July 2, 2025 • 12 mins
This week, we learned a 26-year-old childcare worker has been charged with 70 offences, including child rape, in Victoria.
It has led to an immediate, and state-wide response that has impacted thousands of families in Victoria and an entire sector.
So what exactly do we know about the allegations against this man? And how are officials responding?
We’ll tell you what you need to know in today’s podcast.
Hosts: Billi FitzSimons and Sam Koslowski
Producer: Orla Maher
Want to support The Daily Aus? That's so kind! The best way to do that is to click ‘follow’ on Spotify or Apple and to leave us a five-star review. We would be so grateful.
The Daily Aus is a media company focused on delivering accessible and digestible news to young people. We are completely independent.
Want more from TDA?
Subscribe to The Daily Aus newsletter
Subscribe to The Daily Aus’ YouTube Channel
Have feedback for us?
We’re always looking for new ways to improve what we do. If you’ve got feedback, we’re all ears. Tell us here.
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 (00:00):
Just a warning before we start. This podcast contains highly
distressing themes involving child sexual abuse. So if you're not
in the right headspace to listen to today's episode, maybe
skip this one and come back tomorrow. And if you
or anyone you know need support, you can contact one
eight hundred respect anytime on one eight hundred seven three
seven seven three to two.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Already and this is this is.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
The Daily This is the Daily os Oh now it
makes sense. Good morning, and welcome to the Daily Yours.
It's Thursday, the third of July. I'm Belief at Simon's.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
I'm Sam Kazlowski.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
This week we learned a twenty six year old childcare
worker has been charged with seventy offenses, including child rape
in Victoria. It has led to an immediate and state
wide response that has impacted thousands of families in Victoria
and an entire sector. So what exactly do we know
about the allegations against this man and how are officials responding.
(01:06):
We'll tell you what you need to know in today's podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Billy, this is going to be a difficult chat to
have because of the nature of this story. Before we
get into the details of what's happened. Give me a
sense of how this all originally unfolded.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Yeah, and before I get into the details, I know
we did the message at the start, but I do
just really want to emphasize that the details that we're
sharing today are extremely distressing.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
And part of being a good, responsible news broadcaster and
also a news listener for everyone listening and watching now
is to know when perhaps it's not the right day
to listen to this type of chat.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
So when we first heard about this was on Tuesday
morning when Victoria Police did a press conference with the
Victorian Health Department and also the Victorian government. And I
think when you have all three of those departments involved,
you know that something very serious has happened, and indeed
that was the case.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
So they revealed that.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
A twenty six year old childcare worker whose name is
Joshua Brown, had been charged with more than seventy offenses,
and like I said at the top, that includes child rape. Now,
those seventy charges relate to eight victims at a childcare
center in Point Cook, which is a suburb in Melbourne,
and the offenses allegedly occurred between April twenty twenty two
(02:28):
and January twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
So at the moment, are the charges that have been
laid only relating to one childcare center.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Yes, at this stage.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
However, you might have heard that this man did work
at twenty childcare centers across Victoria between twenty seventeen and
twenty twenty five, and he was working at a childcare
center right up until he was arrested in May this year.
But yes, in terms of the charges that have been laid,
police really emphasized that all of those current charges are
(03:01):
limited to the one childcare center, and Acting Commander Janet Stephenson,
who was the person who announced this on Tuesday, she
was clear in the press conference that they are not
suggesting that the accused has offended against children in all
of the twenty centers. However, saying all that saying that
currently is limited to the one childcare center, police did
(03:24):
say that they are investigating evidence of an allegation at
a second childcare center in Essendon, which is another suburb
in Melbourne.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So what do we know about these charges and has
there been a plea entered by the accused.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
At the stage, So, in terms of the chargers, they
include child rape, attempted child rape, they include sexual activity
in the presence of a child, and they also include
producing child abuse material.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Those are just some of the charges, but there are
many more.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
In terms of the victims of these alleged offenses, police
say that the victim were aged between five months and
two years old at the time of the alleged offenses.
