Debbie Kilroy OAM – one of Australia’s leading advocates for protecting the human rights of women and children through decarceration – has been honoured with a QUT Special Excellence Award, as well as the Faculty of Law winner ahead of this year's Outstanding Alumni Awards ceremony.
Debbie’s passion for reform is the result of her personal experience of the criminal justice system and years spent in youth and adult prisons. She believes in decarecration – the process of moving away from using prisons and other systems of social control in response to crime and social issues – and has dedicated her life to helping others.
After her release in 1992, Debbie established Sisters Inside, which advocates for the human rights of criminalised women and girls, and responds to gaps in the services available to them.
The organisation employs 45 staff who connect women and girls with legal advice and representation. In addition, Sisters Inside seeks to maintain connections between mothers and their children; provide anti-violence, sexual assault and trauma support; help children and young people impacted by the criminal legal system; and facilitate participants’ access to practical life necessities.
Sisters Inside particularly recognises the overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women in Australian criminal legal systems, and actively works to include and empower First Nations women at all levels of Sisters Inside.
Despite its’ growth, Debbie has ensured that Sisters Inside continues to be driven by criminalised women, including current women prisoners. As a result, the organisation has won national and international acclaim for its unique structure and services.
Dr Jacoba Brasch, a fellow QUT Faculty of Law graduate, has known Debbie professionally for 20 years and spoke about how Debbie has committed her life to practising law and seeking justice for others.
“Without doubt, when Debbie was admitted as a legal practitioner, she could have commanded a lucrative salary package with any of the large criminal law or human rights firms in Australia, but that is not Debbie,” said Dr Brasch.
“Instead, she continued practising in a largely unrewarded area of the law through her advocacy and presentation of the most disenfranchised and disempowered in our society – women and girls entering and returning to prison.”
Over the past three decades, Debbie has built alliances across a variety of sectors – most notably the media, political and prison advocacy sectors. This, coupled with Sisters Inside’s NGO Consultative Status at the United Nations, has enabled Debbie to continue contributing to global efforts to stem the tide of women and girls who are pipelined into prisons.
Debbie was admitted to the legal profession by the Supreme Court of Queensland in 2007 and is the first female former serious offender in Australia to be admitted. As one of Queensland’s leading criminal solicitors, she now has her own law firm and draws on her lived experience, social work and legal training to provide accessible, high quality services to her clients.
The annual QUT Outstanding Alumni Awards recognise outstanding graduates of the university, and its predecessor institutions, who have displayed exceptional professional, academic or research achievements and contributions to the community.
Each winner and their achievements will be celebrated at the Outstanding Alumni Awards dinner on October 12 at Room Three-Sixty at QUT Gardens Point campus. The QUT Outstanding Alumnus of the Year will also be announced at the event.