August 20, 2025 • 52 mins
Seven years ago, Anthea Kenny’s world shattered in the space of one conversation with her 11-year-old daughter. What followed was a nightmare no mother should ever have to face... abuse inside her own family, betrayal by the person she thought she knew, a justice system that didn’t always feel just, and the relentless task of holding it all together for four kids.
But this isn’t just a story about trauma – it’s about the kind of belief, fight, and love that can rewrite an ending. From the moment Anthea heard her girls, she believed them. She acted. She fought through courtrooms, headlines, and a system stacked with roadblocks, and she did it while keeping sport, laughter, and a fierce sense of normality alive at home.
Today, those kids are thriving. Anthea’s thriving. And she’s ready to turn her lived hell into a roadmap for other parents blindsided by the unthinkable. This is raw, real, and brimming with the kind of hope that only comes from someone who’s been to the darkest place… and found her way out.
SPONSORED BY TESTART FAMILY LAWYERS
Website: testartfamilylawyers.com.au
ANTHEA KENNY
Email: silencetostrength.antheakenny@gmail.com
TIFFANEE COOK
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Website: tiffcook.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my blood.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm tiff. This is role with the punches and we're
turning life's hardest hits into wins. Nobody wants to go
to court and don't. My friends at test Art Family
Lawyers know that they offer all forms of alternative dispute resolution.
Their team of Melbourne family lawyers have extensive experience in
(00:29):
all areas of family law to facto and same sex couples,
custody and children, family violence and intervention orders, property settlements
and financial agreements. Test Art is in your corner, so
reach out to Mark and the team at www dot
test Artfamilylawyers dot com dot au. Anthea Kenny, welcome to
(00:54):
the show. Thank you, thanks for having me on Absolute pleasure.
How are you?
Speaker 3 (01:01):
I'm great, Thanks Stiff. Yeah, you're doing really really well.
So you know, life before that was a lot tougher,
but as of today, myself and my children are doing
really really well. So as our saying is onwards and upwards. Amazing.
I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Introduced by our good mutual friend mister Mark Thomas.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Thanks Mark, shout out to you. You're amazing. Mark.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
He always he always brings me beautiful guests and beautiful stories,
and he always checks in that I'm happy to have
particular conversations, and this is one that you know, it's
a tough conversation both for yourself and for listeners, and
you know, for everyone involved, but also these conversations are
(01:47):
so important and so healing, and hopefully for yourself you
find the same. I think they can be such a
they can lift a lot of things for the people
sitting in them as well. That's what I've experienced and
a lot of people that have come in here, so
things crossed. Now I've said it, I'd better live up
to that. It better be a good experience. I'll try.
(02:12):
Would you like to give us a little snapshot of
introducing yourself?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Anthea? Absolutely, So, my name's Anthea. My situation and where
I know Mark Thomas is from the Code nine Foundation
with him and Rob Atkins. I've known Rob for probably
close to thirty years. So my situation, I was married
to a police officer for over twenty years. In that situation,
(02:41):
there's many things. He was quite well known. He was
part of the police exec he was on the council,
as a football coach, you name it. Ever, it was
well known I had been on TV many times, and
seven years ago, nearly to the date, on the second
of August two thousand and eighteen, our marriage had been
(03:06):
very much on the rocks for a good year. He'd
had an accident through the through work and had gone
on work cover with that alcoholism setting. And you know,
there was always alcoholism there in the past. But I
came home one day I was planning a split and
(03:28):
it was becoming a violent situation at home. He never
hit me, but it was getting very, very toxic. It
was to the point that I would come home and
be looking for bottles in the garage. You know, you
sit in the car for ten minutes taking a breath,
and what am I going to walk into? And so
I had this particular situation. But on this particular day
(03:50):
things were really rough, and I had this really weird
feeling driving home. And our oldest son at the time
was thirteen and he was going to he was doing cadets,
and my ex husband was driving him to cadets, and
I probably had said to him, can you get some
one to give me a call? The corn ever came
and I passed them driving on the way home, and
(04:14):
so I tried calling in on bluetooth and there was
no answer, and I just had this really weird feeling.
I just can't put my finger on it coming home
from work, and I come home from work all the time,
and it was very drunken and so forth, and it
was becoming very unbearable. Anyway, this particular day, I came
home and one of the girls. We have triplets and
(04:38):
there are eleven, and out of the triplets is one boy,
two girls, and one of the girls just stuck to
me like glue. And I went into the bedroom to
get changed out of my work clothes, and next minute
it was really bizarre, but she just would not leave me,
and next me, she's, Mommy, I've got to tell you something,
(05:00):
you know, what's that sweetie? And Daddy's been touching me.
And then it got worse, progressively worse. She actually said
other things, and next minute she said to me, it's
happened to daughter two. So I called daughter two in
(05:21):
and it turns out they didn't know about each other
that had been happening, something had happened just prior to
me coming home, so obviously they were so scared. Daughter
two came into the bedroom and I said to her
what you know, it's daddy ever touched you? No, Mammy, no.
And next minute daughter one again, you know eleven, and
(05:41):
Daughter one screamed at her. You tell them the truth,
and of course it all came out. And then their
trip of brother came in and like, what's going on,
you know, and he was beside himself. So my world
just fell apart, absolutely fell apart. And I rang my
mother and because you know, the ex husband has taken
(06:01):
their son to cadets, so he's not in the house,
rang my mum, and I was beside myself and he's
abused the girls. And Mom's like, you've got to get
to the place, get to the place. So I do that.
I pile the three kids into the car and I'm
straight down to the local police station and I asked
(06:22):
to see the officer in charge. And with that, you know,
I quietly said to one of the females, seeing a
sergeants there, look such and such, because he'd worked at
this station as well previously, okay, And I said, he's
he's done this. And then I proceeded to tell a
(06:42):
bit more and her words, I'll never forget the words,
she said, So he's raped them and those words at
that time just pierced me. I just couldn't believe it.
So anyway, with that, and again the police are all in.
Everyone knew him, and so we got the wheels going
(07:04):
motion to get that sort of and they have to
go out here put a whatever they call it, to
call out for his arrest, and you know, police had
to pick my someone up from cadets. He had no
idea what was going on. So the wheels were emotion anyway,
(07:27):
So that night my parents were living in Strathbogie at
the time, and you know, the police interview the girls.
You know, I'm in another room, and then it all
starts that we have to go to the Rawal Children's
Hospital and the girls have to have these examinations, and
throughout that whole time they're looking at me, Mummy, where okay,
(07:50):
I'm beside myself. Mummy, We're okay, so you know, and
then it goes from there, and then the next day
we had to go until emergency accommodation that night because
I hadn't arrested him at this point, and go to
an emergency accommodation the next day, come home. Finally, after
we've done our police statements, I didn't sleep all night.
(08:14):
We have to go to the local station and do
all these statements, and at that stage, professional standards of coming.
So we're dealing with soccer and professional standards because he
was a local good police officer. Now to give credit,
they were my lifeline. Professional standards, particularly one police officer.
(08:35):
And anyway, there's statements happen, and I don't know a
lot what's going on at this stage because the girls
aren't telling me. And finally we do these statements, come
home and the kids. It's a Thursday, so it's a Thursday.
It's happened. This is a Friday, and the kids are
all in football finals. So all four kids played football
and they're all in footy finals. And next minute I
(08:57):
finally get home. My mom's mum and dad are with me,
and he's been arrested as far as I know, and
sort of it sort of cuts off. I don't know
what happens at that point, And next minute the police
bring me and we're home and they said we need
to leave the house. We need to get a warrant
to search your house. The house. I said, I'm not
going anywhere. You know, the kids have got football in
(09:19):
my mind. I wanted to keep everything normal for the kids.
Kids have got football training. You don't need a warrant,
just come. So we're in the front room and then
they came and they're asking me for certain items. You know,
where do you keep your tea towels? Where do you
keep you how often do you wash you do? You know?
What did you do with these blankets? Did it all
(09:41):
this kind of stuff? And again I've got no idea
what's going on, what's all this kind of stuff? So
going through the process was absolutely horrific. I couldn't even
tell my friends, my closest friends for a couple of months.
