HELEN DALLEY: Even the Ethical Standards Investigator thought sending her to isolation was inappropriate.

ETHICAL STANDARDS INVESTIGATOR: I need to understand something about — what appears to me to be the severity of your placement in a detention unit. I mean it just bewilders me.

HELEN DALLEY: Premier Beattie confirmed to Sunday Cornelia was locked in the isolation cell for a total of 5 weeks during her 6 months in prison.

Sorry, I am interested in why she was put into an isolation unit?

PETER BEATTIE: I don't know the answer to that but the inquiry should look at that.

HELEN DALLEY: If it was deemed... if it was found out that it was your prison officials who put her in there. I mean she talks about it in this interview. That you've given me the transcript of.

PETER BEATTIE: Sure. Yeah.

HELEN DALLEY: And the um ethical standards person says it just bewilders him or her — the severity of your placement in a detention unit.

PETER BEATTIE: Sure and I think the inquiry should look at that and if out of this inquiry there are some recommendations made about improving the system we'll improve it.

HELEN DALLEY: Some 4 and a half months later, Sunday understands doctors at the jail had serious concerns about her being mentally ill — she was showing symptoms of being non-communicative, not washing or eating properly and being occasionally disruptive.

So they transferred her for immediate psychiatric assessment to Princess Alexandra Hospital on August 20. Sunday's been told that when admitted her behaviour may have changed, becoming more rational and co-operative, perhaps to persuade doctors of her sanity, as she despised hospitals.

After 6 days evaluation, she was deemed not to have a serious enough mental illness to commit her to hospital against her will. But instead of freedom, she was sent back to prison.

PETER BEATTIE: There was some assessment but the assessment didn't establish that the person ah that Cornelia Rau needed to be voluntarily detained in any way.

HELEN DALLEY: So Cornelia stayed in prison in a fragile mental condition without treatment. DIMIA has confirmed it visited Cornelia there only three times in six months.

About the same time Cornelia was languishing in hospital in Brisbane , her family registered her as missing, 5 months after she disappeared. NSW Police launched a missing persons appeal, featuring Cornelia prominently on posters, even advertised in newspapers. But tragically, that did not cross state borders.

On October 5 Cornelia was transferred here to remote Baxter Detention Centre outside Port Augusta. Baxter's a highly secure prison, surrounded by electrified fences. In here Cornelia had little freedom or help.

For most of the four months detained here, she was kept in the most secure behaviour modification units known as Management and Red One. And the heart of the Palmer inquiry will be to get to the bottom of exactly why this mentally ill woman was locked up for so long and the adequacy of medical attention she received under DIMIA's care.

FATHER MICHAEL HILLIER: Here's Anna, or Cornelia, locked away in her room for 18 hours a day, not receiving the proper medical treatment that she needs.

HELEN DALLEY: Father Michael Hillier and the detainees themselves became alarmed about Anna's behaviour, and the authorities' apparent indifference to it.

FATHER HILLIER: This is going back to the 19th century. I mean, this is what happened then, and here we are in the 21st century doing it. There is no other way to see it. Just appalling.

UNIDENTIFIED BAXTER DETENTION CENTRE DETAINEE: Her behaviour is totally different than normal people. She was crying and scratching her body and just feel very impatient. She was in family compound and I have many friends in that compound. And I was told that she removed her clothes and she was naked and very sick — mentally sick, and she behaved like that. So instead of caring her, or giving medication for her sickness, they brought her to management.

HELEN DALLEY: The Management Unit is for behaviour modification, isolating detainees either for their own safety or because they're deemed trouble-makers.

ERIC UPTON: I heard this banging all the time and it was someone in the room next to me, and I noticed it was a lady because I could hear her voice.

HELEN DALLEY: Now back in the UK , Eric Upton had a stint in Baxter when he overstayed his visa. He says he became upset and outspoken because of what he claims was poor access to a dentist. The first night in the isolation cells he saw Cornelia, or Anna, the only woman detained in that unit.

ERIC UPTON: And I could hear her screaming, look I want my tea., I want my dinner, and I said to the guard you know, what's going on here? And he goes well, you know, the lady next door, she's got a bit of a problem, but she's last — she's, you know, getting fed at half past ten at night, that's not on, you know, it's not healthy. And he said, well that's just the way its run around here.

HELEN DALLEY: Refugee advocate Pamela Kerr was the first on the outside to try and investigate Anna. Her diary shows she started making calls. To Immigration, the German Consulate, mental health professionals. But seemed to get nowhere.

PAMELA KERR: In December I had conversations with five different people about Anna. Some were detainees and some were visitors who were getting information from detainees or who had seen her very briefly. Um, everyone said she was sick.

HELEN DALLEY: Eric Upton remembers an episode when guards wanted to search her room.

ERIC UPTON: She started raising her voice and screaming, you know. and the officer said, come in, and she said no I'm not coming inside. And then he came out with this couple of trays of food and then she said, 'Right that's it, you take them, you take them.' And he sort of said, 'Well I am taking them,' and then she sort of spat at him, and he just said, 'Right that's assault,' and then through my window I watched about ten officers marching down towards her room to where she was, and two of them had straps in their hands, which is like straps that would strap your hands together or your feet together.

HELEN DALLEY: Eric claims the lack of privacy for Cornelia was shocking.

ERIC UPTON: I was released from breakfast, and I was walking back towards my room and I peered through her window, just to see if she's ok. And there in a direct view I could see her standing in the shower in the nude.

I said to the officer, I said well, what's going on here? You know, 'How come she hasn't got a curtain around her, she's a lady and you've got male officers here?' And he said, 'Well look, she can't have one because she may hang herself.' I said 'Well you know, that's not right.'