And has he entered the plea yet, So in terms
of a plea, he hasn't, so we don't know whether
or not he will plead guilty or not guilty. What
the police did say is that he was cooperative with
(04:16):
police when they arrested him.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
There's some really horrific allegations. What do we know about
how these families found out about all of this?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah, I think before we look at how the families
found out, we kind of need to understand how police
found out.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
So we don't know the exact details.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
But what we do know is that police say that
this was a proactive investigation that didn't start through someone's complaint,
So this didn't start from a family coming forward or
from a child center coming forward with a complaint. Police
said that they were investigating these alleged crimes before they
actually even had a victim, and they said that it
took them some time to find a victim of how
(05:00):
the families found out. So this is the timeline that
Victoria Police laid out. They said that the man was
arrested on the twelfth of May, which is now two
months ago. In months, We then know that the families
of the eight victims were notified of the charges laid
against Brown last week. So the families of these victims
were notified of what allegedly happened last week, and the
(05:24):
police said that, as you can imagine, this was deeply
distressing for the families to hear, and they're now going
through this process of supporting these families, who all officials
have said is just all of the parents' worst nightmare.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
So we know there's eight victims here, but we also
know that there must be thousands of children who were
at childcare centers at the same time as the alleged defender.
What's being done to kind of deal with the wider
fallout to these allegations.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Yeah, So the Victorian Health Department, who like I said,
was also at this press conference on Tuesday, They said
it has contacted around two thousand and six hundred families
who had children who were attending the childcare centers at
the same time as the accused, and they sent a
letter to these families on Tuesday, so basically at the
(06:12):
same time as the public found out. The families who
didn't have alleged victims at this stage but did have
children at the childcare centers, we kind of found out
at the same time as them, because they were only
sent a letter on Tuesday informing them, and police were
clear in saying that if families haven't been contacted, then
(06:34):
it's highly unlikely that their child has been impacted. But
a detail they share the Victorian Health Department shared, which
they said is just another layer of how distressing this
story has been for, especially so many families in Victoria.
They said that one two hundred children have been recommended
as a precautionary measure to undergo testing for infectious diseases
(06:58):
due to potential.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Risk, which is quite confronting to you.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
Yes, I mean, I've never heard of something like that
happening before now. Police were asked, obviously by journalists about
the nature of the kind of infection they're talking about here,
and a journalist specifically asked if the man had been
tested for an SDI and if that's a kind of
infection they're talking about. Now, police and the Health Department
refuse to answer that question. They said that that is
(07:23):
personal health information and that they weren't going to share it,
especially to protect the privacy of the children and the
families involved here. But the Health Department did say that
the potential infection they are testing for can be treated
with antibiotics.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
So it's all of a sudden kind of turned into
quite a wide ranging not just investigation by police, but
also a health response as well. I want to talk
about the political response. Now, how has the Victorian government responded?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So, like I said, the press conference on Tuesday was
a joint one with Victoria's premier just into Alan there
and I think you could see that she was quite
shocked and shaken by these allegations. She said that she
is sickened by the allegations and that her heart breaks
for the families that are living every parent's worst nightmare.
