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The Outback principal accused of ‘choking’ a student · The Front

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  Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
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  Speaker 1: It's Wednesday, September three, twenty twenty Five convicted criminals, including
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  Speaker 1: a drug trafficker and a sex offender, are trying to
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  Speaker 1: fight Labour's bid to hold them on Nauru. They're part
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  Speaker 1: of the so called enzed YQ cohort of convicted offenders
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  Speaker 1: who are not citizens of Australia but can't be deported
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  Speaker 1: because their home countries won't take them or they have
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  Speaker 1: no alternative citizenship. The Greens Party co founder, whose membership
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  Speaker 1: was canceled, is suing the Greens to reinstate him. Drew
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  Speaker 1: Hutton says the party has become a cult which won't
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  Speaker 1: allow any open discussion of gender or other contentious issues.
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  Speaker 1: He's told the Queensland Supreme Court the party's crushing his
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  Speaker 1: free speech. Those stories alive right now at the Australian
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  Speaker 1: dot com dot u. A principle famous for passionately advocating
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  Speaker 1: for the safety of Indigenous kids is facing charges of
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  Speaker 1: assaulting five boys, including alleged choking and ear pulling. Gavin Morris,
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  Speaker 1: former principle of Yupperinia School in Alice Springs, is pleading
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  Speaker 1: not guilty, and his lawyer has told the court the
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  Speaker 1: incidents have been unfairly characterized. That's today's episode. It's after
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  Speaker 1: dark in Alice Springs and a bunch of kids are
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  Speaker 1: joy riding in the school bus stolen from yupperin your school.
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  Speaker 1: They're weaving all over the road as other drivers scream
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  Speaker 1: at them.
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  Speaker 2: To pull over.
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  Speaker 3: Back.
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  Speaker 1: In twenty twenty three, this was one of the sites
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  Speaker 1: that horrified Australians. Little kids not even teenagers yet running
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  Speaker 1: wild in the red center. Throughout it all, a voice
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  Speaker 1: of compassion was Gavin Morris, the principle of Yepparinia School,
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  Speaker 1: which is in Araluin, a suburb of Alice.
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  Speaker 2: And these kids have had a gut full of feeling
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  Speaker 2: scared and frightened and having to find heidi holes and
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  Speaker 2: walking around the streets late at night by themselves because
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  Speaker 2: they're not safe to go home.
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  Speaker 1: The setting is insanely beautiful, huge blue skies, scrubby little
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  Speaker 1: blue malley trees and in the distance the sandstone mountains
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  Speaker 1: of the McDonald Rangers reach into the sky. But the
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  Speaker 1: community is deeply troubled. Morris has described some of the
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  Speaker 1: families at the school who he says, are often trying
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  Speaker 1: to create loving environments for their kids living in grinding poverty,
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  Speaker 1: sleeping rough in the dry Todd riverbank, or clustered in
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  Speaker 1: town camps where conditions are often appalling.
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  Speaker 2: It's not normal behavior to have ten twelve yr olds
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  Speaker 2: breaking into businesses and homes because they're trying to get
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  Speaker 2: a message across. It doesn't justify the behavior, but it
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  Speaker 2: does explain it.
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  Speaker 1: Morris was a warrior for this community, living on the
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  Speaker 1: traditional lands of the Arrent people, defending those terr away
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  Speaker 1: kids as less troublemakers, more vulnerable souls desperate for help.
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  Speaker 1: It was part of his philosophy about the school being
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  Speaker 1: there to help kids transcend their circumstances by having a
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  Speaker 1: safe place to go each day to get an education.
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  Speaker 1: He was on the Alice Springstown Council and he'd one
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  Speaker 1: government funding to offer boarding facilities so that school kids
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  Speaker 1: could focus on their studies.
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  Speaker 2: At three o'clock, these buses picked these kids up from
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  Speaker 2: school and they dropped them back into the town camps,
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  Speaker 2: which are absolutely abominations. They don't be at any human
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  Speaker 2: rights standard.
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  Speaker 1: Morris laid the blame on the organizations, including territory government
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  Speaker 1: agencies which he said were failing the children.
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  Speaker 2: The tens and tens of millions of dollars which goes
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  Speaker 2: into organizations to maintain the town camps, to establish safe
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  Speaker 2: housing and say places for Aboriginal families to live is
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  Speaker 2: absolutely failing.
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  Speaker 1: And then in twenty twenty four, Morris was charged with
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  Speaker 1: the alleged physical assaults of some of those kids. On Tuesday,
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  Speaker 1: his trial kicked off in the Alice Springs Local Court
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  Speaker 1: where Morris was arraigned on five counts of the assault
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  Speaker 1: of five boys aged from eight to thirteen years. Each
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  Speaker 1: charge has aggravating circumstances that Morris allegedly caused harm to
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  Speaker 1: the kids, and that he was an adult and they
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  Speaker 1: were very young. On each count Morris pleaded not guilty,
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  Speaker 1: and then the media and public were thrown out of
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  Speaker 1: the court.
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  Speaker 3: Normally, what would happen is that we might hear an
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  Speaker 3: opening address from the prosecution, and that did not happen.
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  Speaker 1: Joanna Panagopolis is the Australia Sian's journalist covering this trial.
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  Speaker 1: When the judge proposed closing the court, Joe stood up
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  Speaker 1: from the back of the courtroom and asked to be
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  Speaker 1: allowed to stay. So we could bring our audiences a
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  Speaker 1: proper account of the proceedings. Media usually aren't allowed to
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  Speaker 1: report the names or details of children who are alleged victims,
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  Speaker 1: or sometimes even witnesses, but often we are allowed to
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  Speaker 1: stay in court so we can without identifying children, report
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  Speaker 1: on what they're saying. In this case, no.