HELEN DALLEY: According to Eric many guards — officers — as well as detainees were sympathetic to Cornelia's plight. He says they were both moved to Red one, still a secure unit but less restricted than management. Other detainees and clergy saw her again at Church service, inside Baxter.

UNIDENTIFIED BAXTER DETAINEE: She was going here, going there and biting a piece of paper. She just — she standing up and walking around and this and that. She just — she just work like a kid, you know, that like she did not — no responsibility. She just not care about the society, because she has no mental grounding that — in her, you know?

HELEN DALLEY: By this stage almost everyone in Baxter knows something is seriously wrong with this woman. Including senior medical staff.

Dr Andrew Frukacz the consultant psychiatrist contracted to visit Baxter detainees, speaks for the first time to Sunday about his role. Once every six to eight weeks, he flies himself to Baxter from Bathurst in NSW.

Doctor/patient confidentiality prevents him from commenting directly about Cornelia, but Sunday understands Dr Frukacz assessed her on November 6, four weeks after she had arrived.

HELEN DALLEY: If someone in detention presented with presented you with symptoms of things like withdrawal, at times being non-communicative, at times screaming and crying, at times taking her clothes off in full view of many people, how would you read those sorts of symptoms?

DR FRUKACZ: Well certainly those kind of symptoms would lead one to strongly consider the diagnosis of a psychotic condition such as schizophrenia.

HELEN DALLEY: Sunday can independently reveal that Dr Frukacz's consultation notes show Anna was uncooperative — she gave no history to him — and had said she did not want help. Despite those difficulties, the notes say, that 'her posturings, bizarre behaviour, withdrawal and guardedness lead me to considering schizophrenia.'

DR FRUKACZ: I would be suggesting that people who are seriously mentally ill in that setting — in the setting of the schizophrenia form of illness, should not be in a detention centre. They should be in hospital.

HELEN DALLEY: The notes recommend that the only way to make the diagnosis would be a further period of hospitalisation for observation, then possible treatment.

The notes offer an alternative, that she be monitored in detention, but they make it plain that 'this is not likely to lead to as good an assessment as would be able to be done in a hospital.' DIMIA confirmed to Sunday, advice that she should be sent to hospital. But amazingly, that recommendation from the employed psychiatrist was not followed through. Cornelia was not sent to hospital, staying in Baxter for a further three months.

But surely if you see someone and you want them to go to hospital, how do you feel when they don't go to hospital and weeks go past?

DR FRUKACZ: If that were happening to a patient of mine, then I would be outraged and appalled.

HELEN DALLEY: Other psychiatric professionals like Dr Jon Jureidini agree that the treatment of mental illnesses in Baxter is simply inadequate.

DR JON JUREIDINI: The net effect of the various bureaucracies and the kind of atmosphere and culture of hostility I think — that that seems to us from outside to pervade that system, prevents people from getting appropriate care.

DR ANDREW FRUKACZ: It is very difficult um for myself and I must say for the other medical and psychological staff there to do that job. And it's difficult because it's done in a custodial environment um where often the emphasis is on security rather than care. And I think its quite understandable that the detainees would see this as an example of an uncaring bureaucracy.

HELEN DALLEY: Its unlikely the system will change, despite its catastrophic impact on people like Cornelia Rau. Giving detainees the same rights as most other Australians, would contradict the hardline govt policy of deterring asylum seekers. They will always remain 'non citizens'.

Few people believe that the investigation into Cornelia's case being conducted by former police chief Mick Palmer will have the powers to reveal the truth about how and why the system failed.

PETER BEATTIE: There are two flaws with the inquiry that worry me that will limit his ability. The first is it's not judicial. Now that means because of privacy concerns, there may be a — a limit on what can and can't be said either during the inquiry or afterwards. And the other issue is I'm worried if the inquiry doesn't have judicial powers, that they can't actually make people answer questions.

DEBBIE KILROY: It was an open public inquiry with powers um in regards to whistleblower protection, yes I believe staff would. If they knew that their job was protected, that they would be protected and they could talk out honestly, I believe people would come forward.

HELEN DALLEY: So do you think it's going to reveal anything?

DEBBIE KILROY: The private inquiry?

HELEN DALLEY: The Palmer inquiry.

DEBBIE KILROY: I haven't got much hope.

HELEN DALLEY: Cornelia's sad journey finally ended when her parents identified her on Feb 4. They had noticed a newspaper reference to a sick German woman in detention, which led to police sending them a photograph of Cornelia taken in Baxter.

Their lost daughter was found. Suddenly, the wrongly detained Cornelia was sent to Glenside psychiatric hospital in Adelaide , where she's now under constant medical supervision and medication. Doctors say her recovery is slow, but heartening, as she's now starting to recognise her real name.

CHRIS RAU: The worst possible place for someone with a mental illness, who is terrified of being locked up is in a place where they are locked up for 18 hours a day. I can imagine for her it was one of the most horrific experiences she's ever had. Hopefully we can learn something from this.

PAMELA KERR: On Thursday, Anna was a detainee in Baxter, regarded as a behaviour problem, and then magically on Friday morning, when Anna turns into Cornelia, an Australian resident with an Australian family, she's taken out of Baxter, and treated seriously as a woman with a severe mental illness.

I mean you can't get away from the fact that Anna the asylum seeker, Anna the detainee, was nothing, deserved nothing, and got nothing. Cornelia the Australian resident, one of us, is entitled to the sort of care that we'd want for our own.
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Transcript produced by Media Monitors – The Sunday Program