Glen Fisher on Kings Cross down under the Predators' Paradise

Glen Fisher is an incredible survivor of Australia's notorious Kings Cross. His book Predators’ Paradise is a raw and vulnerable account of Glen’s life. Today Glen supports survivors in healing, seeking justice and finding their voice. He speaks out on survivor mental health and has fought to place four abusers behind bars. There are more predators who need to be held accountable and Glen is fighting on to have them arrested.

He was born into violence and addiction. His mother was addicted to drugs and alcohol and had mental health issues as well as a propensity to violence with her husband and children. The father was arrested and the parents did not reunite after his release. Shunted between his parents and care homes, the violence and cruelty inflicted on Glen left him broken and untrusting. His determination to survive is remarkable.

In his world where no-one could be trusted or confided in, Glen was raped by a friend of his parents at age nine and so he spent most of his energy hiding from the rapist and his parents’ rages. His childhood was lived walking on eggshells.

Glen became a runaway and ended up in institutional ‘care.’ Sent back to his father by authorities, Glen was rejected and abandoned in the streets of Kings Cross.

Here predators of all descriptions pounced on the vulnerable child, even while he lived in a refuge that he believed would be safe. His innocence and health were destroyed by people he trusted because they were in positions of power. Police corruption was rife in the 1980s and protection rackets enabled paedophiles, drug dealers and all sorts of criminals to thrive unchecked. Challenging the police gave them reason to set Glen up for any crime they chose and he was regularly arrested. None of the charges led to conviction.

Unable to deal with the pain of the rape and murder of his fifteen year old girlfriend Linda, Glen turned to heroin to dull his senses and he lived the harsh life of an addict with all its battles and repeated brushes with death, alone in back alleys of Kings Cross. This story clearly shows that there is nothing glamorous about heroin addiction.

Inevitably Glen found himself in prison. Here he learned to navigate the unforgiving system while withdrawing from heroin and coping with the traumas of flashbacks from his past.

Prison enabled this man to get himself into good physical shape and better his education by doing a series of trade and computer courses. He was awarded a General Certificate of Education (equivalent to a School Certificate) which was quite an achievement for a person with very little formal education.

After prison Glen found love and became a father. Here was the incentive for him to escape the demons of the past and turn his back on addiction. He fights hard, fails often and eventually succeeds.

Haunted by his abusers he is driven to fight for justice for himself and the many friends he lost along the way. Having been told by the worst of his abusers that he would never get justice or write a book, Glen became even more determined to do both.

The justice system is a maze of heavily flawed processes. Glen knows this but he keeps fighting. He gave evidence about police corruption and protection of paedophiles at the Wood Royal Commission and also at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse. He assisted police to hold three abusers accountable in court cases that led to their convictions and imprisonment.