December 1, 2025 • 58 mins
When stun grenades exploded in Felicia Djamirze’s bedroom during a police raid, she thought she was going to die. The beauty queen was covered in third-degree burns, had gunpowder in her eyes and almost lost her hand. Felicia tells Gary Jubelin how she became a convicted drug trafficker who faced years in prison, why she has “f**k the police” tattooed to her in Russian, how she’s fighting to break intergenerational crime and why she’s advocating for prison reform.
Learn more about Felicia Djamirze's book Accessory (with Erin O’Dywer) (Affirm Press) here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Detective see aside of life. The average person has never
exposed her I spent thirty four years as a cop.
For twenty five of those years I was catching killers.
That's what I did for a living. I was a
homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,
I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
(00:23):
The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories
from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some
of the content and language might be confronting. That's because
no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.
Join me now as I take you into this world.
(00:46):
In part two of my chat with former Miss Australia
Felucia Jarmise, she tells us about how and why she
fell in love with another bad guy, how that went
terribly wrong, and her dramatic tactical arrest that almost resulted
in the hand amputated. She talked about the reflections on
the life of crime, why she has a tattoo, fucked
the police, why and how she decided to live a
(01:08):
more stable life and what she's doing now giving back
to society. It's an interesting story. Have a listen, Felicia Jamize,
welcome back to I Catch Killers. Did I've pronounced that right?
I've been practicing all morning.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
You've pronounced it better than a lot of people. I
remember when I was in the Supreme Court, they were
pronouncing it, Jamirez, and I thought, well, don't make me
sound like I'm from the Mexican cuchel. Are you making
me sound guilty before I've even you know.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
I got a please?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
So no is how you pronounce it? But it's pretty good.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Okay, Wellrez, I've been practicing. Okay. Part one. We've got
a good understanding of your your life, your upbringing. We
touched on the beauty pageants and lifestyle lifestyle there, your
relationship and your journey into the OMCG gang scene been al.
(02:05):
Did we settle on an old lady or partner or
what was it?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Keep it old lady.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Old lady a member of a gang that ended in
tears And I'm making light of a situation, but yeah,
it's a relationship breakup and Cam's addiction became too much
and his personality changed and they started to be violence,
domestic violence and that and you've walked away from it.
(02:34):
So that's a point we're at. Now, what age were
you at that stage.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I would have been early twenties at that stage, early
to mid twenties, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Did after that experience, did you think, Okay, maybe my
lifestyle choices or the person I was with, maybe I
should step away from that.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yes? I did, But in regards to that, like I
said before, with Jean, it was a matter of finding
somebody that was able to protect me, that I could
feel safe with. So looking back, yeah, it was like
out of the frying pan and into the fire basically,
But in that time in my life I didn't see
(03:15):
it as such. I was just trying to survive.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
Okay, okay, and that was having someone that could stand
up to the wrath of an angry ex partner. That's
a bikey that comeing in and we met Deane this
morning and your mum who have turned up, which is
always always a good sign. That turned up for the podcast.
But you did delve into the world of dating STRAIGHTI
(03:39):
one eighties. I want you to be kind of STRAIGHTI
one eighties. Don't just shatter their shatter their confidence. But
why didn't that work for you after what you've been through.
Maybe I'll just give I think you mentioned like an accountant.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Ye, that was just a really stereotypical general lives of
the picture.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
They get a get a tough time. Did you try that?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
I did, correct. So Dean and I had a period
of time where we were separated because he was given
ten years in prison, and we decided to step both
step away from the relationship and for the sake of
remaining friends and being civil to each other, because if
we tried to maintain an unmaintainable relationship, we would have
(04:23):
just ended up hating and resenting each other and we
would have lost our friendship. So we decided to remain friends.
We were still in contact while he was in prison,
and I helped him as much as I could from
the outside, and still visited, et cetera, folk on the phone,
sent letters, all the stuff that you kind of do,
but without the romantic aspect of that. And also too,
(04:46):
I needed an opportunity to be able to move on
with my life and see if I had a future
with somebody else, and I gave it a really good
red hot goer kind of you know, trying to date
people that had lives very well outside of the experience
of the life that I have had, and nothing against
them or anyone, but it just did not work out.
(05:08):
Our world views two different. The things the way that
we see things are too different. There was a lot
of issues around other people's families not being able to
accept my past. That was quite taboo. So I was
discriminated against him in that way. Oh you know, my
parents would probably not accept that this is the past
that you've had. And I always think my past makes
(05:29):
me who I am, good and bad. It shaped how
I am as a person, how I am as a therapist,
the empathy that I have. So there's a lot of
good things that have come out of some really bad things.
And if people kind of appreciate the good things that
have come from those bad things, that don't belong in
my life anyway. So there was a lot of that
that that kind of went on, so that I.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Did give it a go, you know, Okay, I said,
I just said to ask all I did. Okay, Well,
wind that back because we're a little bit there of
sequence from it. We've got you've broken up, we've cam
you've now got in the relationship with Dean. Dean's just
outside the door. So just think what you're going to
say here, describe doing to me.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Charismatic, good sense of humor, quite a quite a character
like you notice him when he comes into the room
because his personality is quite big, so is his gold chain.
So very eccentric, vivacious character. Likes to talk a lot,
I likes to joke a lot. We get along very well,
very good friends.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Yeah. And where had you known before?
Speaker 2 (06:32):
From the scene as you would call it, Yeah, the scene, Yeah,
just from the scene. And what had happened was I
had heard that Cam was cheating on me with a
working girl from Melbourne, and I thought, oh, you know,
how am I going to get on Facebook to see
(06:52):
what's going Back then, there was no Instagram. It was
MySpace and Facebook, where Facebook was kind of getting popular. Anyway,
Jean me go on his account to look up there.
I know, I was doing a bit of a detective gary.
So I went on Dean's Facebook and I had a
look and I saw that he had tagged or she'd
(07:13):
taked him and they were shopping in Melbourne, and that
kind of confirmed it for me. And then Dean and
I just kind of kept in contact as friends from them,
and then a lot of things happened in between in
regards to you know, Cam and I and that situation
and things escalated and all the rest of it. But
that's how we kind of started talking, right, not on
(07:34):
a romantic sense, we were just friends and he was
helping me to well.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It tells me a little bit about Dean that he
get involved in that type of stuff, like helping you
out if you're in conflict with your partner. It's a bikey.
So what was he into at the time or what
did you believe he was into it at the time.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
I didn't ask, so you know, you don't ask you
you don't know. I could assume, but it's really wasn't
any of my business that point in time.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
But that there was a lot of money around yeah yeah, yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
That was normal, right, That was normal in that scene in.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
The world that you knew, But like it was nothing
to go out and shop at the yeah, the top places,
come out with the handbags and together. Yeah yeah, yeah,
and that was that was something you're attracted to.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
I would say, more than novelty and the feeling of
it as opposed to the items themselves. I'm not a
materialistic person, but I think it was the thrill and
the fun and the head of being able to do
whatever you want, by whatever you want, go wherever you want.
It's quite an intoxicating feeling or emotion. It's not actually
(08:47):
the items themselves, it's the I can.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Do whatever I want, so living the highlighte.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Yeah, and when you grow up in you know, a
situation where you experience some disadvantage, it is a novelty
to be able to go and spend a quarter of
a million dollars in lou Verton. That's a big novelty.
That would be a novelty for anyone. And I'm not
defending those decisions. Yeah, it was just the hit, the thrill,
(09:13):
the dopamine hit.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
So you're getting that dopamine hit. It's living that lifestyle.
I think in the book you talk about, Yeah, the
life was we'd be eating at the flash restaurants, seafood
restaurants and not doing much during the day, do a
line of cake and go out and get on it,
and yeah, that was that was a lifestyle.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Of Actually, my friend dj Emma Salmon has put together
a track where I talk about lines from the book,
and she's done a track and it says exactly those words,
you go out, sleep, repeat.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Yeah, well pretty much pretty much. Was the lifestyle did
you have living that lifestyle? Like I would be concerned
because I've said I'm normally with one coming in the door,
but at any stage it could end or was that
part I'm just trying to get into the mindset. Is
that part of the excitement, the adrenaline that this is good,
(10:09):
We're getting away with something here, but it could end dramatically.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
I always accepted that there was a risk that we
would be arrested, and that was something I fully considered,
and I just felt that the latter was riskier in
regards to not having Deen around and being able to
protect me in those initial stages, and then got to
the point where you know, I was into deep and
(10:37):
we had a really good relationship. Yes, all these things
were going on around us, but we had a really
really good relationship, and I just thought, whatever happens, happens,
But never did I expect for the arrest to happen
in the fashion that had happened.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Well, we'll talk about that because that was dramatic, but
just with the lifestyle, So you at this stage and
you Dean was dealing in drugs. Yes, and just because
you've seen your father, and I've got to ask the
question with addiction, and you would have seen in the
lifestyle that you lived the addiction even with camp, how
(11:14):
did you sort of how did you process that in
your mind that, Okay, we're making money from this. What's
your attitude to.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
That in regards to that, I did think too deeply
into it at the time. On reflection, now, yes, I
can think about it in a very different way, which
I do, but at the time, no, I didn't give
too much thought to it. And I think that speaks
to the fact that a lot of the times people
who are victimized become perpetrators, if we want to use
(11:43):
that word. So both can go hand in hand in
different points of your life. So you will see that
were a lot of women who are actually in prison
victim survivors of horrific abuse, whether that be as children
or as adults, and vice versa. And that even hap
with the men. We spoke about that earlier, about the
abuse that goes on. That's right. So a lot of
(12:06):
the time people who are victimized as children or even
as adults can sometimes then become the perpetrator or framed
as the perpetrator. Then what happens is people ask questions like,
growing up like that, how do you That's very hard
to compartmentalize. It's very different to mentalized. So it's very
(12:27):
complicated because it's a demand and supply business. As you know,
if people didn't seek out drugs and alcohol, then there
would be no market for it. And I'm not defending
it or saying that there should be a market for it,
but hey, why don't we look at the things that
we can do for harm reduction? So more places in
rehabilitation facilities, better access to mental health care, better living standards,
(12:53):
lower the cost of living, improve the social detriments that
cause addiction to begin with, and then there not going
to be such a demand for the supply.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
So the supply and demand, and I'm just thinking how
you're processing in your mind, Well, it's going to be there.
There's the demand.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
We got arrested and there was someone waiting right there
to take over that exact same patch. So the war
on drugs needs to be more than just arresting a
drug lord. It needs to really look at the policies
we have in place in Australia and the social detriments
that lead to offending from a young age, even before
(13:33):
people are born, they've got a risk of being offenders
so to speak, or committing a crime because of the
social detriments and the environment that they're growing up in
or that they're living in. So what has to happen
is we need to look at all of those things
and stop using prisons as a solution for a myriad
of social problems. A lot of people in jail should
(13:54):
not be in jail.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
The war on drugs, so called war on drugs is
not working. But yeah, I'm just trying to get a
sense of I see you now and you're a person
that comes across as a good person at that time,
living the life just how you reconcile. But it's almost like,
well if we don't do it, someone else is going
to do it. And is that what was crossing your
(14:16):
mind at the time.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Well, it was normalized to me because of my life
with Cam right, So that was the introductory period or
stage you could say, where it became normalized when it's
something that should never be normalized. And then also my
upbringing with Yuri and Uri doubled in quite a lot
of illegal dealing, so it wasn't that frowned upon in
(14:38):
my family sisters.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Okay, that's getting getting closer to the understanding of it.