And then on Wednesday, so yesterday, the government made some
(08:14):
announcements about how they will be responding to this, and
there were a few different things that they announced. So
one was that all families whose children have been referred
for precautionary testing, the one that I was just talking
about all of those families. So the oney two hundred
families will be eligible for a five thousand dollar payment. Interesting,
and that is designed to help families who might need
(08:36):
to take time off work or who might now need
to go to therapy all of the health and mental
health appointments that now might be required after they have
learned of this information. And then separate to that, in
terms of strengthening the safety of the childcare sector in Victoria,
one thing they did note is that childcare is actually
regulated in Australia at a national level, so it's not
(08:59):
done by state and territory, which education actually is, but
childcare is not. But despite that, the Premier said that
clearly action needs to be taken now, and so she
said that the government is commissioning an urgent review into
childcare safety in the state, which will be focused on
the immediate actions that they can take. And they said
(09:19):
that part of that will be looking into examining options
for installing CCTV in childcare centers, and she said the
review for that deadline is the fifteenth of August, so
in about two months.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
And I imagine that a lot of that sort of
short term response is of course to try and figure
out where a system failed young children, but also to
give families of children who continue to go to childcare
centers some extra comfort. And that's where I think it's
interesting to think about the industry as well, is that
(09:52):
this is an industry full of mostly brilliant people and
that the sector itself needs to kind of survive this.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
Yeah, the eight government said that they are also going
to be working on a Victorian register for childcare workers,
but the Victorian Premier also noted that a register of
childcare workers is also being looked at at a national level,
but they're going to do the Victorian level one first,
just as a first step.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Tell me what happens next in this case. We know
that the legal system, rightfully so doesn't move fast. So
this is going to go on for a while, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
So the man Joshua Brown is in jail at the
moment and he will remain there until this is dealt
with at the court. His next drew to appear at
the Melbourne Magistrates Court in mid September. So, like you said,
not exactly moving fast, but there are obviously reasons for that.
I think for now though, it's these thousands of families
(10:47):
who are dealing with the immediate effects of just finding
out this information. Like I said, the families of the
eight victims only found out last week, and then the
thousands of families who had children at these childcare centers
at the same time as him, they've only found out
this week. So there is a health response, there is
a police response, and there's a government response, all happening
(11:08):
right now.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
And just to read the rate, at the time of recording,
no plea has been entered by Joshua Brown. We work
in the system which presumes innocence until we know otherwise,
and the courts are now addressing his case. Billy, thank
you for taking us through that really difficult story. We
really appreciate it. Thank you, and thank you for joining
us on the daily ODS. This morning, I'm actually going
(11:29):
to read those helplines one more time. If you or
anyone you know needs some support, you can contact one
eight hundred respects on one eight hundred seven three seven
seven three to two. That's all we've got time for today.
We'll be back with some headlines later on.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
My name is Lily Madden and I'm a proud Arunda
Bunjelung Calcuttin woman from Gadighl country. The Daily oz acknowledges
that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the
Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and torrest
rate island and nations. We pay our respects to the
first peoples of these countries, both past and present.
Just a warning before we start. This podcast contains highly
distressing themes involving child sexual abuse. So if you're not
in the right headspace to listen to today's episode, maybe
skip this one and come back tomorrow. And if you
or anyone you know need support, you can contact one
eight hundred respect anytime on one eight hundred seven three
seven seven three to two.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Already and this is this is.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
The Daily This is the Daily os Oh now it
makes sense. Good morning, and welcome to the Daily Yours.
It's Thursday, the third of July. I'm Belief at Simon's.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
I'm Sam Kazlowski.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
This week we learned a twenty six year old childcare
worker has been charged with seventy offenses, including child rape
in Victoria. It has led to an immediate and state
wide response that has impacted thousands of families in Victoria
and an entire sector. So what exactly do we know
about the allegations against this man and how are officials responding.
(01:06):
We'll tell you what you need to know in today's podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Billy, this is going to be a difficult chat to
have because of the nature of this story. Before we
get into the details of what's happened. Give me a
sense of how this all originally unfolded.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Yeah, and before I get into the details, I know
we did the message at the start, but I do
just really want to emphasize that the details that we're
sharing today are extremely distressing.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
And part of being a good, responsible news broadcaster and
also a news listener for everyone listening and watching now
is to know when perhaps it's not the right day
to listen to this type of chat.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
So when we first heard about this was on Tuesday
morning when Victoria Police did a press conference with the
Victorian Health Department and also the Victorian government. And I
think when you have all three of those departments involved,
you know that something very serious has happened, and indeed
that was the case.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
So they revealed that.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
A twenty six year old childcare worker whose name is
Joshua Brown, had been charged with more than seventy offenses,
and like I said at the top, that includes child rape. Now,
those seventy charges relate to eight victims at a childcare
center in Point Cook, which is a suburb in Melbourne,
and the offenses allegedly occurred between April twenty twenty two
(02:28):
and January twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
So at the moment, are the charges that have been
laid only relating to one childcare center.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Yes, at this stage.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
However, you might have heard that this man did work
at twenty childcare centers across Victoria between twenty seventeen and
twenty twenty five, and he was working at a childcare
center right up until he was arrested in May this year.
