Guilt and pain that never heals

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By Paul Kent

February 07, 2009 12:00am

THEY line up along the lounge, backs straight, headed to their first day of school. They have blonde hair and brown hair and green eyes and others colours hard to determine.

They love Billy Slater, they dress in high heels and practise strutting the catwalk, because one day they want to be a model. They smile toothy grins.

They cuddle their terriers and pose for photos to last a lifetime, which unfortunately those photos do. They are the children killed by their fathers.

Yet another child, it is alleged, has died at the hands of her father.

Arthur Freeman's motives for allegedly throwing his daughter Darcey off Melbourne's West Gate Bridge nine days ago are unclear.

The first question is always, why?

Karen Bell's children - Jack, 7, Maddie, 5 and Bon, 18 months - were killed last June after she fled an abusive relationship with their father Gary.

She is a broken soul these days. Only a few minutes of conversation and her pain resonates.

"I still feel guilty,'' she told The Daily Telegraph yesterday.

"I feel like I wasn't their mum. I was supposed to protect them and I couldn't. I think I will always have that guilt.'' 

In the days after her three children died, Ms Bell begged for tougher laws to protect children.

She had taken two AVOs out against Bell and the Sunday before her children died she asked police to go to her property and get her children back. In the end none of it meant a damn thing.

Police said they were powerless.

In the statement the Freeman family released this week they said, in part:

"For the past two years, the various authorities have been made aware of our fear for the safety of the children and unfortunately no one would listen.''

In the wake of this latest child death, Attorney-General Robert McClelland ordered a brief to determine what lessons can be learned.

The Government is also revisiting changes made to the Family Law Act in 2006.

"The Rudd Government believes residence and contact decisions should be made in the best interests of the child,'' Mr McClelland said.

Other government departments are also examining better solutions.

"For this Government, the safety, health and well-being of children is paramount,'' Families Minister Jenny Macklin said.

"We will use all our available resources to protect children.''

Finally something might be getting done. Or are they just words?

Nobody has bothered to approach Ms Bell and ask about the particular frustrations she experienced.

The big failure still exists. How do you protect children from those supposed to protect them most?

Ms Bell knows her husband's intent behind killing their three children was to make her feel guilty for leaving him.

She knows she cannot let him win by feeling like that, and yet she can't let it go.

It is not her fault, yet it feels so much like it is.

She is tortured by what ifs: "What if I had run away with the kids and changed our names?

What if I was hiding in the bushes watching and saw what he was going to to do? What if I had just left and moved on?

"But if I was going to do it, he would have still found me.''

Her problem is what the Government must act on - what happens when women recognise the danger before a crime has been committed.

"We are also working with the states and territories on a National Child Protection Framework,'' Ms Macklin said.

"The focus of the framework's development has been on stronger prevention, better collaboration between services, improving responses for children in care and young people leaving care and attracting and retaining the right workforce.

"The National Child Protection Framework is expected to be con-sidered by the Council of Australian Governments in coming months.''

Karen Ball saw the dangers.

"In Gary's suicide note it said that he couldn't go to jail,'' she said.

"He couldn't live without the kids, the kids couldn't live without him.

"He felt he was taking them with him because they couldn't live without him.

"When they're in that mental state, there's nothing anybody could do to stop it.''

Once a fortnight Ms Bell is counselled - helping arm her with mechanisms to cope with the pain.

A good thing, as some days she is so crippled by grief it is a small war just to get out of bed. 
Others days are better, but only ever slightly.

She visits her children's gravesites regularly, and they have long solemn chats that only serve to make real the loss and finality.

And every time another child dies needlessly her heart breaks all over again.

There are, she said, "just too many tragedies lately.''

Her voice falls almost to a whisper: "It's one thing after another.''