Uri was dealing in a couple of things. I wondered
why he flew that cargo, playing of a way around
the world the quickest, given this book.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Of records, and you know too, like it was normalized
for Dian as well because he was selling drugs from
the age of thirteen to look after his siblings, because
his mother had an addiction to heroin and his father
was in prison. So that might give people a little
bit more of an understanding of the whole victim perp
(15:13):
make that happens.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I just want to delve in there so people do
get an understanding. And when you're explaining the way there,
that makes a little bit a little bit clearer. Getting
getting back to the lifestyle. You plan to get married
in Singapore and once a Marina Marina. I stayed there
(15:34):
only a couple of nights, and it's most expensive place
I ever stayed in my life. That's like the twin
Towers with the rooftop four. I gotta say I didn't
think it was that good, but for the price, but
you were going to have you won't be getting.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
A discount next time you got. That wasn't a great plug.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Gary probably get sued by it. That'd be interesting. But
well it is great the roof top bar. But you
had the book everything and it was Yeah, you just
didn't have the very different too. It was different. You
thought paying that money everything was going to be turned
on for you, but it wasn't. You had the book
and you couldn't get it was a good Japanese restaurant
(16:14):
downstairs on the ground level. There was.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
A whole different level of wealth in Singapore and it's
a very Yes, it's an international city and it's very
one of the most expensive.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Yeah. Yeah, well, just getting off my wings about stopover
in Singapore. That cost me a fortune. You're going to
have your wedding there, and that's why I bought the
bought up because that would have been an extraordinary cost
to high that place out.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So lucky we had only put a deposit and not
the full amount.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
That to my way, that gives me an understanding of
the lifestyle that you would have been living at the time. Yeah,
so there was plenty of plenty of cash.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Yeah, if anyone's seen what's that movie where they get
married at Marina Basin, Crazy Rich Asians or something.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
Oh, I didn't realize it was movie about on that
The pool is nice, you get there early enough, get
a suit. Okay, it went bad, and it went very bad.
And I'm not making either this. We might have a laugh,
because sometimes in darkness you've got a laugh at things.
But this world that you were living or came crashing
(17:24):
down one morning, can you talk me through it? And
I apologize for making any joke about it, because I
know how scary and horrific it would have been for
you and the injuries that you sustained. Can you tell
us what happened.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I think that with humor it's a really really good
way to cope through dark and hard times. And there's
that really old saying if you don't laugh, you'll cry.
Even when I was laying in hospital in the burns,
you know, I was cracking jokes with the nurses and
they were like, we don't understand how you're kind of
(17:58):
maintaining some kind of positivity or upbeatness when you're in
such a state and in so much pain. So I
think sometimes people when I laugh or when I smile,
they perceive it as I'm not taking the situation seriously. Yeah,
I've been in some serious situations and I do take
it very seriously and I'm not making light of it.
(18:19):
But I do use humor to get through difficult things,
and I think a lot of people do that as well.
It's not that I think that the what's happened is
not serious, and I haven't taken accountability for my role
in it. I have, but just wanted to kind of.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
I'm glad you clarified that because it can be misunderstood.
And I used humor to get through all the years
in homicide and that you really you have to see
some brightness in the darkness and if that's in the
form of humour. But I'm glad you explain that, explain that,
because I don't want people listening to the conversation and
think it's just flippant and.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
It can be very misconscrued. As you know, she's not
taking this seriously, except but I am. And I do
a lot of serious work, and I sit with people
who have been through horrific traumatic experiences and I work
with them on their mental health. A lot of the
things I do are really really heavy and really serious,
so there's nothing flippant about it. It's just my personality
(19:17):
and I like to have a laugh and I've got
a good sense of humor. I like to think. Anyway,
back to the raid. Back to the raid, what had
happened was there was a no knock raid on our
home in Harvey Bay. And at first I thought that
it was a home invasion because there was some conflict
(19:38):
going on at the time with you know, some other people.
And I thought, oh, they're game. They've come to the house,
you know, home invasion. I thought, No, they've got balls.
I kind of thought, you know, but on them. But
I felt a very very hot, burning sensation and a
lot of pain on my face on my hand, and
I thought, okay, I've been shot in the face and you're.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
In better sleep at this time. Correct.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah. And the first g came in, and that was
a death tech grenade because it needed to be a
grenade apparently that could come through the window or through
the building. Came through and it hit me and I thought,
I didn't think in a million years it was a
grenade or that it was the police. I thought that
if it was going to be the police. They would
(20:19):
have just knocked the door down and shown me the
warrant rights. A little bit shot on the face, and
I just need to lay here and pretend to be
dead for a little bit and figure out what I'm going.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
To process going through your mind at the time.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yeah, I was laying in bed and I thought, fuck,
I've been shot, and I was gonna lay here for
a bit. I'm still alive, but I don't know how
long I'm going to be a live for, so I'll
just ride it out a bit and try and see
what's cracking. Have they left, are they still here? You know,
do they think I'm dead? I was kind of, you know,
thinking through all of these things quite quickly, and then
another grenade came through. I didn't know it was a
(20:54):
grenade yet. And then I heard police on this like
loud speaker that it was them, and I could hear
the dogs, and I could hear, you know, certain things
going on. That all led me to believe that there
was a raid. So then I started to crawl towards
the walking robe. The direction of the walk in robe.
I was quite disorientated, as you would know with you know,
(21:17):
those devices, they disorientated.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
They're often called the flash flash bang flash bangs.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yes, the ones that came after were flash bangs.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
Yeah yeah, just a lot of noise, a lot of
bright lights, and just distracting and disorientating. So it creates
a lot of confusion.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Oh yeah, yeah, Well they're designed for that. So, but
they're designed not to come in contact as you would
know with human skin or with furnishings fabrics. A big
fire risk and obviously big risk of injury to anyone
that comes in physical contact with them. And we saw
what happened with the lint siege with certain you know.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
That I saw the link cafe siege where the situation
was resolved when play moved in. The loud noises and
the flashes and the banks. That is the type of
thing that we're talking to me, yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
So what had happened was I tried to get shelter.
In the process of crawling towards the walking row, another
one had hit my elbow here and my elbow was
you know, hanging out, and it was it was blown
out basically, and then I continued on to crawl to
you know, get in between the space where the wardrobe
(22:27):
is and you know the end of the bed and
I slid down, and then a tactical officer stepped through
the bay window and was, you know, holding a gun
to me and saying, you know, put your hands up.
But it was very difficult for me to put my
hands up because this hand was mincemeat and this elbow
was blown out. So I was essentially you know, dragging
my arms up as best I caught at that point
(22:50):
and asking for an ambulance to be called scary, Yeah,
I thought, I'm definitely thought. I thought a lot of
I thought I'm going to have to have my hand
amputated because it just looked.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Like the injury injury that bad, like a mangle mess
was I've seen patoise, but it would have been after
the treatment.
Speaker 2 (23:11):
That was weeks after the treatment. Those photos that everyone sees.
What it happened was we had photos of the injury
when it first happened, when I came into the recess room,
but the injury in the acute phases was horrific, like
it didn't look salvageable. At that point, I had come
(23:31):
to terms with the fact that if I wanted to live,
my hand had to go.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
I think there was a reference where the surgeon said
that you might might be losing your hand.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Yeah, on two occasions.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
Yeah yeah, okay, Well I woke up and I.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Had a hand and I thought, this is great.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Yes, that's what that's what you want to see. What
were what were the police arresting you for at the time.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Trafficking, production and supply of methyl amphetamine.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
So they had had a search warrant for the house,
tactical search warrant they did, but.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
I wasn't arrested until I was in hospital. They came
after the fact, so I was arrested after and I
was under arrest in hospital. I wasn't arrested at the house.
And what about Dean, Well, Dean had a really long
list of charges. I couldn't name them all this There
was a lot in the initial stages, as you know,
(24:25):
there's a lot of charges, and then towards the end.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
So that would have gone through the place search warrant. Yes,
what did they sees?
Speaker 2 (24:33):
They had cameras in our house in most of the
rooms in our house, recording devices, cameras, trackers on vehicles.
They had diggers digging up our property. It was diggers,
and they also had military tanks, those police tanks on
(24:54):
our property as well. I don't know what they were
doing with all of those things because I was cuted
off to hospital all and they also had the dog
squad and everything was pulled out and full tactical execution
of yes, yeah, okay, how long were you in the hospital?
For months? It's in the burns unit for months and months.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
I'm saying, fhato's your face? It was burnt?
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Yeah, my eyes were burned, had third degree burns on
my eyes. My corniers were burnt. I've still got gunpowder
in my corn eers and I've got gunpowder in my
face as well. It's it's a little bit look, I'm
going to say dark comical. When I go to the
UDICI and I have like a facial and the one
time the lady was like pushing on these gunpowder particles
(25:42):
and I said, oh, you're not going to get that out.
That's not that's not a blackhead or a port gunpal,
that's gunpowder, and she's what, So, Yeah, I've still got
gunpowder in my I've got gunpowder all in my elbow. Yeah,
so it's like discolored and then all through my head.
And I've also got gunpowder. It kind of looks like
(26:02):
speckled tattoo, right, kind of black dots. You'd have to
come up quite close to to see it. So, and
I've had a lot of surgeries as well.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Okay, so you're in there for months you were charged?
How how long before it went to court or what
happened when you went to court.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
I was on bail for two years and then I
was on conditions for three, so five years all up.
I was kind of had my freedom at the liberty
of others, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah, reporting conditions or don't leave the state, or don't
associate with.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
I can't leave the country. Haveing been drug tested randomly?
Things like that, So i'd I had quite a few conditions.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Your first charge is that your first criminal charge?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Okay, Dean did he he wouldn't have got bail. I
wouldn't imagine, No, he didn't. Definitely went inside. Yeah, did
you contest the charges?
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Two of the charges were dropped towards sentencing. The charge
that I puled guilty to is supplying. So the reason
why I pled guilty to supply was because in Queensland law,
you may or may not be charged with the same
charge as the principle if you're involved in any component
or any part of the supply. So my part in
(27:25):
the supply that was recorded on the camera was that
I tested a set of scales that Dean allegedly used
later to weigh drugs and then supply those drugs to
somebody else.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Right, So that was your direct involvement in the spydrus. Yes,
so you're not saying you didn't know he was dealing drugs.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
I'm not going to deny that.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Of course, you're saying that you just weren't involved in
that was his thinking pretty much.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
But in saying that, the law is open to interpretation.
So you know, it was a bit of a difficult
situation to navigate.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
You So you're in hospital for months, The recovery must
have taken a hell of a long time. If you're
in the hospital for months, terrific.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
Recovery was terrific, and I put a lot of well,
I put a lot of pressure on myself just in
regards to everyday life, right, But I put a lot
of pressure on myself to get better and to do
the best that I could with what I had. I
was happy and grateful to be alive, So that was
the number one thing, and I thought, I'll deal with
(28:32):
the charges later. And another thing that played heavily on
my mind in that time that even though yes, I
was burnt and I had charges, and I was quite
unwell from the burns, psychologically and physically unwell, the priority
was more so looking after yu ear because Uri was
dying as a family, the priority was making sure that
his last you know months were good, Yeah, good months.
