http://www.insideoutpathways.org/

InsideOut Pathways Inc, 7/220 Mt Glorious Road, Samford (2026)

27/10/2026

I don't usually respond to comments on here. I don't even write half the posts on this page anymore after receiving a warning from the deputy commissioner of QCS.

But every now and then.. someone drops a comment that I think deserves a proper response.

This ones brought to you by a (former?) CCO who feels comfortable enough making personal allegations about me while raising a whole range of problems within QLD's prisons.

Not really bothered by some chocolate 🪿 telling me I'm full of s**t.. I've been called worse lol.

But there are a few things in his comment I'd like to address.

He asks why I don't advocate for drug-free prisons.

Well, 1)... pretty sure prisons are meant to be drug free.. so wtf do you want from me?
and 2) making drugs illegal doesn't treat addiction. You can punish the s**t out of someone for having an addiction, it's not going to make it disappear.

Then he goes on about the rehabilitation programs. And how people attend (after waiting over a year to get on), and continue to use drugs.. and that some only participate to satisfy parole requirements. Yeah, there is truth in that. But you know what? You can't force someone to genuinely change.

People don't just end up struggling with addiction or getting involved in crime for no reason. There's often years of s**t that's happened in their lives leading up to that point.

Why is there not more investment in treatment, education, housing and support BEFORE people's lives even reach that point??

Then there's personal responsibility.

Yes. People should take responsibility for their actions.

But. When did trying to UNDERSTAND why someone behaves a certain way become the same thing as excusing their behaviour?

If a child grows up surrounded by violence, abuse, neglect and substance use, do you just ignore all that when they eventually start showing those very behaviours they've grown up around?

OR if someone has spent their whole life in poverty, living rough, struggling with addiction or never had some kind of stable support network.. do you just pretend none of those circumstances had any bearing on the decisions they made?

None of that means people ARENT responsible for the harm they cause...

But if preventing harm is the goal, surely understanding what contributed to it matters.

Also, here's an interesting one... 'prisoners teaching one another criminal behaviour'.

Yeah, that happens too. I've watched young men turn into criminals inside.

So if people are learning further criminal behaviour while they're incarcerated, shouldn't you be questioning why you continue placing people in those environments and expecting them to come out better?

Imagine joining a gym to get healthier. Only to find out the equipment is broken, the trainers are hopeless and can't even count muster.. oops i mean reps, and none of the members have had any progress or are getting injured. Why would anyone bother?

Then the owner rocks up and says the problem is lack of personal responsibility.

At what point do you start questioning whether 'the gym' itself is the problem?

Next one, victims.

Apparently, because I spend my time advocating for people who've offended in the past, I mustn't care about the victims.

This high IQ CCO literally writes this comment on a post which is all about preventing more people from becoming victims.

Pretty sure you can care about victims of crime AND want to understand why people offend. Those two are not mutually exclusive. And you can support someone who's been incarcerated without condoning whatever circumstances led to them being there.

Oh yeah, he also reminds me that they're called CORRECTIONAL CENTRES for a reason.

Ok champ, here's something worth remembering: this years report from the Queensland Audit Office.

"Queensland Corrective Services (QCS) does not effectively plan for and facilitate the rehabilitation and reintegration of it's prisoners".

Their words, not mine..

"Correctional Centre" lol. Hilarious.

F**k your correctional centre. I have zero interest in building better prisons so you guys can keep filling them. I am more interested in pouring the resources needed into building a society where we don't need them.

If safer communities are genuinely the goal, then our success should be measured by how much harm we prevent, not by how many people we manage to lock up.

27/10/2026

BREACH BAIL, GO TO JAIL. BUT DOES THAT ACTUALLY MAKE QUEENSLAND SAFER?

Here at InsideOut Pathways, there's something we'd genuinely like people to think about, regardless of where they stand politically.

What does making the community safer actually look like?

This week, the Queensland Parliament is expected to debate the Crisafulli Government's proposed "Breach Bail, Go To Jail" laws.

For anyone who hasn't been following, the Government wants to introduce a new offence for people who commit certain serious crimes while already on bail. If convicted of that additional offence, they would face a mandatory minimum of 12 months in custody, which must be served in full.

The proposed laws would also make it harder for adults and children accused of certain serious offences while on bail to be granted bail again.

The Government also wants to change the rules for children, so police would no longer have to consider other options, like giving a warning or referring them to a diversion program, before deciding to take them to court.