But yes, in terms of the charges that have been laid,
police really emphasized that all of those current charges are
(03:01):
limited to the one childcare center, and Acting Commander Janet Stephenson,
who was the person who announced this on Tuesday, she
was clear in the press conference that they are not
suggesting that the accused has offended against children in all
of the twenty centers. However, saying all that saying that
currently is limited to the one childcare center, police did
(03:24):
say that they are investigating evidence of an allegation at
a second childcare center in Essendon, which is another suburb
in Melbourne.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So what do we know about these charges and has
there been a plea entered by the accused.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
At the stage, So, in terms of the chargers, they
include child rape, attempted child rape, they include sexual activity
in the presence of a child, and they also include
producing child abuse material.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Those are just some of the charges, but there are
many more.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
In terms of the victims of these alleged offenses, police
say that the victim were aged between five months and
two years old at the time of the alleged offenses.
And has he entered the plea yet, So in terms
of a plea, he hasn't, so we don't know whether
or not he will plead guilty or not guilty. What
the police did say is that he was cooperative with
(04:16):
police when they arrested him.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
There's some really horrific allegations. What do we know about
how these families found out about all of this?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah, I think before we look at how the families
found out, we kind of need to understand how police
found out.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
So we don't know the exact details.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
But what we do know is that police say that
this was a proactive investigation that didn't start through someone's complaint,
So this didn't start from a family coming forward or
from a child center coming forward with a complaint. Police
said that they were investigating these alleged crimes before they
actually even had a victim, and they said that it
took them some time to find a victim of how
(05:00):
the families found out. So this is the timeline that
Victoria Police laid out. They said that the man was
arrested on the twelfth of May, which is now two
months ago. In months, We then know that the families
of the eight victims were notified of the charges laid
against Brown last week. So the families of these victims
were notified of what allegedly happened last week, and the
(05:24):
police said that, as you can imagine, this was deeply
distressing for the families to hear, and they're now going
through this process of supporting these families, who all officials
have said is just all of the parents' worst nightmare.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
So we know there's eight victims here, but we also
know that there must be thousands of children who were
at childcare centers at the same time as the alleged defender.
What's being done to kind of deal with the wider
fallout to these allegations.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
Yeah, So the Victorian Health Department, who like I said,
was also at this press conference on Tuesday, They said
it has contacted around two thousand and six hundred families
who had children who were attending the childcare centers at
the same time as the accused, and they sent a
letter to these families on Tuesday, so basically at the
(06:12):
same time as the public found out. The families who
didn't have alleged victims at this stage but did have
children at the childcare centers, we kind of found out
at the same time as them, because they were only
sent a letter on Tuesday informing them, and police were
clear in saying that if families haven't been contacted, then
(06:34):
it's highly unlikely that their child has been impacted. But
a detail they share the Victorian Health Department shared, which
they said is just another layer of how distressing this
story has been for, especially so many families in Victoria.
They said that one two hundred children have been recommended
as a precautionary measure to undergo testing for infectious diseases
(06:58):
due to potential.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Risk, which is quite confronting to you.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
Yes, I mean, I've never heard of something like that
happening before now. Police were asked, obviously by journalists about
the nature of the kind of infection they're talking about here,
and a journalist specifically asked if the man had been
tested for an SDI and if that's a kind of
infection they're talking about. Now, police and the Health Department
refuse to answer that question. They said that that is
(07:23):
personal health information and that they weren't going to share it,
especially to protect the privacy of the children and the
families involved here. But the Health Department did say that
the potential infection they are testing for can be treated
with antibiotics.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
So it's all of a sudden kind of turned into
quite a wide ranging not just investigation by police, but
also a health response as well. I want to talk
about the political response. Now, how has the Victorian government responded?