(28:55):
So there was that playing on my mind, and I
was happy that I was on bail. I felt very
privileged that I was on bail, but it afforded me
the opportunity to be able to bury my father. And
I thought after I buried Uri, like I carried him
through his illness, I wanted to carry him to his grave.
So after I buried Yuri, I was fully prepared to
(29:17):
take whatever consequences come my way after that. I walked
into the Supreme Court that day, fully prepared to cop
any consequences that came towards me after I buried him.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Yeah, I would imagine you had an expectation or a
belief that you might have been going to jail or
custodial sentence.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
Most definitely, I left the house that morning, knowing that
it could be you know, quite a few years before
I would come back to that home.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
Well, the burns. You had burns on your face. It
looks like it's all held up, very lucky. How was that?
Because it's confronting when you've been recognized for your looks
and then burn on your face and your hair. I
lost all my So that's a tap humor. I dealt
with losing hair, but the burn on your face, that
(30:07):
must have been confronting for you, along with all the
other injuries, obviously potentially losing your hand when appearance has
been something they've traded on for a long time. How
did that impact on you? Mentally?
Speaker 2 (30:19):
There was a perspective shift in the sense that I
was more grateful to be alive and on bail and
be able to spend time with my father when he
was dying, as opposed to being too worried about my legs.
I did everything that I could, and that was advised
by the surgeons, and I did everything I could to
look after myself. I think I had an expectation that
(30:41):
I would get back to exactly how I was before,
but I soon realized that that is not possible and
anyone that's been through a trauma or an injury mentally
or physically or both knows that you were forever changed
by that, and there's a loss of identity with former
self and you have to build a new one with
your newfound identity. So I needed to kind of grieve
(31:04):
the old me and learn a new me and appreciate
the good things that came out of that, so appreciation
for my freedom, family, a high level of empathy, and
a higher level of respect for human life as well
after watching my father die. So I was looking at
the world from a completely different viewpoint after having those injuries,
(31:26):
and I did my best to get back to as
good as I could. And to be honest, what my
motivating factor also was a little bit of a fuck
you to the police. You know, when they saw me
and I was all, you know, the way I was looking,
they probably thought she's finished. So it kind of drove
me to say, no, actually, I'm going to turn this
around and I'm going to flip the script on this
(31:48):
situation and I'm gonna, you know, get to the best
point that I could. But I remember looking down at
my hand at one point when it still going through
a lot of surgeries, and it was not looking great
at all. I remember feeling like that body part didn't
belong to me. I'd look down at my hand and
(32:10):
I would see my hand as not belonging to me,
and that was a very, very bizarre thing to experience.
But I don't feel like that anymore. But I imagine
that a lot of people go through that when they
have injuries, So that was very bizarre for me.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
It's like losing the hand or losing any body part, burns,
the horrendous injuries, so I could imagine that it would
be traumatic. But it's interesting you said that it's sort
of change your view on life and you realize what's
important important and what you want to do with your life.
And I do understand the motive of well, you know,
(32:48):
fuck you, you've done this to me. Look I'm still standing.
I get that. Do you think it changed you for
the better? Do you think you're a better person.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
I've always been a good person, right. I just think
that it has led me in a direction that I
never thought that I would. I never thought i'd be
doing what I'm doing right.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Funny the journey life can take you on this.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Yeah, I try to not look at it in that
way that it did me good or bad. Of course,
I'd rather not have gone through the experiences that I
went through, because no human psychologically ever wants to go
through pain. We all go through life trying to avoid pain, right,
So I would never kind of choose that, so to speak,
although I did make choices that led to that. But
(33:34):
now I don't really like to look at it that way.
I like to look at it with no regrets, in
respect that everything I've been through has taught me a
massive lesson, and then those lessons enable me to move
forward in my life in a different way and help
other people.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
It's interesting because this is a journey and I am
not downplaying what happened to you would have been horrific.
And then oh they got me good.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
I was laying there in the hospital. I boys, you
you got me fucking good this time?
Speaker 1 (34:03):
Did you didn't get sense to prison? What you get
a corrections order? What? What happened there? What was there?
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Three years to be served in the community. And a
big part of that was the fact that I had
done a degree while I was on bail. Yeah, so
here I am one hand doing a degree. Here is
you know, they're having chemo dying. I'm worried about you know,
I'm probably going to go to prison. Am I going
(34:33):
to get to bury him?
Speaker 1 (34:34):
You know?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was all happening in my household at that time. Chaotic, yes,
very very chaotic, Always something going on, you know. And
when I went to court, you know, the Supreme Court
judge said, you know, you're obviously a high achiever. He
looked at my record of education, he looked at even
the pageants that I had done and won, and the
(34:56):
things that I'd been involved in quite a lot of
charity work prior as well. He looked at all of
those things and they worked in my favor. And also
the fact that I had been so severely injured and
I was still undergoing quite a lot of treatment, a
lot of operations, and a lot of different things to
rehabilitate myself physically and mentally after that trauma. And I
(35:17):
think all of those aspects led to me getting the
community corrections order. But also in respect to that, I
think it's the way that I presented, the way that
I look, and the color of my skin, and the
privilege that I had, So I think a lot of
people are not afforded the opportunity that I was afforded present.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
It's interesting you say that then you would have had
your family supporting you. You've had the history of demonstrating
you could function in society, You've done your studies. Maybe yeah,
the court's got it right for you. But what you're
saying is that there's other people that fall through the
gaps in your situation. Your looks, background and everything played
(35:58):
the part in You're not going inside correct.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
And I think a thought needs to be put to
that topic because a lot of people are sent to
prison based on external factors that have nothing to do
with the offending. So you know, race does come into it,
level of education comes into it. There's a lot of
different things that come into how people present, and a
(36:25):
lot of those things, if not all of those things,
that's not within the realm of control of that person.
For example, if I had a dark skin, which I
could have been born dark skin because my mother's background
is indigenous. Actually in the book, it touches on URI's
family thought that I was going to be born dark.
(36:45):
So if I had been born with a different color skin,
would I have went to prison? I would say there
was a much higher chance I would have been going
to prison if I wasn't blonde and green eyed with
fair skin. So race does come into it and when
it comes to sentencing, and that's something we need to
kind of turn our minds to as well.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
You know, that's a fair court. Like people could say, no,
that doesn't come into play.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
But yeah, oh yeah, it definitely does.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Statistics we dictate otherwise, Ok, court matter, you didn't get
you didn't get a custodial sentence, but three year corrections order.
So what did that involve? What did you have to
do with that?
Speaker 2 (37:25):
I just had to be on best behavior. But that
wasn't a problem, to be honest, it wasn't.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
It was because if you breach that, you then end
up going inside.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
Correct And it did give me some time to reflect.
I had a lot of anger issues prior, and I
think that was dealing with the grief of growing up
in a household with a parent who has an addiction.
Because when you have a parent who has an addiction,
your self esteem is not great because you view yourself
(38:01):
as not having much worth. If they're choosing drugs or
alcohol over you, you think, what am I not working?
Speaker 1 (38:09):
That's a hard a drink hard thing, isn't it like?
But if you love me, why are you drinking? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:16):
They can't possibly love me if they're.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
Choosing so you're self worth yourself worth.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, And so I had a lot of anger problems
and I had a lot of self work to do,
and I did that while I was on conditions because
there was no distractions. Wasn't going out, I wasn't drinking,
I wasn't doing coke, I wasn't doing all of these
things that I was doing in the past to distract
(38:41):
myself from having to deal with these things. So I
had to sit with myself and I had to deal
with all of these things. So that's kind of where
the shift happened. And during that period dealt with a
lot of things.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Hey guys, it's Gary Jubilan here. Want they get more
out of ye catch Killers? Then you should head over
to our new video feed on Spotify where you can
watch every episode of I Catch Killers. Just search for
I Catch Killers video in your Spotify app and start
watching today with Dean he was inside you touched on
(39:15):
earlier and said you made a conscious decision that go separate.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Conscious uncoupling is conscious uncoupling Okay. I think Gwnneth Palchow
and Chris Martin when they divorced, they called it.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
It's a nice way. It's just gone out separate ways,
conscious sun coupling. But that would have been a difficult decision.
But it sounds like, yeah, you're back together again. Yeah,
that's the old detective in me. Notice that because you've
come in here together.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
But what is it like to be a partner of
someone that's in Because how long did Dean get sense?
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Ten years?
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Okay, so that's that's a long time. So you two
you spoke and said both came to a mutual agreement, said.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
He got out, or give it a go, and we'll
see where we're at and whether we can make this work.
And don't get me wrong, there has been some real
ups and downs due to the fact that we're both
very different people to what we were before because of
the trauma that we've both been through as a result
(40:21):
of the raid, as a result of my injuries and
as a result of his long term incarceration and institutionalization
and the mental health detriments of that on both sides
of both experiences. So there has been challenges, big, big challenges.
And even though I'm pretty equipped because I work as
(40:42):
a therapist, it's different when it's somebody so close to
you involved.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
Did you visit him in jail to start with and
then make the decision this we've got to have the
break or have the separation.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah. We were actually on non contact because we were coque,
so when I would visit him, it was just through
the glass. And then we got contact visits. After I
was sentenced. We were able to then apply to have
contact visits, so I visited him nearly the whole time.
(41:16):
We spoke nearly the whole sentence. Yes, as friends after
the separation, so I stayed. We stayed together for four years,
and then when he was sentenced to the ten years,
we made the decision to separate. I don't think there's
enough support for families who are dealing with the ramifications
(41:37):
of incarceration, but especially long term incarceration. You know, I
felt I was equipped to deal with it, and it
was still very, very difficult, because there's things that happen
that you don't even think of, even in the line
of work that I do. We had an argument about
(41:58):
something very trivial, but it came down to the fact
that he had lost his spatial awareness from being in
a confined space for so long. That was the reason
why he couldn't see what I was verbalizing to him.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
To explain that. That's fascinating what happened there.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
So we had a box that was on the back
of the ute, and I said to him, can you
just shift it this way so that the couple clothes
And for half an hour he moved it in every
single direction instead of the one that I told him to,
and I was very frustrated by that. And then finally
he moved it and he got oh it fits, And
(42:39):
I thought, wow, that's bizarre. That's really bizarre. I need
to look into this. And so I read some studies
and I looked into it. And it's because he couldn't
visualize what I was verbalizing to him because his spatial
awareness was flawed from being confined for so long.
Speaker 1 (42:56):
Wow, Okay, I hadn't even considered that sort of impact.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
Me either, and I felt terrible for being so mean
about it. I thox moved the bloody box. Literally. Yeah,
so these are all the things, and that's just one thing,
but these are all the things that families would really
benefit from. Knowing so that they can best support their
loved ones. But who's supporting them? Who's supporting the mothers,
(43:20):
the fathers, the partners, the children of people who have
been incarcerated long term, who's supporting them?
Speaker 1 (43:27):
No knowing what they're going to be like when they're
getting You said, doing change and you change, And yeah,
only if you feel comfortable are you comfortable to say
how doing change? Or notices that the change in doing
after spending so long in prison.
Speaker 2 (43:44):
When jan first got out of prison, there was a
big culture shock for him because he hadn't seen things
like the wool worst self service checkout.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
He was just very shocked by that. He was also
shocked that we don't go to austray a post to
pay our bills anymore.