To be clear, this isn't about someone just missing a curfew or forgetting to report to police. The mandatory sentence is aimed at people who commit specified serious offences while already on bail or in certain related circumstances.

Now, we understand why people want something done about serious crime. Nobody wants to see another person assaulted, another family lose someone they love, or another child experience violence.

But surely there's more to preventing serious crime than deciding how severely someone should be punished after it's already happened?

Why isn't there just as much attention given to what led to that offence, what could have prevented it, and what might stop it from happening again?

Because there's a hell of a lot more to community safety than coming up with slogans that sound good at a press conference.

Does locking someone up for longer actually make the community safer, or does it just mean they're not in the community for that period of time?

If someone commits a serious offence, goes to prison for 12 months, two years or five years, what happens during that time?

Do you think people genuinely change in prison? Do they come out better equipped to live differently? Does spending more time behind bars address whatever circumstances contributed to their offending?

Does any of this prevent the next person from becoming a victim?

That's something we'd really like people to think about.

Whenever InsideOut Pathways speaks about supporting people leaving prison, there are often comments asking why nobody is talking about victims.

And we understand why people ask.

But there's something that often gets overlooked in these conversations.

A lot of people who have spent time in prison have also been victims themselves.

Some have experienced childhood abuse, domestic violence, neglect, sexual assault or other forms of violence long before they ever committed an offence. Some have grown up in circumstances that most people couldn't begin to imagine.

That doesn't excuse what they've done, and it certainly doesn't take away from the experiences of anyone affected by their actions.

If the goal is genuinely to have fewer victims, shouldn't there be just as much conversation about preventing people from reaching the point where they commit those offences in the first place?

Because surely, the more people who can be supported to build stable, meaningful lives away from the justice system, the better chance there is of preventing further offences and more victims.

Most people who go to prison will eventually come out. Whether they've spent 12 months, five years or ten years inside, they're coming back into the communities.

So what happens then?

What happens when someone comes out with nowhere to live, no job, no support, broken relationships and absolutely nothing going for them?

When you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose.

And before someone jumps in with the usual argument about how people make their own choices and need to want to change, of course they do.

But wanting to change and actually having the opportunity to do so are two VERY different things.

You can want to turn your life around more than anything in the world, but that doesn't magically put a roof over your head. It doesn't make an employer overlook your criminal record. It doesn't put food on the table or repair relationships.

People love to talk about personal responsibility, but what exactly are they expecting someone to do when every door they knock on keeps getting slammed in their face?

They need to actually have some better options in front of them.

So we'd genuinely like to hear what people think.

Do you believe keeping people in prison longer will make Queensland safer? Do you think prison changes people? And what do you think would actually help prevent someone from committing another offence?

Because at the end of the day, isn't that what everyone should want?

Fewer people committing crimes. Fewer people becoming victims. And fewer people ending up in prison in the first place.

17/10/2026

Only the Queensland Government could have a prison system that's failing and decide the answer is to give the people inside it fewer human rights protections.

And that's pretty much what's being proposed under its latest prison and parole legislation.

And of course.. the justification is public safety.

Under the proposed changes, prison authorities would no longer have to meet certain obligations under Queensland's Human Rights Act when making a wide range of decisions about people in their custody. The law currently requires authorities to consider people's basic human rights and whether restrictions on those rights are justified.

The Government wants to remove those requirements from many prison management decisions, including decisions affecting people on remand who haven't even been convicted of a crime.

The Government also wants to introduce tougher restrictions around parole, including preventing certain prisoners from applying for years at a time.

But here's what I don't understand...

How does any of that make the community safer??

I don't think people really understand how much control you lose over your own life when you're in prison. Pretty much everything you do depends on someone else's decision. Where you're housed, when you get to see your family, whether you can get into a program, whether you can work, the colour of your shoes...

Prison authorities already have an enormous amount of power over people in custody. So why tf would removing some of those obligations that keep that power in check be a good thing?

Going to prison is already the punishment.

You're separated from your family, your kids grow up without you, relationships fall apart, and you lose years of your life that you're never getting back. And somehow, all of that is supposed to make you a better person?

This whole idea that you can take someone who's already struggling, lock them away from society, strip away almost every bit of independence they have, and expect them to come out better equipped to deal with life has never made much sense to me.

And now the Government wants to weaken some of the protections that are supposed to stop that power from being abused?

Then there's the parole changes.

Being eligible for parole doesn't mean someone is automatically getting out.

It means their circumstances can be assessed and a decision made about whether they're suitable for release.