Everyone knew it was a split. Within three weeks and
it hit the paper. I don't know how, but it
(10:02):
was quite detailed and I actually found out through the
paper there was a little bit more to it, so,
you know, so with that, I actually started my mission
to try and where do you go with this? Because
there's no support groups, Tiff, there's none. There's no support
groups for parents of let's call it incest. There's support
(10:27):
groups for pornography and all the other stuff, but there
was nothing, and I think with suppression orders, and it's
such a deboo subject, there's nothing. But I was lucky
in a lot of ways because I had the support
of Victoria Police who put the wheels in motion for
a lot of welfare. Raw Children's Hospital were obviously involved,
(10:52):
and I always remember there was a one you know,
you can meet one person, they can impact you. I
always remember there was a social worker that particular night
where the girls had their assessments done and she said, Anthea,
they're going to be okay. So you know what makes
you say that? She said, because you believe them. And
(11:14):
she said it's you know, you believe them, so they're
going to be okay. So I've made it a little
bit of a mission going forward. The kids are now
eighteen and they've said to me, in my mind, I've
always known I wanted to do some form of advocacy
going forward to try and this is big. The amount
(11:35):
of people that came and opened up to me when
they found out is I had work colleagues, I've had friends,
I've had people that came up to me. The footy
club were absolutely amazing. They surrounded those kids like you
wouldn't believe. But I had people come out of the
woodwork saying it happened to me, but again there's no
support groups. I joined a I did support I did
(11:59):
join a group that were course restoring hope at the time,
but they were that was developed by some women who
would all be abused as children. So there was groups
for being abused children, but there was nothing for parents.
So going forward, my mission was I needed to find
(12:20):
out as much as I could and then we start
going into COVID lockdowns. But it was just horrific. So
what had happened to him, He'd been put into a
mental institution nonvoluntary for a number of months. I sort
of had to find out a lot of that and
I had no answers to anything. So that night it's gone.
(12:42):
I've never seen him again. The type thing. At that point,
he gets arrested, I've got no idea. It's or cut off.
AVOs got put in place, locks get changed the next day,
and that's it, or cut off and they see it.
I'll go to work on Monday. I go to work
and you know, I've got to keep it together. And
thank god, I did quietly speak to my boss, but
(13:05):
that's it. Had to get on with it, and there
was nothing. And then, as I said, three weeks later,
got into the papers and more and more talk started
to happen, and so it just became a case that
I needed to really find answers, and going through the process,
(13:27):
I was a signed of fantastic psychologist and again that
came through police welfare. They got her for me, and
she'd dealt with police officers, but she'd also dealt with
sex offenders and threw her support. She was just amazing.
And the outcome from her in the end, it became
(13:49):
that when former happens and we are so blindsided by things,
we all are looking for answers and it become the
main focus. We want a reason for something, why did
it happen? But the outcome of her it became that
I was able one big thing. I was able to
(14:09):
walk away. And it's taken a long time, but to
walk away and go I don't need the answers anymore.
And I think that's the first part of healing, when
you can accept that you don't need the answers. The
kids had a wonderful support system. The boys had a
specific psychologist and the girls had the Raw Children's Hospital.
(14:31):
And for me, I wrote to the police commissioner. I
wrote to you know, I was dealing with the DPP.
I had to really push for a long time to
get this case heard. I kind of felt the justice
system at the time was very much on his side.
(14:52):
Not the police, but the justice system. I really had
to push for that, and when we actually went to
a communtal hearing, Actually I'll backtrack a little bit. What
had happened was he was going to get charged and
he was going to plead not guilty. So I'm going
(15:15):
through this again. I've got no one to talk to
other than the psychologist. I didn't speak to friends about
it or anything like that. It just opened up to
a couple of close girlfriends. But it becomes what happens
with something like this trauma. You've got to really work
out who's genuine and who's not. He's there for your
welfare who's not. You lose friends overnight. That happens with
(15:39):
divorce as well, but I lost friends overnight. The amount
of stuff I had to read online, the comments derogatory
about me, about people that just thought they knew our
situation and all that, it was just horrific. And every
day I had to go to work and keep my
shit together for the sake of my kids. And get
(16:03):
on and pay the bills and just work. So anyway,
I had to fight to really get this pushed through
further because I really he was out on parole for
quite some time, able to roam playing the victim, and
(16:24):
he was actually being able to live close to where
we were. He was living in another suburb not far
which was making my mental health really really bad. So
I was really declining. And in the end he was
able to move to another state. So he finally gets
charged and he's going to go not guilty at this stage,
(16:46):
so I had to do a plea bargain. So he's
got these charges against with the girls, I had to
do a plea bargain, And at that time it's a
bit like TV go in and you're you're sitting around
the table and all that. And at the time he
was going not guilty and to do a fleabag, and
(17:09):
they wanted to drop a couple of charges against daughter two.
They felt at the time that she was not strong
enough to go and on the stand, and which is
quite you know, to think about. He was going to
allow our own daughters to testify and all that was
quite horrific. So I agreed to drop these charges against
(17:31):
daughter too, and with that the next day he pled guilty.
So that's something I will always that will live with me.
I kind of felt like I sort of got a
little bit blindsided with that. I didn't feel I got
justice in one way for one daughter. So I've learned
a lot. And having said that, I've learned a lot
(17:52):
through the system, the victims of crime and the departments
to deal with so going forward to be able to
help those who don't have a voice, and in our situation,
it took a while. We finally we went to the
committal hearing in the magistrate's court and to my disgust,
(18:15):
I can't say names or anything, but to my disgust,
the actual magistrate thanked him for attending Mike's husband for
attending the court. And I can remember looking at the
police officer from professional standards and just said, you are
you kidding me? They thanked him because he came down
from another state thanked him and it was all, you know,
(18:38):
it was crazy and anyway, ended up pleading guilty and
then oh they stood actually they obviously sorry, there was
a case for it. And then obviously down the track
it went to the counter court through that I arranged
to make sure that no friends were there. I think
(19:00):
with trauma, I think a lot of people you want
support around you, and this is for me when you
want support. But I think one thing I learned is
you know, for me, I don't want people knowing too much.
And I think that helps with our healing in a
lot of ways. You only have a close network. And
I had so many people want to come to court,
(19:22):
but I said no because it's a case of you
can't unhear what you hear, and I didn't know what
I was going to hear at the court case. So
even though we play guilty, what they do is all
the charges come out in depth. So we went through
it. It was my brother, my mother, and my sister in
law came to court. The newspapers were there and actually
(19:50):
no backtrack, they weren't. They might have been there at
that stage, but I know when I did the victim
impact statement, they end up leaving. But so anyway, he
ended up pleading guilty. But through that court case, through
that they went through and they told things about a
number of the offenses. I was actually home when they happened,
(20:15):
so all these things and it becomes that jigsaw puzzle,
a puzzle with the missing pieces and all that. But
I found out that I was home. And we're talking
like two years into this case, and it was just horrific,
like finding out what I found out because the police
had never told me, the girls had never told me.
(20:37):
And I remember speaking again to this police officer who
was Myra. I said, I was home, so my girls
weren't even safe. That's home. So I've been down the
barrels of the worst that can be. But to me,
it was all about I had to be a mum
(21:00):
and you can't live with a victim mentality, and it's
about For me, it was about I had to get
one step in front of the other. So I put
the wheels in motion and I did what I had
to do. I wrote what I had to write to
whoever it had to be, and started we started getting
(21:20):
our life back on track. And the police had kept
saying to me, and he's going to get the news
down the track, we just don't know when. And then
eighteen months into the case, my brother rang me. I
was at work and he said, have we're seeing the papers.
Everything's online, We're seeing it, and there it was. There's
a big picture of him with someone well known, and
(21:44):
I think it's like page three and his name, what
he's done everything. So even though there's suppression orders in place,
you could easily identify who the victims were. And then
everyone came out of the woodwork. Again my fine blew up.
I had to ring the school. The kids teachers knew
(22:06):
what had happened to them, but no one else knew.
So I had to put the wheels in motion and
speak to the school and that the principal brought them in.
They got protected. And next minute, as I said I
next ment, someone came into my workplace and asked me
if I was his wife. So I copped it from everywhere,
(22:31):
and again we had to go on that journey. So
that again that hit the news really quite It was
all through the newspapers. Again, it hit Facebook and you
know all the other sides, and I had to read
everything again and it's just horrific and all as a mother,
I just wanted to protect my kids.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
It is rare that I am deemed this speechless, and
not speechless in a shocking way, speechless in just you know,
sometimes the best thing you can do as a host
of a conversation is just get out of the way.
But I want to say thank you for being the
(23:21):
mother that's so many survivors crave and need and need
to know exists. I've got so many questions and I
don't even know where to start. I guess one is
(23:41):
how I just think about the influx of emotions and
the natural human response to and I know that you're
so You mentioned your relationship was already on a downhill spiral,
so you were you have. I guess that creates a
(24:02):
better foundation for you to be able to really support
the children and know where you stand. But I feel
like twenty years in a loving relationship and in a family,
you still have this What once existed would have been
a sense of belonging and connection and togetherness, and then
(24:23):
overnight that has turned into a horror film of sorts.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Yeah. Well, actually, looking back, there was deception throughout the
whole marriage. And again, you know, it's not until you
hit these uddern moments that we live in denial with
so many things. You know, when you get married and
all that, and when things start, we don't see these
red flags. They're there, but we don't see them. We
(24:50):
choose to not see them, or you know, I was
twenty five when I met him. He'd already been married
another family. And looking back, you know, maybe I settled,
probably did I think, But there was deception back then,
financial deception back then. My saving grace is that, you know,
(25:12):
we did split not long after our marriage after some
financial deception. He had a lot more debt than I
realized and all that. But when we got back together,
I made sure all the assets went in my name.