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Though all on the phone we're laughing and we should
be laughing. We shouldn't, but yeah, I can understand.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
It's like a Freddie Flintstone stepping into an episode of
The Jetsons, because basically.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
Well, it does just change so constantly, doesn't it. So
take a couple of years out of the world that
continually changes.
Speaker 2 (44:16):
And things are still surprising him to this day. Ask
a lot of questions you know, needs to get up
to date on how we communicate now, on how the
internet works, because the internet back then was very different.
We had those dongles that you would kind of plug
into the side of a computer, and now it's all
you know, Wi Fi and all the rest of it.
So it's all quite mind boggling for him, and it
(44:40):
was a lot. It was just a lot of information
to intake, you know, and I imagine that a lot
of people go through that way.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
How long has he been out for.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
He was released in February of two thousand and twenty four, right, okay,
so not very long at all, just over a while,
a year and a half really he's been out for
and only now I can kind of see that he's
getting on a more even kill with getting used to
(45:11):
being on the outside. But he has a very stable
home life and he also has full time employment, so
that's probably the difference his privilege in that sense that
he's been here. He's got a skill and he's able
to utilize that skill and go and work, and also
access to really good mental health care. So there's a
lot of things that he has that we have implemented
(45:35):
that a lot of people can't. They don't have that
available to them, and I'd like to see that changed.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
How did he process because my understanding with that police raid,
you guys are asleep in bed together, and though I
would imagine for someone like doing the way you've described
him to see he's partner injured in that way, there
would be a lot of anger and rage and all
sorts of things. How did he process that?
Speaker 2 (45:59):
I think a sense of helplessness because he wasn't on
the outside to be able to look after me or
to be able to assist in any way. You know,
my mother basically nursed me back to health, as well
as the medical staff, So him not being able to
be there, he would have felt very, very helpless. I
would say, I can't speak on his behalf, but that's
(46:19):
the feeling that I get.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
Yeah, I just I would imagine the anger and that
would have gone through his mind seeing someone injured like that.
Speaker 2 (46:29):
Oh yeah, most definitely. And I think anyone would be
able to empathize with that feeling of if you see
somebody that you love hurt, or any fellow human being
being hurt, no matter what the circumstances are, you would
feel some kind of you know, anger or empathy in
and around that situation, especially because we felt it was unnecessary.
(46:52):
If they would have come to the door with a warrant,
we would have opened the door and just you know,
there was no need for the injuries, and neither of
us ever could have perceived that the level of harm
that was kind of carried out was ever going to
happen in that way.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
Yeah, was that resolved? There an inquiry into the injuries
or was there any investigation done into that?
Speaker 2 (47:17):
There was, and then there was a settlement outside of
court in regards to those injuries. And I think that
when we speak to investigations, we really need to look
at having an independent body outside of the police that
investigates police. I think that's the only way that we're
(47:37):
going to see a culture shift and some accountability in
the way that the police culture is at the moment.
So I think that's something the people really need to
be pushing for that there's an independent body that does
the investigations. When there is you know, suggestions or claims
of police misconduct.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Well, I don't think that you haven't got an argument there.
You want if stakes have been made, you want lessons
to be learned. So the type of things don't happen then.
Speaker 2 (48:05):
And I think the public sometimes or the media I
shouldn't say, but more so the media or the other
side views it as the family wanting to have revenge
or see some kind of No, it's we don't want
it to happen to another family. All the innocent bystanders
that were involved and that were present at the time,
so innocent members of the public, So you don't want
(48:27):
to see that repeated for other families. It's not about
you know, who's right and who's wrong, and blaming and
you know, revenge, It's not about that. It's about prevention
and making sure and to anyone else.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
And look, you've got your views on police, and yeah,
there's good bike, he says bad bike, he says good police,
says bad police. But I speak for the majority of
the police, like they don't set out to injure people
or cause cause dramas. And police I have seen involved
in situations where people have been injured. If they're decent people,
(49:01):
it takes a cost on them to one wouldn't no one,
no one feels good about them, No.
Speaker 2 (49:06):
One would want to be in that situation. And I
think that's why we need to see a change or
a shift in the culture within the police force so
that these things, you know, don't happen, the preventable.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
Things, and if we do, we change the tatoo.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
Never it's Look, it's my one and only I've ever gotten.
I wasn't even allowed to have my ears pissed growing up.
Believe it or not, I do now, But I actually
got this tattoo on the day that my conditions ended,
kind of as a little bit of a fun thing
to Okay.
Speaker 1 (49:41):
I can see everyone's shocks.
Speaker 2 (49:43):
They were like, Felicia's got a tattoo. No, they didn't
believe it. My mom didn't, but no one believed it.
But no way, I did get it done, you know,
just as a little bit of a you know, celebration
of the conditions ending.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
You know, well it was pretty funny. The posts we
can have a laugh about that, But not all not
all police, not all police. The studies that you did,
what's the focus of your study and what did that
lead to?
Speaker 2 (50:10):
Okay, So the study that we did looks at the
adverse childhood experiences of people who later come into contact
with the criminal justice system. And of course we know
there's going to be a correlation there, and it's been
done extensively overseas, the ACE Study as they call it,
but we changed it so that it was more appropriate
(50:32):
to fit Australia. Obviously the cultural implications there and what
it showed is that there's always a correlation between adverse
childhood experiences and later involvement with the law. So that
tells me that we need to be looking at crime
prevention from the start, not the back end of things. Yes,
(50:54):
things can be done at the back end obviously, with
you know, helping people reintegrate to society and not reoffend excels,
especially when we're looking at out looking up our youth,
which we shouldn't be doing. Other things that can be done,
but we need to look at the social detriments that
cause crime, so poverty, mental illness, addiction, the list goes on.
I could name so many adverse childhood experiences that people
(51:18):
go through, abuse, sexual abuse, So there's so many other
things that we need to be doing and implementing for
our kids and our young people as crime prevention for
the future. And it doesn't just make sense for the
health of the nation, it makes sense fiscally. It's going
to save us money because you're going to have good
functioning citizens that are able to work, contribute, study, do
all these great things. But if they're not afforded that
(51:40):
opportunity or these things are not kind of these issues
are not scaffolded from the beginning. How can we expect
for children to be dragged up and then have no
example and then go out and be fully functioning humans.
Speaker 1 (51:53):
It's just not Look, I agree with you and the
sound logic and everything, say, how can we do that?
How can we achieve that?
Speaker 2 (52:01):
I think that that is a very long, long conversation.
But what we need to do is we need to
give better opportunities to people who have conviction histories in
regards to gaining and accessing meaningful work and skills. And
I think just look a rough example. Say we've got
(52:22):
a mother, she has charges, she has convictions, whatever it
might be, right, she comes out of prison, she wants
to get a job. She can't because there's a lot
of discrimination there when it comes to getting a job
and to workplace discrimination, et cetera. So you get knocked back.
And this happened to me. So I got knocked back
for jobs I was overqualified for and it's like a
(52:46):
slap in the face when you're trying to contribute and
trying to get back into society. So if you give
this woman a job and she's able to support herself,
she's then able to support her children. That in some
cases can eliminate child removed, which is another trauma on
the children and on the mother. And she's able to
pay her rent, put a roof over her head. And
(53:06):
if there's a partner or ex partner that's abusive or
supplying drugs or whatever it might be to that person,
they don't feel the need to go back there for
survival purposes because they can look after themselves. They are
able to house themselves, feed themselves, and look after their kids.
So you're not just giving someone a job. You're changing
the trajectory of their life, but also their children's life.
(53:26):
And that's just one thing that can be done for
crime prevention for the future, and also to break the
cycle of intergenerational trauma. Is there then watching their mum
or their dad going out to work an.
Speaker 1 (53:38):
Example, Well, I've seen too many families in different environments
where there's three generations of the family members that haven't
had gainful employment, and so yeah, you do. You follow
your parents, whether you like to or not. So you've
got to break that cycle and see those kids. Are
(53:59):
you because of your experience and the lifestyle that you've
lived or experience, What are you doing? Is there anything
that you are you speaking to people about what can
be done? Is there stuff that you're using your experience
and your knowledge together with your now education to make
a difference.
Speaker 2 (54:20):
The majority of the work that I do is speaking
about uncomfortable topics that people don't really speak about and
that are not really on the forefront. So the discrimination
that goes on in regards to hiring practices, and I
speak about the feminization of poverty. I speak about the
(54:41):
fact that a lot of people who become perpetrators are
actually victims. So I do speak about all of these things,
and I provide education on all of these things, and
I'm hoping that that's then going to be able to
inform people who whether they're in policy development, whether they're
in government, whether they're in HR, whatever aspect that they're in,
(55:03):
that that can plant a seed for them for them
to sit back and say, Hey, what can I be
doing better? Should I have more trauma informed hiring processes.
Should we change this policy, should we do A B
and C? What can I do to open doors for
people that would usually have doors slammed on their face?
And I'm not doing it as a charity or as
a favor. I'm doing it because I've got the privilege
(55:26):
to do it. So I'm going to then afford somebody
else an opportunity to be able to turn their life around.
And that's a really powerful thing for people to do
on a micro level within whatever's they're within their realm
of control. Basically, So I'm hoping to plant a seed
to challenge a stereotype of want a woman and a
person looks like as a conviction history that we're people
(55:49):
and sometimes people fuck up and it's okay. It doesn't
mean that it should be a life sentence. And like
I said, if you do whatever it is you can
do as a business owner, in government, whatever it might be,
whatever your role is. So whatever you can do that's
within your realm of control, you're actually you're actually implementing
(56:09):
crime prevention on a community level.
Speaker 1 (56:12):
I understand what you're saying, and I agree with it.
Getting it in there. Looking at the life you've had
and the life that you're living now. I see when
you're talking about that, the passion and the excitement that
comes on your face. Is this rocking your boat now
compared to the lifestyle that you used to live.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
Yeah, it is, Yeah, most definitely. I absolutely love speaking
about the issues that I speak about because I think
it's important. You cannot change people's minds until you touch
their heart, and the way to do that is through storytelling.
And I think that by telling your story you can
shift perception and stereotypes. And maybe by me speaking about
(56:53):
my experience, it's going to mean that next time somebody
applies for a job and you know the hiring managers
is that there's a gap in that resume, they're not
going to be put to the bottom of the pile.
Maybe they're going to give them a chance. That's what
I want to see happening. Less discrimination.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
Well, I think that would be a good thing. I've
had a great chat. As I said at the start,
I never thought I'd be sitting down speaking with a
Miss Australia.
Speaker 2 (57:17):
But I never thought I'd be sitting down talking with
a cop for everything gap, I.
Speaker 1 (57:21):
Know it look look at this, but thanks for sharing
your story and I found it interesting. And the book.
If people want to get your book, it's called accessory,
where can they get that?
Speaker 2 (57:33):
You can get that from any major book retailer as
well as on audible. I read the book myself, so yeah,
it's any major retailer.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
Yeah, okay, very good. And if people wanted to reach
out to you on the work that you're doing or
is there any way of getting in contact.
Speaker 2 (57:49):
With you, yeah, sure, so you can reach my team
at info I NFO, at neuro and EU R O
V hub dot com and then also just www dot
Felicia Middle dot com and also at Felicia Mid on Instagram.
Speaker 1 (58:06):
Excellent, excellent. Well, it's nice meeting you, and good luck
for the future. You've you've you've been through it, you've
had the highs, you've lowers, and you've you've got a
life of purpose at the moment, and let's say it
gays well for it.
