, he said, mate, I'll give you
a shot. And I fucking leaned up against the window
(05:26):
and I said, no matter how fucking low I felt
about myself, how bad I overfelt against about myself, I
could never take anything from you. You've got nothing offer
me in this life. I said, you are a piece
of shit, scum, fucking dog you are. You're just a
piece of shit. You're a scum, You're a fucking dog.
I don't fucking trust you. I don't like you. And
I said, now fuck off, don't come to me. And
(05:47):
then the cell door came open and I could see
him in his little posse of people bloody and they're
talking to me. I couldn't give a fuck, And I
just said, mate, you're going to stick up for that
fucking grub, I said, I five years Oh, I said,
you know. But then there was a young blake there
and he had all these books out, you know, and
he studied. And I said, what are you doing, man?
He said, I'm doing a psych degree. He used to
tell me about studying. That's the way out of here.
And he's had to took your advice. He said, maybe
(06:09):
she'd take some of your own, you know.
Speaker 4 (06:11):
So this is coming back around in the full sir.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Yeah, yeah, and this young fella. And by the end
of that day, there was a few things I was
liking about myself, and the fact that, you know, I
had morals, you know, I weren't going to take no
matter how bad fucking things were, I weren't going to
I weren't going to, you know, accept any hint from
a person like that, you know. And I had a
(06:33):
bit of a goal. I thought, you know, well, if
I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it right,
you know.
Speaker 4 (06:36):
And so what year was this, two thousand and six?
Was it?
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (06:39):
No, no, would have been a bit later than that.
I think it was twenty fourteen, two thousand and fifteen.
I spoke the Royal Commission for the first time. In
twenty fifteen. Yeah, I just decided. I said, you're just
going to one more crack at this life, and you
know if I don't get it right now, because I
just thought, you know, pinched on a bank and I
knew the New South Wales coppers wanted me for a
few others and I've been involved in a few close calls.
(07:00):
That's that's why I ended up in Queensland.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
So you were looking at a big whack again.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
You half your life. I would have been getting out
when I was close to sixty. And what happened was,
I'll sit down and I was watching the seven thirty
report on ABC and it come up about the Royal Commission,
and you know, I just I pumped out a little
ladder and I jumped on the phone next day and
I got my friend. I said, can you give me
address to this Royal Commission. I want to write them
a ladder. I just want to test the water a
(07:24):
little bit with this and see how I found in.
And they are well in two weeks of me posting
the letter, I get called for a legal visit and
he's the Royal Commission. They said, we're here to hear
your story. And I told him a little bit of
pete about it and then banged. Straight after it become
a tryal. My councilor and these people, and I'm just going, wow,
you know what I mean. And these people wanted to
hear my story. They didn't want they they weren't telling
me to shut up. They wanted to hear it. They
(07:45):
were genuine they wanted to hear. And so about two
weeks later it was official. We got my we recorded
my my story of abuse. It was the first time
I told it in its entirety.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
You know, I do solemnly, sincerely and truly declare and
affirm that the evidence I shall given this Royal Commission
that'll be the truth, the whole trip, and nothing but
the trip.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
I started trauma counting on a regular basis. I started
off weekly and went to fortnite, and then went to monthly.
And I had this amazing trauma councilor you know who,
you know. I think it's about seven or eight years later.
I'm still in contact with today early now and then
that's rare. That's rare to have that that one count connection. Yeah,
she was an amazing woman. I'll tell you what. I
wouldn't even know what she looks like. I've only ever
(08:28):
spoke to her on.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
The phone, so you've never been in the same room.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Never been in the same room. But she she you know,
she helped change my life, you know what I mean.
I'm blessed. I'm blessed that had happened. And you know,
I went to court, I got sentenced. I've got a
pretty good result for Robin that bank five with the
two with no back date. So I was going to
have to do three years. And and then I went
up to Marriborough Prison in Queensland. I guess you know,
(08:55):
I started to be you know, I don't know, an
advocate for the Royal Commission. I started on you Blake
stories because I started to be able to see things
in people. I realized the more I told my own
story of abuse, the better I was getting.
Speaker 4 (09:07):
Yep, it's actually healing.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
It become cathartic for me. And you know, I'd be
five or six places I said, this is what's happened
to me. I'm talking to Royal commission at the moment,
and I'm getting traumaccounts and things are starting to change
for me, you know, my whole outlook on life starting
to change because I'm starting to realize all these things
I had about myself, I shouldn't. I don't own them.
They belong to perpetrate. Its greatest tool is the silence
and shame of the survivor themselves.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
You know, I think to us us, have you and
I had touched on this subject before and you used
a certain term which I've used since our conversation, and
it was you were carrying a backpack. Yeah, look, carrying
a backpack of somebody else's wrongs.
Speaker 4 (09:48):
Yeah, shame, shame and embarrassment and.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
That hate too. I think, you know, we kept all
that hate pack off and yeah and handed back to
its rifle and that was the word sorry. Yeah, it
took that when I took, you know, And that's what
I talk about today. I talk about, you know, I
carried all this stuff that didn't belong to me, mate,
and that just didn't know I was so I had
so much hate on myself. I had so much shame
and guilt, like you know what I mean, there's a
(10:12):
lot of things attached to you know, abuse survivors that
that you know what I mean, there's some really horrible
things that you left with, but when you tell your
story for the first time, that's quite liberating. That was
for me. It didn't feel comfortable, but the more and
more I told it, like you know, I tell it
on a daily basis that I ain't about ten times
a day.
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.