And what happened was we ended up The only bank
account we ended up having was a mortgage account, so
(25:33):
you know, he sort of had his He would get paid,
he would pay certain more, you know, we paid certain
bills and that's the way it worked, and we had
a good number of years. But if I look back now,
you know, I was young, dumb. I settled, but the
deception was there. The alcohol, and I think with him,
(25:54):
the alcoholism was always there. But because of the shift work,
and we're going back back in the time, they'd have
that quick changeover. It's nothing all at what they have
today Victoria police, you hate, but they'd have that quick changeovers.
And so the time of drinking was that you couldn't
drink during the week, you know, because he did big
on different shifts, but when he would drink, he would
(26:16):
binge and it was quite It was pretty intense. And
and then you know, all of a sudden, we have
these four kids. We had one and you know, you
decided to have a family and then decide on another
one in the triple h thank you universe. Yeah, so
you know, And so I had four kids in two years.
(26:40):
So that was and I had to give up work
and all that. So, like a lot of marriages, you're
leaning on your partner and all that. But looking back now,
if I was on our marriage was on the rocks
for a long long time. But I do remember that
last year I was planning a split and I was
actually talking to his parents at the time to sort
(27:01):
of say I needed to get him up to this
other state to be near his parents because he was
becoming so violent, emotionally violent and unhinged. Never seen anything
like it. And he could have a glare, this particular glare.
And there was one night and I now look back,
(27:22):
daughter one was with me this particular night, and he
sat and he glared at us both so badly. I thought, oh,
this is it. I knew this is it, and looking
back now, it's probably to her, don't you dare tell
your mother? Wow? You know, but it was a glare
and I knew at that point I had to get
(27:43):
out and again as I was planning this split, but
what transpired. Never in a million years would I have
thought that he would be so evil. But in hindsight,
you know, I think alcoholism brody undone and that will
(28:03):
never be an excused. I understand that he has a
severe issue with alcohol and all that, but that that
will never, ever, ever be an excuse. But he I've
never had anyone shatter my world like that, And never
(28:24):
in a million years do you think that that's going
to happen, that their own father is going to do
that to their children, you know, particularly a police officer. Yeah,
I mean we're talking about sergeant. Yeah, absolutely loved his job,
you know.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Yeah, as a mom, what came up for you that
was a challenge to navigate? Was there questions about how
you protect them, how you protect you? Did you grapple
with yourself with any of this? Because you've obviously done
so much work, you sound so like you're in such
a good place of both having accepted it and having
(29:01):
gone moved forward in a really great way. But I
imagine it wasn't that easy. Yeah, sport is a big one.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
I'm a big believer. Answer, Yeah, I'm a big believer
in sport. The kids, we never changed the program for
any of the kids. We kept the routine of sport.
We kept the routine of a laughter, a lot of
dark humor in the house. Definitely a lot of open conversation.
(29:36):
And I think the big one too. They have a
big brother who is absolutely adores his sisters and his brother.
So the big brother took it on himself. He said
to me when it all happened, he said, Mom, I
guess I've got to be the man of the house.
Thirteen years of age. So the big brother, he has
away with words to get them laughing. And my family,
(30:00):
you know, I have an amazing mum and dad, and
brother and sister and sister in law, and and I
have some wonderful, wonderful girlfriends. Again, never they know this.
The girlfriends know the story, but none of them know
the deep the deepest of the darkest things. Because again
(30:21):
I think, and I used to say this to the kids,
you know, you need to talk. We've got the psychologists
for that. We've got the psychologists for that, and you
can talk to family. But it wasn't until the kids
got older, when they pretty much get high school, they
(30:41):
all said, we need to be able to tell a
couple of our friends what happened to us, because I
think sometimes when you can open up and you've got
you can trust people, it gives a little bit of
an understanding that you are the way you are. Yes,
the penny drops. So it wasn't until that they were
a bit older that they could get that support from
friends and all that. But for me, it was about
(31:05):
making making sure the house lives with laughter. You have
to do it. We can all go into we all
have these moments. I can remember there was one day
about six months into it, I came home and I'm
basically had a mental breakdown and I'll never forget that cry.
It must have been horrific for the kids. Horrific cry.
It was like a how And next thing I know,
(31:27):
I've got my one of my friend's husband holding my
hand like the kids were so beside themselves. They rang
one of my close friends down the road and her
husband was like and he was holding my hand, And
I always remember that was my rock bottom and I've
never experienced anything like it. And as my mum's used
to say, sweetie, you just you just got to get
(31:53):
on with it, and you do. You've got to get
on with it. You've got to develop these kids that
build this resilience. And I had to build resilience. But
I think with me as a mum, you carry so
much shame. It's a shame and particularly for what it was.
But you know, I had to learn to trust people again,
(32:16):
let people in, and you choose by people and again.
But I take it back to sport and I started
doing the zoomba. Not good at it but fun. Yeah,
but be doing that for the last five years. But again,
the kids for my mental health, and I'm a big
believer you've got to get out there and just you've
(32:37):
got to start going out and doing things that make
you feel good and talk to the right people. But
in my case, I just feel in some ways going forward.
The kids said to me the other day, now that
they're eighteen, Mum, this doesn't define us, but we know
you need to do it to heal you. And I
just feel I was so fortunate, well, we were fortunate
(32:58):
with our situation because we had so much support from
Victoria Police that the knowledge that I was able to
gain I can help other people with that. You know,
it's just because you don't know where to go with it,
and I can see why people don't report it. But
can I just read something to you about the stats? Yes,
(33:22):
So the stats are as of I just wrote this
down before, and I did a lot of research back
in the day on it, on alcoholism, sex offenders and
all that. But we're talking about the stats for twenty
twenty three, through the National Association of Services Against Sexual Violence,
(33:45):
there's thirty six three hundred and eighteen victims of sexual
assault recorded in Australia. Eighty four percent were female, Two
in five, which is forty one percent, were aged between
ten and seventeen years of age, and two in five
thirty nine percent we're family and domestic violence related, which
(34:06):
breaks down to fourteen fifty nine victims. So many victims
of family violence. And we're probably talking in the worst
case scenario that's between ten and seventeen. We're not even
talking about.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Under Yeah, you're talking about the ones we know.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
So it's such a taboo subject. But you know, what
if it turns out that this is this is my
purpose in life to help others in this regard, Well,
this is my calling.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Taboo is the problem. You know, I'm sure you're aware,
but if you're not, the healing you have fast forwarded
for those girls in how you've handled this is incredibly
you know, the the silence and the shame and the
and the grappling with the whole thing that that victims
(35:08):
do when they don't have the support that you were
able to give them is you know, that's that's that
ship lasts a lifetime and people often spend decades before
they even begin the process of it.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
Yeah. Yeah, I've actually I've actually had grown men cry
that when they found out, Like, okay, people, I know,
grown men cry because when they found out, because and
because it was so at the time, so open, it
was out there, and people came up and cry. And
I think part of that could be a bit of
(35:47):
a healing process too, that they can open up. You know,
it's horrific for males, you know, with them. But but
everyone knew our secret. And as I said, even though
the suppression orders were there, I was able to get
a lot taken out. I dealt with the DPP at
(36:08):
the time, we were able to get a lot of
news articles removed, Like I fought for that, and I
there's so much I look back and look, I don't
know how I was running on empty. But you know,
go to work and then come home and just fight
a system. But there's still a couple in there that
(36:29):
I can't get rid of. But I was able to
get a lot taken down because even though that there's
nothing that they say, the suppression orders weren't. Yeah, nothing,
nothing had changed. It was just you could clearly identify
for as far as I'm concerned for someone to come
to my work and they go on like asking the
(36:51):
kids and so forth. But you know, the beauty in
one way is the two girls have each other and
their brothers are absolutely amazing. And as I said, my
family is amazing. But you do get there. It's seven years.
It was seven years on the weekend. You know, it's
something that will live with me every single day. There's
(37:14):
not a day I don't have a bit of a flashback.
And you know, I've still got probably a work in
progress and a lot of things, a disassociation so to speak,
you know, with with you know, I have issues with memories.
I don't remember a lot prior to this. I can
look at photos and I don't feel that a connection
(37:36):
or anything like that. That's probably a work in progress.
But going forward, Hey, what I've raised four beautiful kids
who who are absolutely going to do wonders in this world.
The three the triplets are all at university, they're all
McDonald's managers. They're all working, you know, and as well,
(37:59):
and my oldest and electrician, you know, and they're absolutely amazing.