Speaker 2 (58:19):
Thanks Gary, and thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (58:20):
Cheers,
The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Detective see aside of life. The average person has never
exposed her I spent thirty four years as a cop.
For twenty five of those years I was catching killers.
That's what I did for a living. I was a
homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,
I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
(00:23):
The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories
from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some
of the content and language might be confronting. That's because
no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.
Join me now as I take you into this world.
(00:46):
In part two of my chat with former Miss Australia
Felucia Jarmise, she tells us about how and why she
fell in love with another bad guy, how that went
terribly wrong, and her dramatic tactical arrest that almost resulted
in the hand amputated. She talked about the reflections on
the life of crime, why she has a tattoo, fucked
the police, why and how she decided to live a
(01:08):
more stable life and what she's doing now giving back
to society. It's an interesting story. Have a listen, Felicia Jamize,
welcome back to I Catch Killers. Did I've pronounced that right?
I've been practicing all morning.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
You've pronounced it better than a lot of people. I
remember when I was in the Supreme Court, they were
pronouncing it, Jamirez, and I thought, well, don't make me
sound like I'm from the Mexican cuchel. Are you making
me sound guilty before I've even you know.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
I got a please?
Speaker 2 (01:39):
So no is how you pronounce it? But it's pretty good.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Okay, Wellrez, I've been practicing. Okay. Part one. We've got
a good understanding of your your life, your upbringing. We
touched on the beauty pageants and lifestyle lifestyle there, your
relationship and your journey into the OMCG gang scene been al.
(02:05):
Did we settle on an old lady or partner or
what was it?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Keep it old lady.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Old lady a member of a gang that ended in
tears And I'm making light of a situation, but yeah,
it's a relationship breakup and Cam's addiction became too much
and his personality changed and they started to be violence,
domestic violence and that and you've walked away from it.
(02:34):
So that's a point we're at. Now, what age were
you at that stage.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I would have been early twenties at that stage, early
to mid twenties, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Did after that experience, did you think, Okay, maybe my
lifestyle choices or the person I was with, maybe I
should step away from that.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yes? I did, But in regards to that, like I
said before, with Jean, it was a matter of finding
somebody that was able to protect me, that I could
feel safe with. So looking back, yeah, it was like
out of the frying pan and into the fire basically,
But in that time in my life I didn't see
(03:15):
it as such. I was just trying to survive.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
Okay, okay, and that was having someone that could stand
up to the wrath of an angry ex partner. That's
a bikey that comeing in and we met Deane this
morning and your mum who have turned up, which is
always always a good sign. That turned up for the podcast.
But you did delve into the world of dating STRAIGHTI
(03:39):
one eighties. I want you to be kind of STRAIGHTI
one eighties. Don't just shatter their shatter their confidence. But
why didn't that work for you after what you've been through.
Maybe I'll just give I think you mentioned like an accountant.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Ye, that was just a really stereotypical general lives of
the picture.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
They get a get a tough time. Did you try that?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
I did, correct. So Dean and I had a period
of time where we were separated because he was given
ten years in prison, and we decided to step both
step away from the relationship and for the sake of
remaining friends and being civil to each other, because if
we tried to maintain an unmaintainable relationship, we would have
(04:23):
just ended up hating and resenting each other and we
would have lost our friendship. So we decided to remain friends.
We were still in contact while he was in prison,
and I helped him as much as I could from
the outside, and still visited, et cetera, folk on the phone,
sent letters, all the stuff that you kind of do,
but without the romantic aspect of that. And also too,
(04:46):
I needed an opportunity to be able to move on
with my life and see if I had a future
with somebody else, and I gave it a really good
red hot goer kind of you know, trying to date
people that had lives very well outside of the experience
of the life that I have had, and nothing against
them or anyone, but it just did not work out.
(05:08):
Our world views two different. The things the way that
we see things are too different. There was a lot
of issues around other people's families not being able to
accept my past. That was quite taboo. So I was
discriminated against him in that way. Oh you know, my
parents would probably not accept that this is the past
that you've had. And I always think my past makes
(05:29):
me who I am, good and bad. It shaped how
I am as a person, how I am as a therapist,
the empathy that I have. So there's a lot of
good things that have come out of some really bad things.
And if people kind of appreciate the good things that
have come from those bad things, that don't belong in
my life anyway. So there was a lot of that
that that kind of went on, so that I.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Did give it a go, you know, Okay, I said,
I just said to ask all I did. Okay, Well,
wind that back because we're a little bit there of
sequence from it. We've got you've broken up, we've cam
you've now got in the relationship with Dean. Dean's just
outside the door. So just think what you're going to
say here, describe doing to me.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Charismatic, good sense of humor, quite a quite a character
like you notice him when he comes into the room
because his personality is quite big, so is his gold chain.
So very eccentric, vivacious character. Likes to talk a lot,
I likes to joke a lot. We get along very well,
very good friends.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
Yeah. And where had you known before?
Speaker 2 (06:32):
From the scene as you would call it, Yeah, the scene, Yeah,
just from the scene. And what had happened was I
had heard that Cam was cheating on me with a
working girl from Melbourne, and I thought, oh, you know,
how am I going to get on Facebook to see
(06:52):
what's going Back then, there was no Instagram. It was
MySpace and Facebook, where Facebook was kind of getting popular. Anyway,
Jean me go on his account to look up there.
I know, I was doing a bit of a detective gary.
So I went on Dean's Facebook and I had a
look and I saw that he had tagged or she'd
(07:13):
taked him and they were shopping in Melbourne, and that
kind of confirmed it for me. And then Dean and
I just kind of kept in contact as friends from them,
and then a lot of things happened in between in
regards to you know, Cam and I and that situation
and things escalated and all the rest of it. But
that's how we kind of started talking, right, not on
(07:34):
a romantic sense, we were just friends and he was
helping me to well.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
It tells me a little bit about Dean that he
get involved in that type of stuff, like helping you
out if you're in conflict with your partner. It's a bikey.
So what was he into at the time or what
did you believe he was into it at the time.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
I didn't ask, so you know, you don't ask you
you don't know. I could assume, but it's really wasn't
any of my business that point in time.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
But that there was a lot of money around yeah yeah, yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
That was normal, right, That was normal in that scene in.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
The world that you knew, But like it was nothing
to go out and shop at the yeah, the top places,
come out with the handbags and together. Yeah yeah, yeah,
and that was that was something you're attracted to.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
I would say, more than novelty and the feeling of
it as opposed to the items themselves. I'm not a
materialistic person, but I think it was the thrill and
the fun and the head of being able to do
whatever you want, by whatever you want, go wherever you want.
It's quite an intoxicating feeling or emotion. It's not actually
(08:47):
the items themselves, it's the I can.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Do whatever I want, so living the highlighte.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Yeah, and when you grow up in you know, a
situation where you experience some disadvantage, it is a novelty
to be able to go and spend a quarter of
a million dollars in lou Verton. That's a big novelty.
That would be a novelty for anyone. And I'm not
defending those decisions. Yeah, it was just the hit, the thrill,
(09:13):
the dopamine hit.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
So you're getting that dopamine hit. It's living that lifestyle.
I think in the book you talk about, Yeah, the
life was we'd be eating at the flash restaurants, seafood
restaurants and not doing much during the day, do a
line of cake and go out and get on it,
and yeah, that was that was a lifestyle.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
Of Actually, my friend dj Emma Salmon has put together
a track where I talk about lines from the book,
and she's done a track and it says exactly those words,
you go out, sleep, repeat.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Yeah, well pretty much pretty much. Was the lifestyle did
you have living that lifestyle? Like I would be concerned
because I've said I'm normally with one coming in the door,
but at any stage it could end or was that
part I'm just trying to get into the mindset. Is
that part of the excitement, the adrenaline that this is good,
(10:09):
We're getting away with something here, but it could end dramatically.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
I always accepted that there was a risk that we
would be arrested, and that was something I fully considered,
and I just felt that the latter was riskier in
regards to not having Deen around and being able to
protect me in those initial stages, and then got to
the point where you know, I was into deep and
(10:37):
we had a really good relationship. Yes, all these things
were going on around us, but we had a really
really good relationship, and I just thought, whatever happens, happens,
But never did I expect for the arrest to happen
in the fashion that had happened.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Well, we'll talk about that because that was dramatic, but
just with the lifestyle, So you at this stage and
you Dean was dealing in drugs. Yes, and just because
you've seen your father, and I've got to ask the
question with addiction, and you would have seen in the
lifestyle that you lived the addiction even with camp, how
(11:14):
did you sort of how did you process that in
your mind that, Okay, we're making money from this. What's
your attitude to.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
That in regards to that, I did think too deeply
into it at the time. On reflection, now, yes, I
can think about it in a very different way, which
I do, but at the time, no, I didn't give
too much thought to it. And I think that speaks
to the fact that a lot of the times people
who are victimized become perpetrators, if we want to use
(11:43):
that word. So both can go hand in hand in
different points of your life. So you will see that
were a lot of women who are actually in prison
victim survivors of horrific abuse, whether that be as children
or as adults, and vice versa. And that even hap
with the men. We spoke about that earlier, about the
abuse that goes on. That's right. So a lot of
(12:06):
the time people who are victimized as children or even
as adults can sometimes then become the perpetrator or framed
as the perpetrator. Then what happens is people ask questions like,
growing up like that, how do you That's very hard
to compartmentalize. It's very different to mentalized. So it's very
(12:27):
complicated because it's a demand and supply business. As you know,
if people didn't seek out drugs and alcohol, then there
would be no market for it. And I'm not defending
it or saying that there should be a market for it,
but hey, why don't we look at the things that
we can do for harm reduction? So more places in
rehabilitation facilities, better access to mental health care, better living standards,
(12:53):
lower the cost of living, improve the social detriments that
cause addiction to begin with, and then there not going
to be such a demand for the supply.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
So the supply and demand, and I'm just thinking how
you're processing in your mind, Well, it's going to be there.
There's the demand.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
We got arrested and there was someone waiting right there
to take over that exact same patch. So the war
on drugs needs to be more than just arresting a
drug lord. It needs to really look at the policies
we have in place in Australia and the social detriments
that lead to offending from a young age, even before
(13:33):
people are born, they've got a risk of being offenders
so to speak, or committing a crime because of the
social detriments and the environment that they're growing up in
or that they're living in. So what has to happen
is we need to look at all of those things
and stop using prisons as a solution for a myriad
of social problems. A lot of people in jail should
(13:54):
not be in jail.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
The war on drugs, so called war on drugs is
not working. But yeah, I'm just trying to get a
sense of I see you now and you're a person
that comes across as a good person at that time,
living the life just how you reconcile. But it's almost like,
well if we don't do it, someone else is going
to do it. And is that what was crossing your
(14:16):
mind at the time.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Well, it was normalized to me because of my life
with Cam right, So that was the introductory period or
stage you could say, where it became normalized when it's
something that should never be normalized. And then also my
upbringing with Yuri and Uri doubled in quite a lot
of illegal dealing, so it wasn't that frowned upon in
(14:38):
my family sisters.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Okay, that's getting getting closer to the understanding of it.