Speaker 3 (07:51):
So, like I said, the press conference on Tuesday was
a joint one with Victoria's premier just into Alan there
and I think you could see that she was quite
shocked and shaken by these allegations. She said that she
is sickened by the allegations and that her heart breaks
for the families that are living every parent's worst nightmare.
And then on Wednesday, so yesterday, the government made some
(08:14):
announcements about how they will be responding to this, and
there were a few different things that they announced. So
one was that all families whose children have been referred
for precautionary testing, the one that I was just talking
about all of those families. So the oney two hundred
families will be eligible for a five thousand dollar payment. Interesting,
and that is designed to help families who might need
(08:36):
to take time off work or who might now need
to go to therapy all of the health and mental
health appointments that now might be required after they have
learned of this information. And then separate to that, in
terms of strengthening the safety of the childcare sector in Victoria,
one thing they did note is that childcare is actually
regulated in Australia at a national level, so it's not
(08:59):
done by state and territory, which education actually is, but
childcare is not. But despite that, the Premier said that
clearly action needs to be taken now, and so she
said that the government is commissioning an urgent review into
childcare safety in the state, which will be focused on
the immediate actions that they can take. And they said
(09:19):
that part of that will be looking into examining options
for installing CCTV in childcare centers, and she said the
review for that deadline is the fifteenth of August, so
in about two months.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
And I imagine that a lot of that sort of
short term response is of course to try and figure
out where a system failed young children, but also to
give families of children who continue to go to childcare
centers some extra comfort. And that's where I think it's
interesting to think about the industry as well, is that
(09:52):
this is an industry full of mostly brilliant people and
that the sector itself needs to kind of survive this.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
Yeah, the eight government said that they are also going
to be working on a Victorian register for childcare workers,
but the Victorian Premier also noted that a register of
childcare workers is also being looked at at a national level,
but they're going to do the Victorian level one first,
just as a first step.
Speaker 1 (10:17):
Tell me what happens next in this case. We know
that the legal system, rightfully so doesn't move fast. So
this is going to go on for a while, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:26):
So the man Joshua Brown is in jail at the
moment and he will remain there until this is dealt
with at the court. His next drew to appear at
the Melbourne Magistrates Court in mid September. So, like you said,
not exactly moving fast, but there are obviously reasons for that.
I think for now though, it's these thousands of families
(10:47):
who are dealing with the immediate effects of just finding
out this information. Like I said, the families of the
eight victims only found out last week, and then the
thousands of families who had children at these childcare centers
at the same time as him, they've only found out
this week. So there is a health response, there is
a police response, and there's a government response, all happening
(11:08):
right now.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
And just to read the rate, at the time of recording,
no plea has been entered by Joshua Brown. We work
in the system which presumes innocence until we know otherwise,
and the courts are now addressing his case. Billy, thank
you for taking us through that really difficult story. We
really appreciate it. Thank you, and thank you for joining
us on the daily ODS. This morning, I'm actually going
(11:29):
to read those helplines one more time. If you or
anyone you know needs some support, you can contact one
eight hundred respects on one eight hundred seven three seven
seven three to two. That's all we've got time for today.
We'll be back with some headlines later on.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
My name is Lily Madden and I'm a proud Arunda
Bunjelung Calcuttin woman from Gadighl country. The Daily oz acknowledges
that this podcast is recorded on the lands of the
Gadighl people and pays respect to all Aboriginal and torrest
rate island and nations. We pay our respects to the
first peoples of these countries, both past and present.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
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.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Crime Junkie
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.