And you know, they could have gone down these different paths,
but I was able to help keep them on the
straight narrow. And again, it's all about talking. But I
keep going back to it, Sport.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
When you made that choice to go and report it
straight away because he was a member of the Victorian Police,
was there a part of you that wondered if they
were going to listen?
Speaker 3 (38:34):
And believe absolutely, I you know, I've heard often some
different stories about the situation regards to that. I understand,
you know, there was a lot of them were affected
(38:57):
because I think, what it is, no one sees it coming,
and you know, you're working in this position of integrity
and trust, and you know, so it's not only easy done.
What he's done. He's a police officer. Yeah, and so
(39:17):
they there's things there that I might not be able
to say ya here, but there's things that I sort
of think he might have got touch with kids gloves
in certain ways, with certain aspects. But I can tell
you the professional standards team and even he see that
this one police officer again is my savior. He'd actually
(39:39):
gone through the academy with my ex husband knew, but
he was amazing and he he was on site like
the whole time. He was there to get justice. But
he did it with kindness and he did it with integrity, compassion,
but he was there to get justice. You know. It
(40:03):
even got to the point that I even had a
turns out when the ex husband was in this other
state on bail. He got himself a girlfriend and I
even got this call from he was able to move
on well. And mind you, he did get sentenced. He
did when he finally did plead guilty, and he did
(40:25):
get sentenced to get ten years and four months with
parole in six years and four months. But having said that,
I think he was probably on bail for about close
to two years, so he was getting on with his life.
I couldn't move. I couldn't. I comparely put one foot
in front of the other. But this police officer was
certainly on a mission. But he'd got himself a girlfriend.
(40:48):
And I got this phone call at work one day
and this guy had said it was bizarre. This guy
had said he was from some sexual crime unit of
some sort, and straight away, I'd like to think I'm
a bit switched on, but obviously I couldn't pick my husband.
But and uh, it was really bizarre. And this guy
(41:10):
was asking me questions, and I said, can I get
you a number to call you back? Because I just
knew it was dodgy anyway, gave me a number and
I rang it, like I checked it out online. It
was really dodgy. So I reported it to the professional
standards and they even tracked it and even into Yeah,
they got him interviewed in another state. So you know,
(41:32):
it turns out it was the ex husband's girlfriend's ex
partner or you know. It was so dysfunctional. But I
even hit you there. I had to say to this
police office, you know, let's let it drop now, let's
let's get on with it, let's let's move on. You know,
I don't want any more of this to consume my time.
It had already taken a number of years. But I
(41:54):
have to say professional standards were fantastic. But you know,
only the day I contact Mark Thomas, I actually had
one of my ex husband's colleagues come over for a
coffee and we got talking and what he did sits
with them all. You know, they're all not okay. Yeah,
(42:16):
And I think another reason tiff to get this story
out this is I actually got a speeding ticket last
year and yeah, I got pulled over and anyway, the
police officer gives me this ticket and I said, oh, yeah,
I should have known better. And I said my husband
was in the team U and he's like, I thought,
(42:41):
I recognized your name. Oh my god, so there you
I recognized my name. So we've gone back like a
six years. And the next day I get a phone
call from a senior sergeant from this other station. I've
never even met these people, and he just rang me
to check in that I was okay. Oh so yeah,
you know, I don't know. I can't speak for Victoria
(43:02):
Police or anything like that, but I do know what
he did his hard and I want to I can't
credit the support and there are so many wonderful officers
out there, so he happened to be a bad egg.
But you know what, I I'll find it. Like you know,
(43:25):
he's where he needs to be and I thought that,
and he can't hurt anyone else anymore.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
This is so much more a good news story than
I expected, you know, I it's it's I can't wait
to share it. I can't wait for people to hear
it because it's there's so much hope and positivity and
something that's truly, truly one of the shittiest things that
you know, that we could be sitting here talking about.
(43:54):
There's so not many stories like this at this level
that people can access. So you're doing amazing work.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
Yeah, thank you. I sort of just you know, we
all have a story. You certainly get to an age.
We all have a story. And as I say to
the kids, bad things happen to good people all the time.
We can never get answers for it. We can't choose
what happens to us sometimes, but we can certainly choose
how we handle it. And that's probably our motto. You know,
(44:27):
you have these choices and you can either go down
that path, you can go down this victim mentality, and
you know, some things are horrific to people, and you know,
I'm lucky we got the tools a lot of people don't.
So if I can again and help people with some
of those tools to get hope. You know, as I
know of some of my girlfriends who've come out of
(44:48):
the woodwork, it happened to them in the seventies and eighties.
Their mother's never had any support, no one was believed.
You know, it's been going on since the beginning of time.
But if I if it means that that's something again,
as I keep saying, if it's something that I can
advocate for and build more on now the kids are older,
(45:09):
this is I'm ready to go. We caon no, because
it's just as I say, we look at those numbers
and that's just the tip of the iceberg, TIF and
it's such I keep going back. It's a taboo subject,
but it's just so horrific and it goes on more
than we realize.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
And just because of the emotion around it it, I
think it's it's really murky, like it's hard to expect
that your outcome would be the normal, right where yeah,
Mum just believes me and we go and we fight
this and we get justice, and we get justice when
(45:52):
that person came from a career where they those these
teammates needed to be involved in that process like it is.
Speaker 3 (46:02):
So I know, when they put out the call for
his arrest, I think they all went into shock. Yeah,
I understand there was a lot of them needed counseling. Yeah,
and then when they found out the horrifics of it all. Yeah,
you know, I went to hear exactly what's going on.
(46:23):
And yeah, so as a mother, that's something that I
you know, as I say to the girls in particular,
and they're doing really, really well, but as I say,
you know, I'm no longer on this earth and something
may trigger. You've got to find counseling. You've got to
(46:44):
get the right people to talk to. And you know, again,
I think we need to put so much trust into
There's some good psychologists out there, many good police, and
we just need to learn to trust things. But again,
so much is that we've got to help ourselves as well.
(47:07):
You know, there's no book for this kind of thing.
And as I said, no one I couldn't talk to anyone.
I so wanted to talk to someone and I couldn't.
And again for me, it was more I deliberately didn't.
My friends knew a lot to a degree, but they
didn't know the nitty gritties. As I said, for court,
(47:28):
I wouldn't allow any friends to come to court because
it's such a personal thing, and I think for me
that keeps the friendships because what happens is is like,
no one wants pity. That's the bottom line. You don't
want pity, and I don't ever want to be. Our
family don't need pity. We don't want it, we don't
(47:48):
need it. We're doing really, really well. And if I
can just say to people, if if you feel that
there's something not right, and I'll be honest with you too.
About three weeks prior to me finding out there was
there was a moment that I actually pulled one of
the girls aside and I said, dad ever done anything.
(48:11):
It was just something not right. We can often feel
it in our guart and report it. Let the police
do what they need to do. And you know, we
may not always get justice and things, but we need
to get the tools that we can move forward. And
(48:32):
I think for me accepting that I can, we'll never
get those answers. I've got to be okay with that,
and I am okay evil.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Where can people connect with you, follow you, find you,
what what's the way forward for you?
Speaker 3 (48:48):
And so, as I said I have before, I've probably
put the cart before the horse doing this podcast with you,
but I do plan on creating a site again. You know,
I've got to go through, create a bit of a
sight and start putting things up there. Again. You know,
(49:08):
no one's really shown me the way. I've got to
now work out what to do. I'd like to start
going down a path of public speaking again, put those
tools in place and get that advocacy. And again I
feel that I now one thing that comes out of it.
You certainly get a voice, and you know no topic
(49:30):
topic is off you know, off bounds to me anymore,
and you get this voice. And so I plan on
taking this further advocacy, so to speak, to make it
you know that someone's got that, they've got places to go,
and I get with suppression orders and we can do
it with anonymous work, so to speak, if people want
(49:54):
to when I get it all set up, and I'll
touch base with you when I do get set up.
If that's okay, one of and obviously I'd love to
get your links and share and then just take it
from there. But I think if I can touch the
heart of one mother, and there's also fathers out there,
but if I can touch the heart of one mother
(50:16):
and give them a piece of hope that seven years on,
that we are where we are today, we truly have
a great life. We really do.
Speaker 2 (50:28):
I love that I'll have. So when you do get
links and a website, go get an RL now on
park it so.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
I can put it in the show. I'm to do that.
Speaker 2 (50:37):
Yeah, I will put it in the show notes. It'll
probably listeners, it might already be there if you're listening
to it right now, so there's and if it's not,
reach out to me and I'll make sure at some
point you get connected. But yeah, I'm just so proud
of where you've landed with this and to have been
able to have this conversation and well done.