But imagine spending years trying to do everything that's expected of you.

Staying out of trouble, working, completing programs when you can actually get into them, maintaining relationships on the outside and trying to give yourself something to look forward to.

And then being told that you might not even be allowed to apply for another 5 or 10 years. What does that do to someone?

What happens when people start believing that nothing they do matters anymore? That no matter how hard they try, how much progress they make or how much they've changed, they're no closer to getting another chance?

I'm not saying everyone is suddenly going to give up.. but it's not difficult to understand how taking away someone's hope can affect their mental health, their behaviour and their willingness to keep trying.

And don't forget the consequences of that don't just affect the person inside. Their families are living through it too.

Now heres what makes this whole thing even more frustrating.

In July this year, the Queensland Audit Office released a report identifying serious failures in rehabilitation and reintegration.

More than 1000 prisoners were waiting to access rehabilitation programs. Thousands more were waiting for wellbeing programs. Fewer than half of those leaving custody had received pre-release support.

The average waiting time to get on a rehabilitation program was one year and four months.

Have a think about that for a second.

People are expected to address their issues, complete programs. demonstrate progress and prepare themselves to return to society.

But the very 'system' thats supposed to give them those opportunities isn't providing enough access to them.

And instead of addressing those failures, the government is proposing more restrictions...

How tf does that even make sense?

And this is where their whole public safety argument falls apart...

Most people in prison eventually come home. They're coming back into the community, looking for work, finding somewhere to live, reconnecting with their familes and trying to build a life.

What happens to someone while they're inside doesn't just disappear the moment they walk out the gate.

And neither do the circumstances that may have contributed to them ending up there in the first place.

Poverty, addiction, homelessness, trauma, lack of opportunity... Locking someone away doesn't automatically fix any of those things.

So if the Government is genuinely concerned about public safety, why isn't it putting the same energy into addressing those problems?

Why aren't we talking about housing, healthcare, education, employment and proper access to drug and alcohol treatment and mental health support?

Why does the answer always seem to be more punishment, more restrictions and more time behind bars?

Making people's lives harder is not going to make the community safer.

16/10/2026

This photo was taken 2.5 years ago.

We all caught up for breakfast, fresh out of prison. We all sat and spoke about our experience and struggles, and shared a laugh at our own expense. I even needed help with learning how to use my phone again. Despite all of that, we were all hopeful. We were ready to start our new chapter and build a new life.

Now what a lot of people won't see is what it's actually like to walk out of the QLD prison system. You grab your bag of belongings, cop a cheeky 'See you when you come back' from chiefy at the gate, then you're on your own. No job lined up. For many, no housing security. No real plan to rebuild your life. Centrelink gives you enough to choose either a roof over your head, or food in your belly.

'We're FREE!!', but without support or work, most people are set up to fail before they even make it home.

We all helped each other out the best we could. I did my best to write up resumes for two of the boys. One had a trade, the other had a solid background in hospitality. Another one of the guys wanted to study Cert III & IV in Fitness with me - he had so much potential but couldnt afford the downpayment to start.

The motivation and willingness to change was there. But without opportunity, motivation alone isn't enough to keep you free. It's like trying to run a race with your shoelaces tied together. No matter how hard you try, you just can't get ahead. How long do you keep pushing until you go back to what worked for you?

Today, only two of us remain on the outside. The only two who managed to find a way to make a living.

Employers - every time you give someone a chance, you're re-writing the course of a life, a family, and a community. Recidivism is complex, however a steady job plays a big part in giving people the stability they need to build a life outside prison.

When you open a door - as well as helping someone break the cycle, you're also making our communities safer, stronger, and more connected. It's the difference between another statistic, or another success story.

Want to make a real difference? Get in contact and help someone take their next step.

20/09/2026

This is Krystal… one of our own… and she has just been named the 2026 Queensland Training Awards Equity Student of the Year.

The award recognises her achievement, but no trophy could tell the full story of what it took to reach that stage.

She is such an inspiration to me. Her road hasn’t been easy, and she has experienced things that can change a person’s entire future. She’s been knocked down in ways most will never see, fought battles most will never know about and had to rebuild herself more times than anyone ever should.

Nearly 20 years after beginning her apprenticeship, Krystal went back and finished what she started.

But determination alone couldn’t have brought her here. Somebody had to look beyond her past, recognise what was inside her and give her an opportunity.

Someone opened a door… Krystal f*cking ran through that mf.

It didn’t erase her past or make the road easy. It just gave her the chance to prove what she could do.