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  Speaker 3: Dice, so we were denied and sent out.
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  Speaker 1: But here's what we can glean about what this case
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  Speaker 1: is actually about. Two of the counts relate to allegations
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  Speaker 1: children had their ears pulled, possibly both at the same time,
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  Speaker 1: by Gavin Morris. Another relates to an allegation Morris choked
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  Speaker 1: or grabbed a child around the neck. Those details emerged
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  Speaker 1: in legal argument before the trial began, so moments of
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  Speaker 1: physical contact where the details are contested. We didn't get
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  Speaker 1: to hear the first child witness, but it's clear he's
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  Speaker 1: alleged being forcefully held by Morris. That's because a teacher,
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  Speaker 1: Oliver Tuo, gave evidence on Tuesday afternoon about what he recalls.
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  Speaker 1: Oliver Tuo described an incident where he called Morris to
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  Speaker 1: his classroom to help deal with a boy who was shouting,
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  Speaker 1: throwing punches, and hurling chairs. Tuo said he took the
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  Speaker 1: rest of the class to the school kitchen for their
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  Speaker 1: own safety, and then described seeing Morris and the boy
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  Speaker 1: coming out of the classroom. He demonstrated to the court
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  Speaker 1: a bear hug where Morris, standing behind the boy, had
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  Speaker 1: his arms around him restraining one arm while the boy
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  Speaker 1: kicked his legs towards railings and shouted, let me go.
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  Speaker 1: Tuo said he had not seen what had happened inside
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  Speaker 1: the classroom between Morris and the boy. He said he
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  Speaker 1: asked Morris if he was okay, and Morris said, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I've got this. Tuo was asked by the Crown if
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  Speaker 1: he recalled ever hearing this particular child claiming he had
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  Speaker 1: been choked by Gavin Morrow. He said he had not.
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  Speaker 1: He was also asked if he was aware of previous
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  Speaker 1: incidents involving other children bullying or throwing rocks at this
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  Speaker 1: particular child. Tuo said there were many violent incidents at
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  Speaker 1: the school and he could not recall any particular occasions
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  Speaker 1: like that. It's hid in courts, isn't it, Joe? Where
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  Speaker 1: we are as the media allowed to be there for
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  Speaker 1: Usually for most proceedings, there's often press benches provided for
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  Speaker 1: us or somewhere to sit, but it's very difficult to
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  Speaker 1: gain information. We often then find ourselves rushing to the
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  Speaker 1: registry begging them to give us documents to try and
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  Speaker 1: work out exactly what's going on. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely, I mean coming into this case, we didn't know
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  Speaker 3: anything except that there were five alleged charges and they
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  Speaker 3: were related to an aggravated assault of someone under the
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  Speaker 3: age of sixteen. And now when we enter the court
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  Speaker 3: and we don't get a lay of the land in
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  Speaker 3: terms of what mister Morris is being accused of, that
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  Speaker 3: it's hard to paint a fair and accurate report of
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  Speaker 3: what the proceedings will be and sort of what the
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  Speaker 3: next ten days which it's set down for could hold.
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  Speaker 1: Coming up another twist in the story of Gavin Morris.
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  Speaker 1: He is an additional part of the Gavin Morris mystery.
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  Speaker 1: Back in twenty twenty four, the Australians National Crime correspondent
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  Speaker 1: David Murray went to Alice Springs to report on allegations
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  Speaker 1: swirling around about another man. At the time, Gavin Morris
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  Speaker 1: was one of the people in the community, telling Dave
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  Speaker 1: he supported the kids to bring forward any allegation of wrongdoing.
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  Speaker 2: I have Aboriginal staff company all the time saying Gavin,
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  Speaker 2: can we do something about the way that we live.
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  Speaker 2: I don't deserve to go home and live with this poverty,
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  Speaker 2: with this violence. Can you help us? And what you know,
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  Speaker 2: I've got the privilege to have the principal position in
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  Speaker 2: your pernia. While I'm in this position, I'll be doing
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  Speaker 2: whatever it takes to improve the living standards in the
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  Speaker 2: town camps to get kids to school, because the way
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  Speaker 2: out of poverty is to get a job and to
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  Speaker 2: be on an employment pathway which is rich and purposeful,
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  Speaker 2: and we have to address the living standards where these
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  Speaker 2: kids are coming from.
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  Speaker 1: Now both men are before the courts. It's potentially a
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  Speaker 1: life changing moment for Gavin Morris, isn't it. He's left
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  Speaker 1: the school, he's let go of his position at the
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  Speaker 1: Alice Springs Town Council. There's a lot writing on this, Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Totally, and it feels I can only see what I'm seeing,
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  Speaker 3: but it feels to me or it appears that he's
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  Speaker 3: sort of carrying that with him as he walks in
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  Speaker 3: and out of the courthouse. It's huge. I mean, his
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  Speaker 3: whole life was here and he was obviously a pillar
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  Speaker 3: of this canmmunity embedded in many parts of it. He
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  Speaker 3: said before that he wants to clear his name, and
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  Speaker 3: I think that's very much what he's trying to do here.
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  Speaker 1: Join a Panagopolas is reporting on this trial from Alice Springs,
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  Speaker 1: and you can read her coverage by joining our subscribers
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  Speaker 1: at the Australian dot com dot au