Speaker 3 (50:59):
Thank you, thank you, TIF, thank you. And as I said, Mark,
it all happened so quick with Mark Thomas and Anty
we are today. So yeah, I definitely will get those
wheels in motion the time is right, And yeah, I
just want to thank you for having me on and yeah,
we are really in a good place. And if I
could put the tools out there for what helped me. Again,
(51:21):
this is on my own experience and if it can
help anyone, that's that's my mission one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (51:29):
It can keep doing what we do. Thanks everyone for
tuning in, and thank you Anthea, thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:37):
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my
blood
Speaker 3 (52:03):
S.
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my blood.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm tiff. This is role with the punches and we're
turning life's hardest hits into wins. Nobody wants to go
to court and don't. My friends at test Art Family
Lawyers know that they offer all forms of alternative dispute resolution.
Their team of Melbourne family lawyers have extensive experience in
(00:29):
all areas of family law to facto and same sex couples,
custody and children, family violence and intervention orders, property settlements
and financial agreements. Test Art is in your corner, so
reach out to Mark and the team at www dot
test Artfamilylawyers dot com dot au. Anthea Kenny, welcome to
(00:54):
the show. Thank you, thanks for having me on Absolute pleasure.
How are you?
Speaker 3 (01:01):
I'm great, Thanks Stiff. Yeah, you're doing really really well.
So you know, life before that was a lot tougher,
but as of today, myself and my children are doing
really really well. So as our saying is onwards and upwards. Amazing.
I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
Introduced by our good mutual friend mister Mark Thomas.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
Thanks Mark, shout out to you. You're amazing. Mark.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
He always he always brings me beautiful guests and beautiful stories,
and he always checks in that I'm happy to have
particular conversations, and this is one that you know, it's
a tough conversation both for yourself and for listeners, and
you know, for everyone involved, but also these conversations are
(01:47):
so important and so healing, and hopefully for yourself you
find the same. I think they can be such a
they can lift a lot of things for the people
sitting in them as well. That's what I've experienced and
a lot of people that have come in here, so
things crossed. Now I've said it, I'd better live up
to that. It better be a good experience. I'll try.
(02:12):
Would you like to give us a little snapshot of
introducing yourself?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Anthea? Absolutely, So, my name's Anthea. My situation and where
I know Mark Thomas is from the Code nine Foundation
with him and Rob Atkins. I've known Rob for probably
close to thirty years. So my situation, I was married
to a police officer for over twenty years. In that situation,
(02:41):
there's many things. He was quite well known. He was
part of the police exec he was on the council,
as a football coach, you name it. Ever, it was
well known I had been on TV many times, and
seven years ago, nearly to the date, on the second
of August two thousand and eighteen, our marriage had been
(03:06):
very much on the rocks for a good year. He'd
had an accident through the through work and had gone
on work cover with that alcoholism setting. And you know,
there was always alcoholism there in the past. But I
came home one day I was planning a split and
(03:28):
it was becoming a violent situation at home. He never
hit me, but it was getting very, very toxic. It
was to the point that I would come home and
be looking for bottles in the garage. You know, you
sit in the car for ten minutes taking a breath,
and what am I going to walk into? And so
I had this particular situation. But on this particular day
(03:50):
things were really rough, and I had this really weird
feeling driving home. And our oldest son at the time
was thirteen and he was going to he was doing cadets,
and my ex husband was driving him to cadets, and
I probably had said to him, can you get some
one to give me a call? The corn ever came
and I passed them driving on the way home, and
(04:14):
so I tried calling in on bluetooth and there was
no answer, and I just had this really weird feeling.
I just can't put my finger on it coming home
from work, and I come home from work all the time,
and it was very drunken and so forth, and it
was becoming very unbearable. Anyway, this particular day, I came
home and one of the girls. We have triplets and
(04:38):
there are eleven, and out of the triplets is one boy,
two girls, and one of the girls just stuck to
me like glue. And I went into the bedroom to
get changed out of my work clothes, and next minute
it was really bizarre, but she just would not leave me,
and next me, she's, Mommy, I've got to tell you something,
(05:00):
you know, what's that sweetie? And Daddy's been touching me.
And then it got worse, progressively worse. She actually said
other things, and next minute she said to me, it's
happened to daughter two. So I called daughter two in
(05:21):
and it turns out they didn't know about each other
that had been happening, something had happened just prior to
me coming home, so obviously they were so scared. Daughter
two came into the bedroom and I said to her
what you know, it's daddy ever touched you? No, Mammy, no.
And next minute daughter one again, you know eleven, and
(05:41):
Daughter one screamed at her. You tell them the truth,
and of course it all came out. And then their
trip of brother came in and like, what's going on,
you know, and he was beside himself. So my world
just fell apart, absolutely fell apart. And I rang my
mother and because you know, the ex husband has taken
(06:01):
their son to cadets, so he's not in the house,
rang my mum, and I was beside myself and he's
abused the girls. And Mom's like, you've got to get
to the place, get to the place. So I do that.
I pile the three kids into the car and I'm
straight down to the local police station and I asked
(06:22):
to see the officer in charge. And with that, you know,
I quietly said to one of the females, seeing a
sergeants there, look such and such, because he'd worked at
this station as well previously, okay, And I said, he's
he's done this. And then I proceeded to tell a
(06:42):
bit more and her words, I'll never forget the words,
she said, So he's raped them and those words at
that time just pierced me. I just couldn't believe it.
So anyway, with that, and again the police are all in.
Everyone knew him, and so we got the wheels going
(07:04):
motion to get that sort of and they have to
go out here put a whatever they call it, to
call out for his arrest, and you know, police had
to pick my someone up from cadets. He had no
idea what was going on. So the wheels were emotion anyway,
(07:27):
So that night my parents were living in Strathbogie at
the time, and you know, the police interview the girls.
You know, I'm in another room, and then it all
starts that we have to go to the Rawal Children's
Hospital and the girls have to have these examinations, and
throughout that whole time they're looking at me, Mummy, where okay,
(07:50):
I'm beside myself. Mummy, We're okay, so you know, and
then it goes from there, and then the next day
we had to go until emergency accommodation that night because
I hadn't arrested him at this point, and go to
an emergency accommodation the next day, come home. Finally, after
we've done our police statements, I didn't sleep all night.
(08:14):
We have to go to the local station and do
all these statements, and at that stage, professional standards of coming.
So we're dealing with soccer and professional standards because he
was a local good police officer. Now to give credit,
they were my lifeline. Professional standards, particularly one police officer.
(08:35):
And anyway, there's statements happen, and I don't know a
lot what's going on at this stage because the girls
aren't telling me. And finally we do these statements, come
home and the kids. It's a Thursday, so it's a Thursday.
It's happened. This is a Friday, and the kids are
all in football finals. So all four kids played football
and they're all in footy finals. And next minute I
(08:57):
finally get home. My mom's mum and dad are with me,
and he's been arrested as far as I know, and
sort of it sort of cuts off. I don't know
what happens at that point, And next minute the police
bring me and we're home and they said we need
to leave the house. We need to get a warrant
to search your house. The house. I said, I'm not
going anywhere. You know, the kids have got football in
(09:19):
my mind. I wanted to keep everything normal for the kids.
Kids have got football training. You don't need a warrant,
just come. So we're in the front room and then
they came and they're asking me for certain items. You know,
where do you keep your tea towels? Where do you
keep you how often do you wash you do? You know?
What did you do with these blankets? Did it all
(09:41):
this kind of stuff? And again I've got no idea
what's going on, what's all this kind of stuff? So
going through the process was absolutely horrific. I couldn't even
tell my friends, my closest friends for a couple of months.
Everyone knew it was a split. Within three weeks and
it hit the paper. I don't know how, but it
(10:02):
was quite detailed and I actually found out through the
paper there was a little bit more to it, so,
you know, so with that, I actually started my mission
to try and where do you go with this? Because
there's no support groups, Tiff, there's none. There's no support
groups for parents of let's call it incest. There's support
(10:27):
groups for pornography and all the other stuff, but there
was nothing, and I think with suppression orders, and it's
such a deboo subject, there's nothing. But I was lucky
in a lot of ways because I had the support
of Victoria Police who put the wheels in motion for
a lot of welfare. Raw Children's Hospital were obviously involved,
(10:52):
and I always remember there was a one you know,
you can meet one person, they can impact you. I
always remember there was a social worker that particular night
where the girls had their assessments done and she said, Anthea,
they're going to be okay. So you know what makes
you say that? She said, because you believe them. And
(11:14):
she said it's you know, you believe them, so they're
going to be okay. So I've made it a little
bit of a mission going forward. The kids are now
eighteen and they've said to me, in my mind, I've
always known I wanted to do some form of advocacy
going forward to try and this is big. The amount
(11:35):
of people that came and opened up to me when
they found out is I had work colleagues, I've had friends,
I've had people that came up to me. The footy
club were absolutely amazing. They surrounded those kids like you
wouldn't believe. But I had people come out of the
woodwork saying it happened to me, but again there's no
support groups. I joined a I did support I did
(11:59):
join a group that were course restoring hope at the time,
but they were that was developed by some women who
would all be abused as children. So there was groups
for being abused children, but there was nothing for parents.
