The grim tth of beg gay prison | Sadhbh Walshe | The Guardian

Contents:

• COOMA JAIL'S DARK PAST CLUS BEG WORLD'S ONLY 'GAY PRISON', PODST REVEALS
• COOMA JAIL: PRISON THAT WAS ONCE 'WORLD'S ONLY JAIL FOR GAY MEN'
• INSI A PRISON CELL FOR GAY FORMER GANG MEMBERS EL SALVADOR
• 10 THGS I LEARNED AS A GAY PRISONER BEHD BARS
• THE GRIM TTH OF BEG GAY PRISON
• HOW TO FD A GAY PRISONER PENPAL AND WHAT TO KNOW WHEN YOU DO
• RSIA ‘HAS SECRETLY OPENED NAZI-STYLE PRISONS WHERE HUNDREDS OF GAY MEN ARE HELD AND SOME MURRED,’ LOL REPORTS CLAIM
• GAY ADULT FILM STAR MIKE DOZER GETS AT LEAST 8 YEARS ADD TO HIS PRISON SENTENCE – VIDEO

COOMA JAIL'S DARK PAST CLUS BEG WORLD'S ONLY 'GAY PRISON', PODST REVEALS

As celebratns ramp up ahead of Sydney's annual Gay and Lbian Mardi Gras this week, a dark part of Atralia's LGBTQI+ history is beg explored by a new pots:The Greatt Menace podst explor the dark past of Cooma's jailThe se reopened the 1950s as a "gay jail"Podst maker says was the world's only "gay prison"Podst The Greatt Menace has unearthed the tth behd the world's only "gay prison, " which operated the regnal New South Wal town of Cooma om 1957 to hoe men nvicted of homosexual historic jail and one-time asylum closed the early 1900s before s reopeng. "When someone tells you that there was a gay prison signed to rcerate gay men that self was shockg enough. (Supplied: Patrick Abboud)The Amazon podst spends eight episos explorg the history of the Cooma Correctnal Centre as a "gay prison" the mid to late 1900s and clus terviews wh mat om that time.

COOMA JAIL: PRISON THAT WAS ONCE 'WORLD'S ONLY JAIL FOR GAY MEN'

"I'd walked past that prison multiple tim as a teenager gog through my own stggle wh my homosexualy, " he said. (Supplied)"I n't help but sometim feel like 's still the 50s and 60s when the NSW ernment was tryg to eradite homosexualy om the face of the earth, " he said. Image source, The Greatt MenaceImage ptn, Cooma jail was once ed exclively to imprison gay menSet one of the lst and wdit small towns Atralia, Cooma prison holds a dark only was reopened 1957 wh the specific purpose of rceratg men for "homosexual offenc", was also said to be ed as a human ttg ground wh the ultimate goal of eraditg homosexualy om 's jail is believed to have been the only known homosexual prison the world, acrdg to a new now, even some prison staff say they didn't know the real reason gay prisoners were segregated Strzelecki, 66, started as a ctodial servic officer at the prison 1979, and later set up the Corrective Servic Mm Cooma.

INSI A PRISON CELL FOR GAY FORMER GANG MEMBERS EL SALVADOR

We'd red stamp homosexual prisoners wh 'N/A': non-associatn wh mastream prisons, " he tells the BBC. "You wouldn't bunk two together… that was one of our biggt problems - keepg an eye on them, " says Mr New, now source, Thomas McCoyImage ptn, L Strzelecki (left) worked at the jail before settg up the lol Corrective Servic MmHistoril documents suggt New South Wal (NSW) Jtice Mister Reg Downg took cred for tablishg the reportedly exprsed "pri" at his pet project, tellg the Sydney Morng Herald 1957: "Nowhere Europe or Ameri did I fd any prisons where homosexuals were separated om other prisoners.

