“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body”. ~Elizabeth Stone

Captain Australia’s Crime Fighting Journal, Entry#55

Captain Australia Theme Song

I mentioned that I’ve accepted a Mission in my Quest to Fight Evil, from a small business owner (www.burgerz.com.au) in Kings Cross who is suffering from the proximity of a legal injection room which brings drug dealers and addicts like moths to a flame.  I had a freelance videographer help me take video of my Kings Cross patrol, which I will update in the next week or so & will also announce my strategy to clean up that sordid part of Australia.

In the meantime, I was given another Mission when thisafternoon I received a telephone call from a distressed citizen seeking my help.   Her son had left the house angry, and she believed that he was in a local abandoned house which squatters and addicts are known to use.  She asked me to find the boy and bring him home.

I asked why she had not phoned the police, and she put forward that she felt her son was experimenting with drugs, and that if he was absorbed into the legal system it would destroy any hope of turning him around before it is too late.  She was openly sceptical about my ability to help, but stated that the boy had been talking about me for weeks, and she’d seen my Online Journal on his computer and obtained my phone number – and felt it was worth a try.

So I set out to firstly locate this drug house where she felt he might be.  The video below is a crude recording of my efforts to canvass the locals to try and find the place, and once I found the place, to gain entry in search of the young man.  (His mother gave me permission to share their story under the proviso that I do not disclose their identities or show their faces).

As you can see, we did eventually find the place, although when trying to enter were confronted by a neighbour who threatened to call the police (more out of concern regarding our intent than worry for the boy, although I tried to explain his situation and our motive for avoiding police involvment).  I agreed to wait and speak to the police, as I hadn’t done anything unlawful (yet), and ideally obtain their consent to enter the abandoned property to look for ‘my friend’.

In fact, the police did not arrive – and about 45 minutes later the mother rang me back advising that her son had just showed up at home.  In a lovely turn of events, she asked that I visit and speak to him, which was a real honour and a privilege.  I spent about an hour and a half with them talking things through, and just got home.

Although I don’t have film of my discussion with the young man, I’m very pleased to report that things are quite hopeful for him.  With his mother around he was quite recalcitrant, but we did get the opportunity to speak alone, where he opened up and shared his own feelings on the situation – and he gave none of the usual stress indicators that a lying person does when he told me openly that he is not a drug user.

Being raised by a single mother, he felt that she was overly protective and smothering him, not allowing him to make his own mistakes, which regularly brought them into conflict.  He seemed a genuinely good kid, and there is no doubt his mother loves him – they just need to reconcile her need for control and his need for freedom.

I’ll check in again in about a week, but thankfully it looks like they didn’t really need my help after all !