So going forward, my mission was I needed to find
(12:20):
out as much as I could and then we start
going into COVID lockdowns. But it was just horrific. So
what had happened to him, He'd been put into a
mental institution nonvoluntary for a number of months. I sort
of had to find out a lot of that and
I had no answers to anything. So that night it's gone.
(12:42):
I've never seen him again. The type thing. At that point,
he gets arrested, I've got no idea. It's or cut off.
AVOs got put in place, locks get changed the next day,
and that's it, or cut off and they see it.
I'll go to work on Monday. I go to work
and you know, I've got to keep it together. And
thank god, I did quietly speak to my boss, but
(13:05):
that's it. Had to get on with it, and there
was nothing. And then, as I said, three weeks later,
got into the papers and more and more talk started
to happen, and so it just became a case that
I needed to really find answers, and going through the process,
(13:27):
I was a signed of fantastic psychologist and again that
came through police welfare. They got her for me, and
she'd dealt with police officers, but she'd also dealt with
sex offenders and threw her support. She was just amazing.
And the outcome from her in the end, it became
(13:49):
that when former happens and we are so blindsided by things,
we all are looking for answers and it become the
main focus. We want a reason for something, why did
it happen? But the outcome of her it became that
I was able one big thing. I was able to
(14:09):
walk away. And it's taken a long time, but to
walk away and go I don't need the answers anymore.
And I think that's the first part of healing, when
you can accept that you don't need the answers. The
kids had a wonderful support system. The boys had a
specific psychologist and the girls had the Raw Children's Hospital.
(14:31):
And for me, I wrote to the police commissioner. I
wrote to you know, I was dealing with the DPP.
I had to really push for a long time to
get this case heard. I kind of felt the justice
system at the time was very much on his side.
(14:52):
Not the police, but the justice system. I really had
to push for that, and when we actually went to
a communtal hearing, Actually I'll backtrack a little bit. What
had happened was he was going to get charged and
he was going to plead not guilty. So I'm going
(15:15):
through this again. I've got no one to talk to
other than the psychologist. I didn't speak to friends about
it or anything like that. It just opened up to
a couple of close girlfriends. But it becomes what happens
with something like this trauma. You've got to really work
out who's genuine and who's not. He's there for your
welfare who's not. You lose friends overnight. That happens with
(15:39):
divorce as well, but I lost friends overnight. The amount
of stuff I had to read online, the comments derogatory
about me, about people that just thought they knew our
situation and all that, it was just horrific. And every
day I had to go to work and keep my
shit together for the sake of my kids. And get
(16:03):
on and pay the bills and just work. So anyway,
I had to fight to really get this pushed through
further because I really he was out on parole for
quite some time, able to roam playing the victim, and
(16:24):
he was actually being able to live close to where
we were. He was living in another suburb not far
which was making my mental health really really bad. So
I was really declining. And in the end he was
able to move to another state. So he finally gets
charged and he's going to go not guilty at this stage,
(16:46):
so I had to do a plea bargain. So he's
got these charges against with the girls, I had to
do a plea bargain, And at that time it's a
bit like TV go in and you're you're sitting around
the table and all that. And at the time he
was going not guilty and to do a fleabag, and
(17:09):
they wanted to drop a couple of charges against daughter two.
They felt at the time that she was not strong
enough to go and on the stand, and which is
quite you know, to think about. He was going to
allow our own daughters to testify and all that was
quite horrific. So I agreed to drop these charges against
(17:31):
daughter too, and with that the next day he pled guilty.
So that's something I will always that will live with me.
I kind of felt like I sort of got a
little bit blindsided with that. I didn't feel I got
justice in one way for one daughter. So I've learned
a lot. And having said that, I've learned a lot
(17:52):
through the system, the victims of crime and the departments
to deal with so going forward to be able to
help those who don't have a voice, and in our situation,
it took a while. We finally we went to the
committal hearing in the magistrate's court and to my disgust,
(18:15):
I can't say names or anything, but to my disgust,
the actual magistrate thanked him for attending Mike's husband for
attending the court. And I can remember looking at the
police officer from professional standards and just said, you are
you kidding me? They thanked him because he came down
from another state thanked him and it was all, you know,
(18:38):
it was crazy and anyway, ended up pleading guilty and
then oh they stood actually they obviously sorry, there was
a case for it. And then obviously down the track
it went to the counter court through that I arranged
to make sure that no friends were there. I think
(19:00):
with trauma, I think a lot of people you want
support around you, and this is for me when you
want support. But I think one thing I learned is
you know, for me, I don't want people knowing too much.
And I think that helps with our healing in a
lot of ways. You only have a close network. And
I had so many people want to come to court,
(19:22):
but I said no because it's a case of you
can't unhear what you hear, and I didn't know what
I was going to hear at the court case. So
even though we play guilty, what they do is all
the charges come out in depth. So we went through
it. It was my brother, my mother, and my sister in
law came to court. The newspapers were there and actually
(19:50):
no backtrack, they weren't. They might have been there at
that stage, but I know when I did the victim
impact statement, they end up leaving. But so anyway, he
ended up pleading guilty. But through that court case, through
that they went through and they told things about a
number of the offenses. I was actually home when they happened,
(20:15):
so all these things and it becomes that jigsaw puzzle,
a puzzle with the missing pieces and all that. But
I found out that I was home. And we're talking
like two years into this case, and it was just horrific,
like finding out what I found out because the police
had never told me, the girls had never told me.
(20:37):
And I remember speaking again to this police officer who
was Myra. I said, I was home, so my girls
weren't even safe. That's home. So I've been down the
barrels of the worst that can be. But to me,
it was all about I had to be a mum
(21:00):
and you can't live with a victim mentality, and it's
about For me, it was about I had to get
one step in front of the other. So I put
the wheels in motion and I did what I had
to do. I wrote what I had to write to
whoever it had to be, and started we started getting
(21:20):
our life back on track. And the police had kept
saying to me, and he's going to get the news
down the track, we just don't know when. And then
eighteen months into the case, my brother rang me. I
was at work and he said, have we're seeing the papers.
Everything's online, We're seeing it, and there it was. There's
a big picture of him with someone well known, and
(21:44):
I think it's like page three and his name, what
he's done everything. So even though there's suppression orders in place,
you could easily identify who the victims were. And then
everyone came out of the woodwork. Again my fine blew up.
I had to ring the school. The kids teachers knew
(22:06):
what had happened to them, but no one else knew.
So I had to put the wheels in motion and
speak to the school and that the principal brought them in.
They got protected. And next minute, as I said I
next ment, someone came into my workplace and asked me
if I was his wife. So I copped it from everywhere,
(22:31):
and again we had to go on that journey. So
that again that hit the news really quite It was
all through the newspapers. Again, it hit Facebook and you
know all the other sides, and I had to read
everything again and it's just horrific and all as a mother,
I just wanted to protect my kids.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
It is rare that I am deemed this speechless, and
not speechless in a shocking way, speechless in just you know,
sometimes the best thing you can do as a host
of a conversation is just get out of the way.
But I want to say thank you for being the
(23:21):
mother that's so many survivors crave and need and need
to know exists. I've got so many questions and I
don't even know where to start. I guess one is
(23:41):
how I just think about the influx of emotions and
the natural human response to and I know that you're
so You mentioned your relationship was already on a downhill spiral,
so you were you have. I guess that creates a
(24:02):
better foundation for you to be able to really support
the children and know where you stand. But I feel
like twenty years in a loving relationship and in a family,
you still have this What once existed would have been
a sense of belonging and connection and togetherness, and then
(24:23):
overnight that has turned into a horror film of sorts.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Yeah. Well, actually, looking back, there was deception throughout the
whole marriage. And again, you know, it's not until you
hit these uddern moments that we live in denial with
so many things. You know, when you get married and
all that, and when things start, we don't see these
red flags. They're there, but we don't see them. We
(24:50):
choose to not see them, or you know, I was
twenty five when I met him. He'd already been married
another family. And looking back, you know, maybe I settled,
probably did I think, But there was deception back then,
financial deception back then. My saving grace is that, you know,
(25:12):
we did split not long after our marriage after some
financial deception. He had a lot more debt than I
realized and all that. But when we got back together,
I made sure all the assets went in my name.
