Harrowing allegations of rape, beatings and staff cover-ups have been detailed in a 12-month review into a notorious Queensland mental health hospital.
Warning: This story includes descriptions of sexual violence
Brisbane’s Wolston Park Mental Hospital closed in 2001, but, for decades, it has been at the centre of disturbing allegations of abuse and chemical restraint.
An investigation by the ABC last year into historic allegations of patient mistreatment sparked a review into health services at the facility from 1950 to 2000.
The 77-page report was published on Friday, alongside an appendix of patients’ stories in their own voices.
The facility initially opened with one building. (Supplied: State Library of Queensland)
Up to 83 people expressed interest in the review, led by social worker Professor Robert Bland. Sixty-six were interviewed, including 14 former patients, 25 family members, 18 former staff, historians and a local priest.
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All of the former child patients reported being sexually assaulted at the mental hospital.
“I was beaten. I was raped. I was sodomised. I was pissed on,” one former patient said.
“If it wasn’t happening to me, you were watching it happen to someone else.”
Another former patient described being just a child and witnessing a staff member rape “a 12-year-old autistic boy tied up to an aerobics bar”.
Staff also coerced patients into having sex, according to another participant.
Patients would know when staff members wanted sex as they would hang a towel over the bedroom door, they alleged.
‘Culture of staff abuse’
Grave markers for Wolston Park Mental Hospital patients, halfway between Brisbane and Ipswich. (ABC News: Glen Armstrong)
Others spoke about a culture of staff cover-ups and abuse.
A participant who witnessed a serious physical assault on a patient alleged they were prevented from giving evidence in court by a senior member of the hospital.
“[They] said if he’s convicted, I will have a strike on my hands,’ they told the review.
The abusive staff member immediately found work at a local aged care facility after resigning, according to the patient.
Another participant claimed she was threatened by staff after witnessing them bullying and intimidating a member of her family.
“[The staff member] told me that I was never to tell anyone what I saw, and that’s when he said, ‘I’ll send you to [the] Osler House [ward] with 16-year-olds if you ever tell anyone.'”
Former Wolston Park inmates were left with their “own ghosts and demons to fight”. (Supplied:Â Queensland State Archives)
Legacy of intergenerational trauma left ‘demons to fight’
Another family member of a patient said their brother needed 40 stitches in his head after experiencing violence by a staff member.
A woman whose mother admitted herself into Wolston Park after seeing ghosts and demons around the family home, said her family had suffered a legacy of intergenerational trauma.
“So even though I’m in my 40s now, and those events at Wolston Park happened so long ago, I’ve been left with my own ghosts and demons to fight.”
Wolston Park investigation to aim to put names to graves
Chemical restraint was another common theme of the report, with one patient claiming, due to the over-medication, “You were unable to see, you were so blinded by drugs.”
Another person said their mother was subjected to heavy medication for depression and anxiety, and shock therapy, which induced coma.
“In the period of one month, she went from zero to 32 comas,” they said.
Professor Bland said arising concerns of alleged historical misconduct were referred to the Ethical Standards Unit of Queensland Health.
“I am assured that these concerns are being handled within appropriate ethical and legal guidelines,” Professor Bland said in the report.
A former patient has turned to painting Wolston Park in an effort to heal from the trauma she suffered in her time at the facility. (ABC News: Glen Armstrong)
The review made just two recommendations: that the report be made public and that participants who had requested they be named have their identities released by Queensland Health.
The review’s terms of reference prohibited participants from being named due to concerns about “the privacy of participants and non-participants”.
“Withholding their names was, for some, a further extension of their sense of being silenced by the Queensland government,” the report said.Investigating sexual violence in psychiatric wards
Survivors of Wolston Park and family members had been calling for a formal apology to all former patients and the erection of a public memorial honouring their experiences.Â
Professor Bland had previously told the ABC that the review would aim to put names to the hundreds of unidentified gravestones of former patients across Queensland cemeteries, which was also championed by survivors.
A Queensland Health spokesperson told the ABC that “while the review’s terms of reference did not include naming gravesites, building restoration, determining liability or recommending financial compensation, we are investigating options for a memorial at the site to recognise and acknowledge those who have been impacted”.
“The review cannot undo what people experienced but we hope it has given them a voice and provided some relief from their experiences,” they said.
“While we acknowledge the recommendation to publish the names of review participants with their stories, we must balance this against patient confidentiality requirements.”
One participant told the review they wanted the public not to remember them as criminally insane or unfit for society, but as a child with nowhere else to go.
“I went in there without a mental illness, and I came out with a mental illness. They gave me a life sentence, and I feel like my soul was taken,” they said.
“The nursing staff that were the abusers, who are still alive, I want brought to justice.”