Uri was dealing in a couple of things. I wondered
why he flew that cargo, playing of a way around
the world the quickest, given this book.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Of records, and you know too, like it was normalized
for Dian as well because he was selling drugs from
the age of thirteen to look after his siblings, because
his mother had an addiction to heroin and his father
was in prison. So that might give people a little
bit more of an understanding of the whole victim perp
(15:13):
make that happens.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I just want to delve in there so people do
get an understanding. And when you're explaining the way there,
that makes a little bit a little bit clearer. Getting
getting back to the lifestyle. You plan to get married
in Singapore and once a Marina Marina. I stayed there
(15:34):
only a couple of nights, and it's most expensive place
I ever stayed in my life. That's like the twin
Towers with the rooftop four. I gotta say I didn't
think it was that good, but for the price, but
you were going to have you won't be getting.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
A discount next time you got. That wasn't a great plug.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Gary probably get sued by it. That'd be interesting. But
well it is great the roof top bar. But you
had the book everything and it was Yeah, you just
didn't have the very different too. It was different. You
thought paying that money everything was going to be turned
on for you, but it wasn't. You had the book
and you couldn't get it was a good Japanese restaurant
(16:14):
downstairs on the ground level. There was.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
A whole different level of wealth in Singapore and it's
a very Yes, it's an international city and it's very
one of the most expensive.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Yeah. Yeah, well, just getting off my wings about stopover
in Singapore. That cost me a fortune. You're going to
have your wedding there, and that's why I bought the
bought up because that would have been an extraordinary cost
to high that place out.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
So lucky we had only put a deposit and not
the full amount.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
That to my way, that gives me an understanding of
the lifestyle that you would have been living at the time. Yeah,
so there was plenty of plenty of cash.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Yeah, if anyone's seen what's that movie where they get
married at Marina Basin, Crazy Rich Asians or something.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
Oh, I didn't realize it was movie about on that
The pool is nice, you get there early enough, get
a suit. Okay, it went bad, and it went very bad.
And I'm not making either this. We might have a laugh,
because sometimes in darkness you've got a laugh at things.
But this world that you were living or came crashing
(17:24):
down one morning, can you talk me through it? And
I apologize for making any joke about it, because I
know how scary and horrific it would have been for
you and the injuries that you sustained. Can you tell
us what happened.
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I think that with humor it's a really really good
way to cope through dark and hard times. And there's
that really old saying if you don't laugh, you'll cry.
Even when I was laying in hospital in the burns,
you know, I was cracking jokes with the nurses and
they were like, we don't understand how you're kind of
(17:58):
maintaining some kind of positivity or upbeatness when you're in
such a state and in so much pain. So I
think sometimes people when I laugh or when I smile,
they perceive it as I'm not taking the situation seriously. Yeah,
I've been in some serious situations and I do take
it very seriously and I'm not making light of it.
(18:19):
But I do use humor to get through difficult things,
and I think a lot of people do that as well.
It's not that I think that the what's happened is
not serious, and I haven't taken accountability for my role
in it. I have, but just wanted to kind of.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
I'm glad you clarified that because it can be misunderstood.
And I used humor to get through all the years
in homicide and that you really you have to see
some brightness in the darkness and if that's in the
form of humour. But I'm glad you explain that, explain that,
because I don't want people listening to the conversation and
think it's just flippant and.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
It can be very misconscrued. As you know, she's not
taking this seriously, except but I am. And I do
a lot of serious work, and I sit with people
who have been through horrific traumatic experiences and I work
with them on their mental health. A lot of the
things I do are really really heavy and really serious,
so there's nothing flippant about it. It's just my personality
(19:17):
and I like to have a laugh and I've got
a good sense of humor. I like to think. Anyway,
back to the raid. Back to the raid, what had
happened was there was a no knock raid on our
home in Harvey Bay. And at first I thought that
it was a home invasion because there was some conflict
(19:38):
going on at the time with you know, some other people.
And I thought, oh, they're game. They've come to the house,
you know, home invasion. I thought, No, they've got balls.
I kind of thought, you know, but on them. But
I felt a very very hot, burning sensation and a
lot of pain on my face on my hand, and
I thought, okay, I've been shot in the face and you're.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
In better sleep at this time. Correct.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah. And the first g came in, and that was
a death tech grenade because it needed to be a
grenade apparently that could come through the window or through
the building. Came through and it hit me and I thought,
I didn't think in a million years it was a
grenade or that it was the police. I thought that
if it was going to be the police. They would
(20:19):
have just knocked the door down and shown me the
warrant rights. A little bit shot on the face, and
I just need to lay here and pretend to be
dead for a little bit and figure out what I'm going.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
To process going through your mind at the time.
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Yeah, I was laying in bed and I thought, fuck,
I've been shot, and I was gonna lay here for
a bit. I'm still alive, but I don't know how
long I'm going to be a live for, so I'll
just ride it out a bit and try and see
what's cracking. Have they left, are they still here? You know,
do they think I'm dead? I was kind of, you know,
thinking through all of these things quite quickly, and then
another grenade came through. I didn't know it was a
(20:54):
grenade yet. And then I heard police on this like
loud speaker that it was them, and I could hear
the dogs, and I could hear, you know, certain things
going on. That all led me to believe that there
was a raid. So then I started to crawl towards
the walking robe. The direction of the walk in robe.
I was quite disorientated, as you would know with you know,
(21:17):
those devices, they disorientated.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
They're often called the flash flash bang flash bangs.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yes, the ones that came after were flash bangs.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
Yeah yeah, just a lot of noise, a lot of
bright lights, and just distracting and disorientating. So it creates
a lot of confusion.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
Oh yeah, yeah, Well they're designed for that. So, but
they're designed not to come in contact as you would
know with human skin or with furnishings fabrics. A big
fire risk and obviously big risk of injury to anyone
that comes in physical contact with them. And we saw
what happened with the lint siege with certain you know.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
That I saw the link cafe siege where the situation
was resolved when play moved in. The loud noises and
the flashes and the banks. That is the type of
thing that we're talking to me, yes, exactly.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
So what had happened was I tried to get shelter.
In the process of crawling towards the walking row, another
one had hit my elbow here and my elbow was
you know, hanging out, and it was it was blown
out basically, and then I continued on to crawl to
you know, get in between the space where the wardrobe
(22:27):
is and you know the end of the bed and
I slid down, and then a tactical officer stepped through
the bay window and was, you know, holding a gun
to me and saying, you know, put your hands up.
But it was very difficult for me to put my
hands up because this hand was mincemeat and this elbow
was blown out. So I was essentially you know, dragging
my arms up as best I caught at that point
(22:50):
and asking for an ambulance to be called scary, Yeah,
I thought, I'm definitely thought. I thought a lot of
I thought I'm going to have to have my hand
amputated because it just looked.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Like the injury injury that bad, like a mangle mess
was I've seen patoise, but it would have been after
the treatment.
Speaker 2 (23:11):
That was weeks after the treatment. Those photos that everyone sees.
What it happened was we had photos of the injury
when it first happened, when I came into the recess room,
but the injury in the acute phases was horrific, like
it didn't look salvageable. At that point, I had come
(23:31):
to terms with the fact that if I wanted to live,
my hand had to go.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
I think there was a reference where the surgeon said
that you might might be losing your hand.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
Yeah, on two occasions.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
Yeah yeah, okay, Well I woke up and I.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Had a hand and I thought, this is great.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Yes, that's what that's what you want to see. What
were what were the police arresting you for at the time.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Trafficking, production and supply of methyl amphetamine.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
So they had had a search warrant for the house,
tactical search warrant they did, but.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
I wasn't arrested until I was in hospital. They came
after the fact, so I was arrested after and I
was under arrest in hospital. I wasn't arrested at the house.
And what about Dean, Well, Dean had a really long
list of charges. I couldn't name them all this There
was a lot in the initial stages, as you know,
(24:25):
there's a lot of charges, and then towards the end.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
So that would have gone through the place search warrant. Yes,
what did they sees?
Speaker 2 (24:33):
They had cameras in our house in most of the
rooms in our house, recording devices, cameras, trackers on vehicles.
They had diggers digging up our property. It was diggers,
and they also had military tanks, those police tanks on
(24:54):
our property as well. I don't know what they were
doing with all of those things because I was cuted
off to hospital all and they also had the dog
squad and everything was pulled out and full tactical execution
of yes, yeah, okay, how long were you in the hospital?
For months? It's in the burns unit for months and months.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
I'm saying, fhato's your face? It was burnt?
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Yeah, my eyes were burned, had third degree burns on
my eyes. My corniers were burnt. I've still got gunpowder
in my corn eers and I've got gunpowder in my
face as well. It's it's a little bit look, I'm
going to say dark comical. When I go to the
UDICI and I have like a facial and the one
time the lady was like pushing on these gunpowder particles
(25:42):
and I said, oh, you're not going to get that out.
That's not that's not a blackhead or a port gunpal,
that's gunpowder, and she's what, So, Yeah, I've still got
gunpowder in my I've got gunpowder all in my elbow. Yeah,
so it's like discolored and then all through my head.
And I've also got gunpowder. It kind of looks like
(26:02):
speckled tattoo, right, kind of black dots. You'd have to
come up quite close to to see it. So, and
I've had a lot of surgeries as well.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Okay, so you're in there for months you were charged?
How how long before it went to court or what
happened when you went to court.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
I was on bail for two years and then I
was on conditions for three, so five years all up.
I was kind of had my freedom at the liberty
of others, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah, reporting conditions or don't leave the state, or don't
associate with.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
I can't leave the country. Haveing been drug tested randomly?
Things like that, So i'd I had quite a few conditions.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
Your first charge is that your first criminal charge?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Okay, Dean did he he wouldn't have got bail. I
wouldn't imagine, No, he didn't. Definitely went inside. Yeah, did
you contest the charges?
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Two of the charges were dropped towards sentencing. The charge
that I puled guilty to is supplying. So the reason
why I pled guilty to supply was because in Queensland law,
you may or may not be charged with the same
charge as the principle if you're involved in any component
or any part of the supply. So my part in
(27:25):
the supply that was recorded on the camera was that
I tested a set of scales that Dean allegedly used
later to weigh drugs and then supply those drugs to
somebody else.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Right, So that was your direct involvement in the spydrus. Yes,
so you're not saying you didn't know he was dealing drugs.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
I'm not going to deny that.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Of course, you're saying that you just weren't involved in
that was his thinking pretty much.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
But in saying that, the law is open to interpretation.
So you know, it was a bit of a difficult
situation to navigate.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
You So you're in hospital for months, The recovery must
have taken a hell of a long time. If you're
in the hospital for months, terrific.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
Recovery was terrific, and I put a lot of well,
I put a lot of pressure on myself just in
regards to everyday life, right, But I put a lot
of pressure on myself to get better and to do
the best that I could with what I had. I
was happy and grateful to be alive, So that was
the number one thing, and I thought, I'll deal with
(28:32):
the charges later. And another thing that played heavily on
my mind in that time that even though yes, I
was burnt and I had charges, and I was quite
unwell from the burns, psychologically and physically unwell, the priority
was more so looking after yu ear because Uri was
dying as a family, the priority was making sure that
his last you know months were good, Yeah, good months.
(28:55):
So there was that playing on my mind, and I
was happy that I was on bail. I felt very
privileged that I was on bail, but it afforded me
the opportunity to be able to bury my father. And
I thought after I buried Uri, like I carried him
through his illness, I wanted to carry him to his grave.