And what happened was we ended up The only bank
account we ended up having was a mortgage account, so
(25:33):
you know, he sort of had his He would get paid,
he would pay certain more, you know, we paid certain
bills and that's the way it worked, and we had
a good number of years. But if I look back now,
you know, I was young, dumb. I settled, but the
deception was there. The alcohol, and I think with him,
(25:54):
the alcoholism was always there. But because of the shift work,
and we're going back back in the time, they'd have
that quick changeover. It's nothing all at what they have
today Victoria police, you hate, but they'd have that quick changeovers.
And so the time of drinking was that you couldn't
drink during the week, you know, because he did big
on different shifts, but when he would drink, he would
(26:16):
binge and it was quite It was pretty intense. And
and then you know, all of a sudden, we have
these four kids. We had one and you know, you
decided to have a family and then decide on another
one in the triple h thank you universe. Yeah, so
you know, And so I had four kids in two years.
(26:40):
So that was and I had to give up work
and all that. So, like a lot of marriages, you're
leaning on your partner and all that. But looking back now,
if I was on our marriage was on the rocks
for a long long time. But I do remember that
last year I was planning a split and I was
actually talking to his parents at the time to sort
(27:01):
of say I needed to get him up to this
other state to be near his parents because he was
becoming so violent, emotionally violent and unhinged. Never seen anything
like it. And he could have a glare, this particular glare.
And there was one night and I now look back,
(27:22):
daughter one was with me this particular night, and he
sat and he glared at us both so badly. I thought, oh,
this is it. I knew this is it, and looking
back now, it's probably to her, don't you dare tell
your mother? Wow? You know, but it was a glare
and I knew at that point I had to get
(27:43):
out and again as I was planning this split, but
what transpired. Never in a million years would I have
thought that he would be so evil. But in hindsight,
you know, I think alcoholism brody undone and that will
(28:03):
never be an excused. I understand that he has a
severe issue with alcohol and all that, but that that
will never, ever, ever be an excuse. But he I've
never had anyone shatter my world like that, And never
(28:24):
in a million years do you think that that's going
to happen, that their own father is going to do
that to their children, you know, particularly a police officer. Yeah,
I mean we're talking about sergeant. Yeah, absolutely loved his job,
you know.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Yeah, as a mom, what came up for you that
was a challenge to navigate? Was there questions about how
you protect them, how you protect you? Did you grapple
with yourself with any of this? Because you've obviously done
so much work, you sound so like you're in such
a good place of both having accepted it and having
(29:01):
gone moved forward in a really great way. But I
imagine it wasn't that easy. Yeah, sport is a big one.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
I'm a big believer. Answer, Yeah, I'm a big believer
in sport. The kids, we never changed the program for
any of the kids. We kept the routine of sport.
We kept the routine of a laughter, a lot of
dark humor in the house. Definitely a lot of open conversation.
(29:36):
And I think the big one too. They have a
big brother who is absolutely adores his sisters and his brother.
So the big brother took it on himself. He said
to me when it all happened, he said, Mom, I
guess I've got to be the man of the house.
Thirteen years of age. So the big brother, he has
away with words to get them laughing. And my family,
(30:00):
you know, I have an amazing mum and dad, and
brother and sister and sister in law, and and I
have some wonderful, wonderful girlfriends. Again, never they know this.
The girlfriends know the story, but none of them know
the deep the deepest of the darkest things. Because again
(30:21):
I think, and I used to say this to the kids,
you know, you need to talk. We've got the psychologists
for that. We've got the psychologists for that, and you
can talk to family. But it wasn't until the kids
got older, when they pretty much get high school, they
(30:41):
all said, we need to be able to tell a
couple of our friends what happened to us, because I
think sometimes when you can open up and you've got
you can trust people, it gives a little bit of
an understanding that you are the way you are. Yes,
the penny drops. So it wasn't until that they were
a bit older that they could get that support from
friends and all that. But for me, it was about
(31:05):
making making sure the house lives with laughter. You have
to do it. We can all go into we all
have these moments. I can remember there was one day
about six months into it, I came home and I'm
basically had a mental breakdown and I'll never forget that cry.
It must have been horrific for the kids. Horrific cry.
It was like a how And next thing I know,
(31:27):
I've got my one of my friend's husband holding my
hand like the kids were so beside themselves. They rang
one of my close friends down the road and her
husband was like and he was holding my hand, And
I always remember that was my rock bottom and I've
never experienced anything like it. And as my mum's used
to say, sweetie, you just you just got to get
(31:53):
on with it, and you do. You've got to get
on with it. You've got to develop these kids that
build this resilience. And I had to build resilience. But
I think with me as a mum, you carry so
much shame. It's a shame and particularly for what it was.
But you know, I had to learn to trust people again,
(32:16):
let people in, and you choose by people and again.
But I take it back to sport and I started
doing the zoomba. Not good at it but fun. Yeah,
but be doing that for the last five years. But again,
the kids for my mental health, and I'm a big
believer you've got to get out there and just you've
(32:37):
got to start going out and doing things that make
you feel good and talk to the right people. But
in my case, I just feel in some ways going forward.
The kids said to me the other day, now that
they're eighteen, Mum, this doesn't define us, but we know
you need to do it to heal you. And I
just feel I was so fortunate, well, we were fortunate
(32:58):
with our situation because we had so much support from
Victoria Police that the knowledge that I was able to
gain I can help other people with that. You know,
it's just because you don't know where to go with it,
and I can see why people don't report it. But
can I just read something to you about the stats? Yes,
(33:22):
So the stats are as of I just wrote this
down before, and I did a lot of research back
in the day on it, on alcoholism, sex offenders and
all that. But we're talking about the stats for twenty
twenty three, through the National Association of Services Against Sexual Violence,
(33:45):
there's thirty six three hundred and eighteen victims of sexual
assault recorded in Australia. Eighty four percent were female, Two
in five, which is forty one percent, were aged between
ten and seventeen years of age, and two in five
thirty nine percent we're family and domestic violence related, which
(34:06):
breaks down to fourteen fifty nine victims. So many victims
of family violence. And we're probably talking in the worst
case scenario that's between ten and seventeen. We're not even
talking about.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Under Yeah, you're talking about the ones we know.
Speaker 3 (34:26):
So it's such a taboo subject. But you know, what
if it turns out that this is this is my
purpose in life to help others in this regard, Well,
this is my calling.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Taboo is the problem. You know, I'm sure you're aware,
but if you're not, the healing you have fast forwarded
for those girls in how you've handled this is incredibly
you know, the the silence and the shame and the
and the grappling with the whole thing that that victims
(35:08):
do when they don't have the support that you were
able to give them is you know, that's that's that
ship lasts a lifetime and people often spend decades before
they even begin the process of it.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
Yeah. Yeah, I've actually I've actually had grown men cry
that when they found out, Like, okay, people, I know,
grown men cry because when they found out, because and
because it was so at the time, so open, it
was out there, and people came up and cry. And
I think part of that could be a bit of
(35:47):
a healing process too, that they can open up. You know,
it's horrific for males, you know, with them. But but
everyone knew our secret. And as I said, even though
the suppression orders were there, I was able to get
a lot taken out. I dealt with the DPP at
(36:08):
the time, we were able to get a lot of
news articles removed, Like I fought for that, and I
there's so much I look back and look, I don't
know how I was running on empty. But you know,
go to work and then come home and just fight
a system. But there's still a couple in there that
(36:29):
I can't get rid of. But I was able to
get a lot taken down because even though that there's
nothing that they say, the suppression orders weren't. Yeah, nothing,
nothing had changed. It was just you could clearly identify
for as far as I'm concerned for someone to come
to my work and they go on like asking the
(36:51):
kids and so forth. But you know, the beauty in
one way is the two girls have each other and
their brothers are absolutely amazing. And as I said, my
family is amazing. But you do get there. It's seven years.
It was seven years on the weekend. You know, it's
something that will live with me every single day. There's
(37:14):
not a day I don't have a bit of a flashback.
And you know, I've still got probably a work in
progress and a lot of things, a disassociation so to speak,
you know, with with you know, I have issues with memories.
I don't remember a lot prior to this. I can
look at photos and I don't feel that a connection
(37:36):
or anything like that. That's probably a work in progress.
But going forward, Hey, what I've raised four beautiful kids
who who are absolutely going to do wonders in this world.
The three the triplets are all at university, they're all
McDonald's managers. They're all working, you know, and as well,
(37:59):
and my oldest and electrician, you know, and they're absolutely amazing.
And you know, they could have gone down these different paths,
but I was able to help keep them on the
straight narrow. And again, it's all about talking. But I
keep going back to it, Sport.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
When you made that choice to go and report it
straight away because he was a member of the Victorian Police,
was there a part of you that wondered if they
were going to listen?
Speaker 3 (38:34):
And believe absolutely, I you know, I've heard often some
different stories about the situation regards to that. I understand,
you know, there was a lot of them were affected
(38:57):
because I think, what it is, no one sees it coming,
and you know, you're working in this position of integrity
and trust, and you know, so it's not only easy done.