10 THGS I LEARNED AS A GAY PRISONER BEHD BARS

" A 1958 prs statement om Mr Downg nam Cooma prison as "the only penal stutn the world, so far as is known, voted specifilly to the tentn of homosexual offenrs". Prisoners at Cooma were rcerated for beg gay, or crim related to beg gay; homosexualy wasn't crimalised NSW until dranian state laws 1955 had cracked down on homosexualy.

"The legislative chang were very wi-rangg their asslt on the civil liberti of men thought to have homoerotic sir. Attempted buggery rried five years, and a harsher crackdown, a clse was add statg "wh or whout the nsent of such person" source, State Library of NSWImage ptn, Reg Downg exprsed pri separatg gay prisoners om othersBoth Mr Wotherspoon and the podst ce evince of police actg as "agents provotrs" to ce men to m homosexual acts.

THE GRIM TTH OF BEG GAY PRISON

"They'd e hunky policemen to entrap gay men by enticg them to have sex, ually public toilets, " Mr Wotherspoon 1958, the NSW ernment announced a mtee of quiry to the "e and treatment of homosexualy". It nam Cooma prison as "a special stutn for nvicted homosexual offenrs" which will "facilate the vtigatn" a "scientific evaluatn of the problem and possible solutn" has been found, Mr Downg is quoted as sayg, "the ernment nsirs that the problem mt be attacked wh vigour". ' and nclud that 'overmotherg' was "a major e of homosexualy, " says podst creator and journalist Patrick Abboud, who has spent years rearchg the prison.

HOW TO FD A GAY PRISONER PENPAL AND WHAT TO KNOW WHEN YOU DO

"We know they failed their missn to eradite homosexualy bee our podst reveals gay men havg ongog relatnships the prison. "The elive report has never been found - somethg Mr Abboud says amounts to a "ver up" source, Getty ImagImage ptn, Cooma is a town of about 7, 000 peopleIt's unclear when homosexual prisoners were no longer sent to Cooma.

Corrective Servic NSW and the NSW Department of Communi and Jtice cled to ment on the allegatns, cg their "historil nature" Abboud believ gay prisoners may have been sent there until the early 1980s, cg a 1982 statement om the rrective servic mister claimg the policy still stood. Sex offenrs were also sent to Cooma and this further stigmatised gay prisoners, says Mr Wotherspoon says, wh recent parliamentary bate of a Relig Discrimatn Bill threateng to allow discrimatn based on sexual orientatn, such recent history rri a soberg warng.

You may also be terted :Media ptn, How Atralia's first gay imam is 'savg liv'. The prison director showed him an isolatn cell, where ne former gang members—om each of the untry’s three ma anized crime groups, MS-13, and two factns of Barr 18—had been moved after g out as gay.

RSIA ‘HAS SECRETLY OPENED NAZI-STYLE PRISONS WHERE HUNDREDS OF GAY MEN ARE HELD AND SOME MURRED,’ LOL REPORTS CLAIM

“Bee the gangs, if there’s even the spicn that you’re gay, you pay for wh your life.

GAY ADULT FILM STAR MIKE DOZER GETS AT LEAST 8 YEARS ADD TO HIS PRISON SENTENCE – VIDEO

” In this particular prison, San Francis Gotera, the east of the Central Amerin untry, gang culture was not the only source of vilent homophobia. The state had effectively ced ntrol of daily life si Gotera to church lears, who preach that homosexualy is a s as grave as vlence. 8—follows Geovany, a gay man who worked as a hman for Barr 18 and left the gang 2016.

Livg the isolatn cell wh his partner and other gay mat, he grappl wh both his sexualy and his vlent past. Homosexualy remas taboo and vlence and discrimatn agast LGBTQ people is rife.

“How is possible for a untry to have s moral pass so broken that homosexualy and murr n feel the same? “But the tth is that they are already nmned: they’ve left the gang; they’ve lived wh former members of other gangs; and they’ve lived openly as gay people, ” she says. The homosexual is the same, ” says a pastor one terview laid over a scene of him preachg to rapturo crowds the prison urtyard.