So after I buried Yuri, I was fully prepared to
(29:17):
take whatever consequences come my way after that. I walked
into the Supreme Court that day, fully prepared to cop
any consequences that came towards me after I buried him.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Yeah, I would imagine you had an expectation or a
belief that you might have been going to jail or
custodial sentence.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
Most definitely, I left the house that morning, knowing that
it could be you know, quite a few years before
I would come back to that home.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
Well, the burns. You had burns on your face. It
looks like it's all held up, very lucky. How was that?
Because it's confronting when you've been recognized for your looks
and then burn on your face and your hair. I
lost all my So that's a tap humor. I dealt
with losing hair, but the burn on your face, that
(30:07):
must have been confronting for you, along with all the
other injuries, obviously potentially losing your hand when appearance has
been something they've traded on for a long time. How
did that impact on you? Mentally?
Speaker 2 (30:19):
There was a perspective shift in the sense that I
was more grateful to be alive and on bail and
be able to spend time with my father when he
was dying, as opposed to being too worried about my legs.
I did everything that I could, and that was advised
by the surgeons, and I did everything I could to
look after myself. I think I had an expectation that
(30:41):
I would get back to exactly how I was before,
but I soon realized that that is not possible and
anyone that's been through a trauma or an injury mentally
or physically or both knows that you were forever changed
by that, and there's a loss of identity with former
self and you have to build a new one with
your newfound identity. So I needed to kind of grieve
(31:04):
the old me and learn a new me and appreciate
the good things that came out of that, so appreciation
for my freedom, family, a high level of empathy, and
a higher level of respect for human life as well
after watching my father die. So I was looking at
the world from a completely different viewpoint after having those injuries,
(31:26):
and I did my best to get back to as
good as I could. And to be honest, what my
motivating factor also was a little bit of a fuck
you to the police. You know, when they saw me
and I was all, you know, the way I was looking,
they probably thought she's finished. So it kind of drove
me to say, no, actually, I'm going to turn this
around and I'm going to flip the script on this
(31:48):
situation and I'm gonna, you know, get to the best
point that I could. But I remember looking down at
my hand at one point when it still going through
a lot of surgeries, and it was not looking great
at all. I remember feeling like that body part didn't
belong to me. I'd look down at my hand and
(32:10):
I would see my hand as not belonging to me,
and that was a very, very bizarre thing to experience.
But I don't feel like that anymore. But I imagine
that a lot of people go through that when they
have injuries, So that was very bizarre for me.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
It's like losing the hand or losing any body part, burns,
the horrendous injuries, so I could imagine that it would
be traumatic. But it's interesting you said that it's sort
of change your view on life and you realize what's
important important and what you want to do with your life.
And I do understand the motive of well, you know,
(32:48):
fuck you, you've done this to me. Look I'm still standing.
I get that. Do you think it changed you for
the better? Do you think you're a better person.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
I've always been a good person, right. I just think
that it has led me in a direction that I
never thought that I would. I never thought i'd be
doing what I'm doing right.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Funny the journey life can take you on this.
Speaker 2 (33:12):
Yeah, I try to not look at it in that
way that it did me good or bad. Of course,
I'd rather not have gone through the experiences that I
went through, because no human psychologically ever wants to go
through pain. We all go through life trying to avoid pain, right,
So I would never kind of choose that, so to speak,
although I did make choices that led to that. But
(33:34):
now I don't really like to look at it that way.
I like to look at it with no regrets, in
respect that everything I've been through has taught me a
massive lesson, and then those lessons enable me to move
forward in my life in a different way and help
other people.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
It's interesting because this is a journey and I am
not downplaying what happened to you would have been horrific.
And then oh they got me good.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
I was laying there in the hospital. I boys, you
you got me fucking good this time?
Speaker 1 (34:03):
Did you didn't get sense to prison? What you get
a corrections order? What? What happened there? What was there?
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Three years to be served in the community. And a
big part of that was the fact that I had
done a degree while I was on bail. Yeah, so
here I am one hand doing a degree. Here is
you know, they're having chemo dying. I'm worried about you know,
I'm probably going to go to prison. Am I going
(34:33):
to get to bury him?
Speaker 1 (34:34):
You know?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
It was all happening in my household at that time. Chaotic, yes,
very very chaotic, Always something going on, you know. And
when I went to court, you know, the Supreme Court
judge said, you know, you're obviously a high achiever. He
looked at my record of education, he looked at even
the pageants that I had done and won, and the
(34:56):
things that I'd been involved in quite a lot of
charity work prior as well. He looked at all of
those things and they worked in my favor. And also
the fact that I had been so severely injured and
I was still undergoing quite a lot of treatment, a
lot of operations, and a lot of different things to
rehabilitate myself physically and mentally after that trauma. And I
(35:17):
think all of those aspects led to me getting the
community corrections order. But also in respect to that, I
think it's the way that I presented, the way that
I look, and the color of my skin, and the
privilege that I had, So I think a lot of
people are not afforded the opportunity that I was afforded present.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
It's interesting you say that then you would have had
your family supporting you. You've had the history of demonstrating
you could function in society, You've done your studies. Maybe yeah,
the court's got it right for you. But what you're
saying is that there's other people that fall through the
gaps in your situation. Your looks, background and everything played
(35:58):
the part in You're not going inside correct.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
And I think a thought needs to be put to
that topic because a lot of people are sent to
prison based on external factors that have nothing to do
with the offending. So you know, race does come into it,
level of education comes into it. There's a lot of
different things that come into how people present, and a
(36:25):
lot of those things, if not all of those things,
that's not within the realm of control of that person.
For example, if I had a dark skin, which I
could have been born dark skin because my mother's background
is indigenous. Actually in the book, it touches on URI's
family thought that I was going to be born dark.
(36:45):
So if I had been born with a different color skin,
would I have went to prison? I would say there
was a much higher chance I would have been going
to prison if I wasn't blonde and green eyed with
fair skin. So race does come into it and when
it comes to sentencing, and that's something we need to
kind of turn our minds to as well.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
You know, that's a fair court. Like people could say, no,
that doesn't come into play.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
But yeah, oh yeah, it definitely does.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Statistics we dictate otherwise, Ok, court matter, you didn't get
you didn't get a custodial sentence, but three year corrections order.
So what did that involve? What did you have to
do with that?
Speaker 2 (37:25):
I just had to be on best behavior. But that
wasn't a problem, to be honest, it wasn't.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
It was because if you breach that, you then end
up going inside.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
Correct And it did give me some time to reflect.
I had a lot of anger issues prior, and I
think that was dealing with the grief of growing up
in a household with a parent who has an addiction.
Because when you have a parent who has an addiction,
your self esteem is not great because you view yourself
(38:01):
as not having much worth. If they're choosing drugs or
alcohol over you, you think, what am I not working?
Speaker 1 (38:09):
That's a hard a drink hard thing, isn't it like?
But if you love me, why are you drinking? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:16):
They can't possibly love me if they're.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
Choosing so you're self worth yourself worth.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, And so I had a lot of anger problems
and I had a lot of self work to do,
and I did that while I was on conditions because
there was no distractions. Wasn't going out, I wasn't drinking,
I wasn't doing coke, I wasn't doing all of these
things that I was doing in the past to distract
(38:41):
myself from having to deal with these things. So I
had to sit with myself and I had to deal
with all of these things. So that's kind of where
the shift happened. And during that period dealt with a
lot of things.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Hey guys, it's Gary Jubilan here. Want they get more
out of ye catch Killers? Then you should head over
to our new video feed on Spotify where you can
watch every episode of I Catch Killers. Just search for
I Catch Killers video in your Spotify app and start
watching today with Dean he was inside you touched on
(39:15):
earlier and said you made a conscious decision that go separate.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Conscious uncoupling is conscious uncoupling Okay. I think Gwnneth Palchow
and Chris Martin when they divorced, they called it.
Speaker 1 (39:29):
It's a nice way. It's just gone out separate ways,
conscious sun coupling. But that would have been a difficult decision.
But it sounds like, yeah, you're back together again. Yeah,
that's the old detective in me. Notice that because you've
come in here together.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
But what is it like to be a partner of
someone that's in Because how long did Dean get sense?
Speaker 2 (39:52):
Ten years?
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Okay, so that's that's a long time. So you two
you spoke and said both came to a mutual agreement, said.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
He got out, or give it a go, and we'll
see where we're at and whether we can make this work.
And don't get me wrong, there has been some real
ups and downs due to the fact that we're both
very different people to what we were before because of
the trauma that we've both been through as a result
(40:21):
of the raid, as a result of my injuries and
as a result of his long term incarceration and institutionalization
and the mental health detriments of that on both sides
of both experiences. So there has been challenges, big, big challenges.
And even though I'm pretty equipped because I work as
(40:42):
a therapist, it's different when it's somebody so close to
you involved.
Speaker 1 (40:47):
Did you visit him in jail to start with and
then make the decision this we've got to have the
break or have the separation.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Yeah. We were actually on non contact because we were coque,
so when I would visit him, it was just through
the glass. And then we got contact visits. After I
was sentenced. We were able to then apply to have
contact visits, so I visited him nearly the whole time.
(41:16):
We spoke nearly the whole sentence. Yes, as friends after
the separation, so I stayed. We stayed together for four years,
and then when he was sentenced to the ten years,
we made the decision to separate. I don't think there's
enough support for families who are dealing with the ramifications
(41:37):
of incarceration, but especially long term incarceration. You know, I
felt I was equipped to deal with it, and it
was still very, very difficult, because there's things that happen
that you don't even think of, even in the line
of work that I do. We had an argument about
(41:58):
something very trivial, but it came down to the fact
that he had lost his spatial awareness from being in
a confined space for so long. That was the reason
why he couldn't see what I was verbalizing to him.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
To explain that. That's fascinating what happened there.
Speaker 2 (42:15):
So we had a box that was on the back
of the ute, and I said to him, can you
just shift it this way so that the couple clothes
And for half an hour he moved it in every
single direction instead of the one that I told him to,
and I was very frustrated by that. And then finally
he moved it and he got oh it fits, And
(42:39):
I thought, wow, that's bizarre. That's really bizarre. I need
to look into this. And so I read some studies
and I looked into it. And it's because he couldn't
visualize what I was verbalizing to him because his spatial
awareness was flawed from being confined for so long.
Speaker 1 (42:56):
Wow, Okay, I hadn't even considered that sort of impact.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
Me either, and I felt terrible for being so mean
about it. I thox moved the bloody box. Literally. Yeah,
so these are all the things, and that's just one thing,
but these are all the things that families would really
benefit from. Knowing so that they can best support their
loved ones. But who's supporting them? Who's supporting the mothers,
(43:20):
the fathers, the partners, the children of people who have
been incarcerated long term, who's supporting them?
Speaker 1 (43:27):
No knowing what they're going to be like when they're
getting You said, doing change and you change, And yeah,
only if you feel comfortable are you comfortable to say
how doing change? Or notices that the change in doing
after spending so long in prison.
Speaker 2 (43:44):
When jan first got out of prison, there was a
big culture shock for him because he hadn't seen things
like the wool worst self service checkout.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
He was just very shocked by that. He was also
shocked that we don't go to austray a post to
pay our bills anymore.
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Though all on the phone we're laughing and we should
be laughing. We shouldn't, but yeah, I can understand.
Speaker 2 (44:04):
It's like a Freddie Flintstone stepping into an episode of
The Jetsons, because basically.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
Well, it does just change so constantly, doesn't it. So
take a couple of years out of the world that
continually changes.