What he's done. He's a police officer. Yeah, and so
(39:17):
they there's things there that I might not be able
to say ya here, but there's things that I sort
of think he might have got touch with kids gloves
in certain ways, with certain aspects. But I can tell
you the professional standards team and even he see that
this one police officer again is my savior. He'd actually
(39:39):
gone through the academy with my ex husband knew, but
he was amazing and he he was on site like
the whole time. He was there to get justice. But
he did it with kindness and he did it with integrity, compassion,
but he was there to get justice. You know. It
(40:03):
even got to the point that I even had a
turns out when the ex husband was in this other
state on bail. He got himself a girlfriend and I
even got this call from he was able to move
on well. And mind you, he did get sentenced. He
did when he finally did plead guilty, and he did
(40:25):
get sentenced to get ten years and four months with
parole in six years and four months. But having said that,
I think he was probably on bail for about close
to two years, so he was getting on with his life.
I couldn't move. I couldn't. I comparely put one foot
in front of the other. But this police officer was
certainly on a mission. But he'd got himself a girlfriend.
(40:48):
And I got this phone call at work one day
and this guy had said it was bizarre. This guy
had said he was from some sexual crime unit of
some sort, and straight away, I'd like to think I'm
a bit switched on, but obviously I couldn't pick my husband.
But and uh, it was really bizarre. And this guy
(41:10):
was asking me questions, and I said, can I get
you a number to call you back? Because I just
knew it was dodgy anyway, gave me a number and
I rang it, like I checked it out online. It
was really dodgy. So I reported it to the professional
standards and they even tracked it and even into Yeah,
they got him interviewed in another state. So you know,
(41:32):
it turns out it was the ex husband's girlfriend's ex
partner or you know. It was so dysfunctional. But I
even hit you there. I had to say to this
police office, you know, let's let it drop now, let's
let's get on with it, let's let's move on. You know,
I don't want any more of this to consume my time.
It had already taken a number of years. But I
(41:54):
have to say professional standards were fantastic. But you know,
only the day I contact Mark Thomas, I actually had
one of my ex husband's colleagues come over for a
coffee and we got talking and what he did sits
with them all. You know, they're all not okay. Yeah,
(42:16):
And I think another reason tiff to get this story
out this is I actually got a speeding ticket last
year and yeah, I got pulled over and anyway, the
police officer gives me this ticket and I said, oh, yeah,
I should have known better. And I said my husband
was in the team U and he's like, I thought,
(42:41):
I recognized your name. Oh my god, so there you
I recognized my name. So we've gone back like a
six years. And the next day I get a phone
call from a senior sergeant from this other station. I've
never even met these people, and he just rang me
to check in that I was okay. Oh so yeah,
you know, I don't know. I can't speak for Victoria
(43:02):
Police or anything like that, but I do know what
he did his hard and I want to I can't
credit the support and there are so many wonderful officers
out there, so he happened to be a bad egg.
But you know what, I I'll find it. Like you know,
(43:25):
he's where he needs to be and I thought that,
and he can't hurt anyone else anymore.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
This is so much more a good news story than
I expected, you know, I it's it's I can't wait
to share it. I can't wait for people to hear
it because it's there's so much hope and positivity and
something that's truly, truly one of the shittiest things that
you know, that we could be sitting here talking about.
(43:54):
There's so not many stories like this at this level
that people can access. So you're doing amazing work.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
Yeah, thank you. I sort of just you know, we
all have a story. You certainly get to an age.
We all have a story. And as I say to
the kids, bad things happen to good people all the time.
We can never get answers for it. We can't choose
what happens to us sometimes, but we can certainly choose
how we handle it. And that's probably our motto. You know,
(44:27):
you have these choices and you can either go down
that path, you can go down this victim mentality, and
you know, some things are horrific to people, and you know,
I'm lucky we got the tools a lot of people don't.
So if I can again and help people with some
of those tools to get hope. You know, as I
know of some of my girlfriends who've come out of
(44:48):
the woodwork, it happened to them in the seventies and eighties.
Their mother's never had any support, no one was believed.
You know, it's been going on since the beginning of time.
But if I if it means that that's something again,
as I keep saying, if it's something that I can
advocate for and build more on now the kids are older,
(45:09):
this is I'm ready to go. We caon no, because
it's just as I say, we look at those numbers
and that's just the tip of the iceberg, TIF and
it's such I keep going back. It's a taboo subject,
but it's just so horrific and it goes on more
than we realize.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
And just because of the emotion around it it, I
think it's it's really murky, like it's hard to expect
that your outcome would be the normal, right where yeah,
Mum just believes me and we go and we fight
this and we get justice, and we get justice when
(45:52):
that person came from a career where they those these
teammates needed to be involved in that process like it is.
Speaker 3 (46:02):
So I know, when they put out the call for
his arrest, I think they all went into shock. Yeah,
I understand there was a lot of them needed counseling. Yeah,
and then when they found out the horrifics of it all. Yeah,
you know, I went to hear exactly what's going on.
(46:23):
And yeah, so as a mother, that's something that I
you know, as I say to the girls in particular,
and they're doing really, really well, but as I say,
you know, I'm no longer on this earth and something
may trigger. You've got to find counseling. You've got to
(46:44):
get the right people to talk to. And you know, again,
I think we need to put so much trust into
There's some good psychologists out there, many good police, and
we just need to learn to trust things. But again,
so much is that we've got to help ourselves as well.
(47:07):
You know, there's no book for this kind of thing.
And as I said, no one I couldn't talk to anyone.
I so wanted to talk to someone and I couldn't.
And again for me, it was more I deliberately didn't.
My friends knew a lot to a degree, but they
didn't know the nitty gritties. As I said, for court,
(47:28):
I wouldn't allow any friends to come to court because
it's such a personal thing, and I think for me
that keeps the friendships because what happens is is like,
no one wants pity. That's the bottom line. You don't
want pity, and I don't ever want to be. Our
family don't need pity. We don't want it, we don't
(47:48):
need it. We're doing really, really well. And if I
can just say to people, if if you feel that
there's something not right, and I'll be honest with you too.
About three weeks prior to me finding out there was
there was a moment that I actually pulled one of
the girls aside and I said, dad ever done anything.
(48:11):
It was just something not right. We can often feel
it in our guart and report it. Let the police
do what they need to do. And you know, we
may not always get justice and things, but we need
to get the tools that we can move forward. And
(48:32):
I think for me accepting that I can, we'll never
get those answers. I've got to be okay with that,
and I am okay evil.
Speaker 2 (48:43):
Where can people connect with you, follow you, find you,
what what's the way forward for you?
Speaker 3 (48:48):
And so, as I said I have before, I've probably
put the cart before the horse doing this podcast with you,
but I do plan on creating a site again. You know,
I've got to go through, create a bit of a
sight and start putting things up there. Again. You know,
(49:08):
no one's really shown me the way. I've got to
now work out what to do. I'd like to start
going down a path of public speaking again, put those
tools in place and get that advocacy. And again I
feel that I now one thing that comes out of it.
You certainly get a voice, and you know no topic
(49:30):
topic is off you know, off bounds to me anymore,
and you get this voice. And so I plan on
taking this further advocacy, so to speak, to make it
you know that someone's got that, they've got places to go,
and I get with suppression orders and we can do
it with anonymous work, so to speak, if people want
(49:54):
to when I get it all set up, and I'll
touch base with you when I do get set up.
If that's okay, one of and obviously I'd love to
get your links and share and then just take it
from there. But I think if I can touch the
heart of one mother, and there's also fathers out there,
but if I can touch the heart of one mother
(50:16):
and give them a piece of hope that seven years on,
that we are where we are today, we truly have
a great life. We really do.
Speaker 2 (50:28):
I love that I'll have. So when you do get
links and a website, go get an RL now on
park it so.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
I can put it in the show. I'm to do that.
Speaker 2 (50:37):
Yeah, I will put it in the show notes. It'll
probably listeners, it might already be there if you're listening
to it right now, so there's and if it's not,
reach out to me and I'll make sure at some
point you get connected. But yeah, I'm just so proud
of where you've landed with this and to have been
able to have this conversation and well done.
Speaker 3 (50:59):
Thank you, thank you, TIF, thank you. And as I said, Mark,
it all happened so quick with Mark Thomas and Anty
we are today. So yeah, I definitely will get those
wheels in motion the time is right, And yeah, I
just want to thank you for having me on and yeah,
we are really in a good place. And if I
could put the tools out there for what helped me. Again,
(51:21):
this is on my own experience and if it can
help anyone, that's that's my mission one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (51:29):
It can keep doing what we do. Thanks everyone for
tuning in, and thank you Anthea, thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:37):
She said, it's now never I got fighting in my
blood
Speaker 3 (52:03):
S.
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