Speaker 2 (44:16):
And things are still surprising him to this day. Ask
a lot of questions you know, needs to get up
to date on how we communicate now, on how the
internet works, because the internet back then was very different.
We had those dongles that you would kind of plug
into the side of a computer, and now it's all
you know, Wi Fi and all the rest of it.
So it's all quite mind boggling for him, and it
(44:40):
was a lot. It was just a lot of information
to intake, you know, and I imagine that a lot
of people go through that way.
Speaker 1 (44:48):
How long has he been out for.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
He was released in February of two thousand and twenty four, right, okay,
so not very long at all, just over a while,
a year and a half really he's been out for
and only now I can kind of see that he's
getting on a more even kill with getting used to
(45:11):
being on the outside. But he has a very stable
home life and he also has full time employment, so
that's probably the difference his privilege in that sense that
he's been here. He's got a skill and he's able
to utilize that skill and go and work, and also
access to really good mental health care. So there's a
lot of things that he has that we have implemented
(45:35):
that a lot of people can't. They don't have that
available to them, and I'd like to see that changed.
Speaker 1 (45:40):
How did he process because my understanding with that police raid,
you guys are asleep in bed together, and though I
would imagine for someone like doing the way you've described
him to see he's partner injured in that way, there
would be a lot of anger and rage and all
sorts of things. How did he process that?
Speaker 2 (45:59):
I think a sense of helplessness because he wasn't on
the outside to be able to look after me or
to be able to assist in any way. You know,
my mother basically nursed me back to health, as well
as the medical staff, So him not being able to
be there, he would have felt very, very helpless. I
would say, I can't speak on his behalf, but that's
(46:19):
the feeling that I get.
Speaker 1 (46:21):
Yeah, I just I would imagine the anger and that
would have gone through his mind seeing someone injured like that.
Speaker 2 (46:29):
Oh yeah, most definitely. And I think anyone would be
able to empathize with that feeling of if you see
somebody that you love hurt, or any fellow human being
being hurt, no matter what the circumstances are, you would
feel some kind of you know, anger or empathy in
and around that situation, especially because we felt it was unnecessary.
(46:52):
If they would have come to the door with a warrant,
we would have opened the door and just you know,
there was no need for the injuries, and neither of
us ever could have perceived that the level of harm
that was kind of carried out was ever going to
happen in that way.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
Yeah, was that resolved? There an inquiry into the injuries
or was there any investigation done into that?
Speaker 2 (47:17):
There was, and then there was a settlement outside of
court in regards to those injuries. And I think that
when we speak to investigations, we really need to look
at having an independent body outside of the police that
investigates police. I think that's the only way that we're
(47:37):
going to see a culture shift and some accountability in
the way that the police culture is at the moment.
So I think that's something the people really need to
be pushing for that there's an independent body that does
the investigations. When there is you know, suggestions or claims
of police misconduct.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
Well, I don't think that you haven't got an argument there.
You want if stakes have been made, you want lessons
to be learned. So the type of things don't happen then.
Speaker 2 (48:05):
And I think the public sometimes or the media I
shouldn't say, but more so the media or the other
side views it as the family wanting to have revenge
or see some kind of No, it's we don't want
it to happen to another family. All the innocent bystanders
that were involved and that were present at the time,
so innocent members of the public, So you don't want
(48:27):
to see that repeated for other families. It's not about
you know, who's right and who's wrong, and blaming and
you know, revenge, It's not about that. It's about prevention
and making sure and to anyone else.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
And look, you've got your views on police, and yeah,
there's good bike, he says bad bike, he says good police,
says bad police. But I speak for the majority of
the police, like they don't set out to injure people
or cause cause dramas. And police I have seen involved
in situations where people have been injured. If they're decent people,
(49:01):
it takes a cost on them to one wouldn't no one,
no one feels good about them, No.
Speaker 2 (49:06):
One would want to be in that situation. And I
think that's why we need to see a change or
a shift in the culture within the police force so
that these things, you know, don't happen, the preventable.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
Things, and if we do, we change the tatoo.
Speaker 2 (49:24):
Never it's Look, it's my one and only I've ever gotten.
I wasn't even allowed to have my ears pissed growing up.
Believe it or not, I do now, But I actually
got this tattoo on the day that my conditions ended,
kind of as a little bit of a fun thing
to Okay.
Speaker 1 (49:41):
I can see everyone's shocks.
Speaker 2 (49:43):
They were like, Felicia's got a tattoo. No, they didn't
believe it. My mom didn't, but no one believed it.
But no way, I did get it done, you know,
just as a little bit of a you know, celebration
of the conditions ending.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
You know, well it was pretty funny. The posts we
can have a laugh about that, But not all not
all police, not all police. The studies that you did,
what's the focus of your study and what did that
lead to?
Speaker 2 (50:10):
Okay, So the study that we did looks at the
adverse childhood experiences of people who later come into contact
with the criminal justice system. And of course we know
there's going to be a correlation there, and it's been
done extensively overseas, the ACE Study as they call it,
but we changed it so that it was more appropriate
(50:32):
to fit Australia. Obviously the cultural implications there and what
it showed is that there's always a correlation between adverse
childhood experiences and later involvement with the law. So that
tells me that we need to be looking at crime
prevention from the start, not the back end of things. Yes,
(50:54):
things can be done at the back end obviously, with
you know, helping people reintegrate to society and not reoffend excels,
especially when we're looking at out looking up our youth,
which we shouldn't be doing. Other things that can be done,
but we need to look at the social detriments that
cause crime, so poverty, mental illness, addiction, the list goes on.
I could name so many adverse childhood experiences that people
(51:18):
go through, abuse, sexual abuse, So there's so many other
things that we need to be doing and implementing for
our kids and our young people as crime prevention for
the future. And it doesn't just make sense for the
health of the nation, it makes sense fiscally. It's going
to save us money because you're going to have good
functioning citizens that are able to work, contribute, study, do
all these great things. But if they're not afforded that
(51:40):
opportunity or these things are not kind of these issues
are not scaffolded from the beginning. How can we expect
for children to be dragged up and then have no
example and then go out and be fully functioning humans.
Speaker 1 (51:53):
It's just not Look, I agree with you and the
sound logic and everything, say, how can we do that?
How can we achieve that?
Speaker 2 (52:01):
I think that that is a very long, long conversation.
But what we need to do is we need to
give better opportunities to people who have conviction histories in
regards to gaining and accessing meaningful work and skills. And
I think just look a rough example. Say we've got
(52:22):
a mother, she has charges, she has convictions, whatever it
might be, right, she comes out of prison, she wants
to get a job. She can't because there's a lot
of discrimination there when it comes to getting a job
and to workplace discrimination, et cetera. So you get knocked back.
And this happened to me. So I got knocked back
for jobs I was overqualified for and it's like a
(52:46):
slap in the face when you're trying to contribute and
trying to get back into society. So if you give
this woman a job and she's able to support herself,
she's then able to support her children. That in some
cases can eliminate child removed, which is another trauma on
the children and on the mother. And she's able to
pay her rent, put a roof over her head. And
(53:06):
if there's a partner or ex partner that's abusive or
supplying drugs or whatever it might be to that person,
they don't feel the need to go back there for
survival purposes because they can look after themselves. They are
able to house themselves, feed themselves, and look after their kids.
So you're not just giving someone a job. You're changing
the trajectory of their life, but also their children's life.
(53:26):
And that's just one thing that can be done for
crime prevention for the future, and also to break the
cycle of intergenerational trauma. Is there then watching their mum
or their dad going out to work an.
Speaker 1 (53:38):
Example, Well, I've seen too many families in different environments
where there's three generations of the family members that haven't
had gainful employment, and so yeah, you do. You follow
your parents, whether you like to or not. So you've
got to break that cycle and see those kids. Are
(53:59):
you because of your experience and the lifestyle that you've
lived or experience, What are you doing? Is there anything
that you are you speaking to people about what can
be done? Is there stuff that you're using your experience
and your knowledge together with your now education to make
a difference.
Speaker 2 (54:20):
The majority of the work that I do is speaking
about uncomfortable topics that people don't really speak about and
that are not really on the forefront. So the discrimination
that goes on in regards to hiring practices, and I
speak about the feminization of poverty. I speak about the
(54:41):
fact that a lot of people who become perpetrators are
actually victims. So I do speak about all of these things,
and I provide education on all of these things, and
I'm hoping that that's then going to be able to
inform people who whether they're in policy development, whether they're
in government, whether they're in HR, whatever aspect that they're in,
(55:03):
that that can plant a seed for them for them
to sit back and say, Hey, what can I be
doing better? Should I have more trauma informed hiring processes.
Should we change this policy, should we do A B
and C? What can I do to open doors for
people that would usually have doors slammed on their face?
And I'm not doing it as a charity or as
a favor. I'm doing it because I've got the privilege
(55:26):
to do it. So I'm going to then afford somebody
else an opportunity to be able to turn their life around.
And that's a really powerful thing for people to do
on a micro level within whatever's they're within their realm
of control. Basically, So I'm hoping to plant a seed
to challenge a stereotype of want a woman and a
person looks like as a conviction history that we're people
(55:49):
and sometimes people fuck up and it's okay. It doesn't
mean that it should be a life sentence. And like
I said, if you do whatever it is you can
do as a business owner, in government, whatever it might be,
whatever your role is. So whatever you can do that's
within your realm of control, you're actually you're actually implementing
(56:09):
crime prevention on a community level.
Speaker 1 (56:12):
I understand what you're saying, and I agree with it.
Getting it in there. Looking at the life you've had
and the life that you're living now. I see when
you're talking about that, the passion and the excitement that
comes on your face. Is this rocking your boat now
compared to the lifestyle that you used to live.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
Yeah, it is, Yeah, most definitely. I absolutely love speaking
about the issues that I speak about because I think
it's important. You cannot change people's minds until you touch
their heart, and the way to do that is through storytelling.
And I think that by telling your story you can
shift perception and stereotypes. And maybe by me speaking about
(56:53):
my experience, it's going to mean that next time somebody
applies for a job and you know the hiring managers
is that there's a gap in that resume, they're not
going to be put to the bottom of the pile.
Maybe they're going to give them a chance. That's what
I want to see happening. Less discrimination.
Speaker 1 (57:09):
Well, I think that would be a good thing. I've
had a great chat. As I said at the start,
I never thought I'd be sitting down speaking with a
Miss Australia.
Speaker 2 (57:17):
But I never thought I'd be sitting down talking with
a cop for everything gap, I.
Speaker 1 (57:21):
Know it look look at this, but thanks for sharing
your story and I found it interesting. And the book.
If people want to get your book, it's called accessory,
where can they get that?
Speaker 2 (57:33):
You can get that from any major book retailer as
well as on audible. I read the book myself, so yeah,
it's any major retailer.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
Yeah, okay, very good. And if people wanted to reach
out to you on the work that you're doing or
is there any way of getting in contact.
Speaker 2 (57:49):
With you, yeah, sure, so you can reach my team
at info I NFO, at neuro and EU R O
V hub dot com and then also just www dot
Felicia Middle dot com and also at Felicia Mid on Instagram.
Speaker 1 (58:06):
Excellent, excellent. Well, it's nice meeting you, and good luck
for the future. You've you've you've been through it, you've
had the highs, you've lowers, and you've you've got a
life of purpose at the moment, and let's say it
gays well for it.
Speaker 2 (58:19):
Thanks Gary, and thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (58:20):
Cheers,
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