And look what she’s done with it.

But her achievements aren’t the reason we love her as much as we do.

I love the way she treats people. She knows what it feels like to be judged by your past, and she refuses to judge anyone else by theirs. She offers her chair, her time and her skills to people rebuilding their lives. When she sees someone struggling, her first thought is always about how she can help.

She has been there through some of my hardest moments too, always checking in and reminding me I don’t have to carry everything alone.

Then, during a moment that belonged entirely to HER, she stood on that stage and chose to speak about second chances and InsideOut Pathways.

Even in one of the biggest moments of her journey, she was still thinking about lifting other people up beside her.

After the gala, she told me, “It’s all swings and roundabouts. We’ll make it to the top together.”

And that is Krystal.

Krystal, we are so f*cking proud of everything you have overcome, but even prouder of the human being you are.

Having you on the IOP team is an honour, and calling you our sister is something we will never take for granted.

We love you, Krystal!!! You deserve every bit of this 🧡

18/09/2026

Hey guys.

We've had a few people reach out lately who are understandably unhappy that we haven't responded or haven't been able to help, and I've noticed a few comments about it on our posts too. And I totally get the frustration.

If you've reached out because you're struggling, looking for work, you're trying to help someone or you're in a s**t situation and nobody gets back to you... I understand why you'd be pi**ed.

But what I'd like people to remember is that we're all volunteers.

There isn't a team of paid staff sitting in an office answering messages. There's no case workers being paid to manage a certain number of people each day. We don't have people to cover when another person is struggling or unavailable.

I mean, it's the goal... I'd love to one day have a place IOP can call home and no longer have to take Zoom calls from my daughters bedroom. But for now, we're just ordinary people trying to help where we can.

Lately, we've been down a couple of volunteers, and since then I"ve also had to take a step back myself. We've had to deal with some pretty heavy situations in the last little while.

You wouldn't believe some of the s**t people are going through behind closed doors while the rest of the world just keeps moving around them. Its pretty hard to put the phone down and just forget about it.

On top of that, I've had some things going on in my own life as well, so between everything else, it became too much.

So yes, we've fallen behind.

Our email and DMs are backed up. And I got a heap of unread texts. There are people I've told I'd call who I haven't called yet... and I'm sorry to those who have been left waiting.

Opportunities have been missed, as employers have reached out and I just haven't been on top of things enough to follow through.

And that's a f*cked feeling.

People have trusted us enough to ask for help, sometimes telling us things they probably havent told many other people. Employers have trusted us enough to offer someone an opportunity.. and knowing that either of those things might have gone unanswered because I haven't been able to keep up doesn't sit well with me.

Anyway, we've had a pretty promising week. Had some really good conversations with people who want to get involved and help us build some proper capacity around what we're doing.

We are going to spend the next week working through everything, and hopefully by the end of next week we'll be pretty close to being caught up.

If you're waiting on us, please feel free to follow up!

And while I'm here I may as well put this out there too;

If you've followed Insideout Pathways for a while, believe in what we're trying to do and have a little bit of time or skills you could volunteer, I'd love to hear from you.

That could look like helping someone build a resume... calling employers... following up referrals... finding services or accomodation options... helping with fundraising or partnerships... or maybe you've got a completely different skill that could be useful.

You don't need to have worked in this space before.

What matters to me more is how you see people.

Been to jail? Supported someone who has? Or neither? Doesn't matter. If you'd like to have a discussion about what you could bring to InsideOut Pathways, send me an email.

Just don't get angry if it takes me a little while to reply haha

Vincent
[email protected]

17/09/2026

Get out of jail. Find a job. Stay off the gear. Find somewhere stable to live. Surround yourself with better people and start rebuilding your life.

That's pretty much what people expect from someone the moment they leave prison.

Sounds easy enough when you put it like that.

We're currently trying to help a young 24 year old who was released from Woodford earlier this year.

Growing up, his parents weren't able to care for him, so a lot of his childhood was spent either living with his grandmother in kinship care or in different placements through child safety.

As he got older, he found something he enjoyed and started an apprenticeship as a Small Engine Technician, working on motorbikes. He completed 2 of the 3 years before being involved in a motorcycle accident that left him injured. He struggled to physically keep up at work and eventually lost his job.

Things became pretty unstable from there. Substance abuse became part of his life, he struggled to maintain employment and housing, spent a heap of time homeless and eventually ended up in prison.

When he was released earlier this year, there wasn't stable housing waiting for him. He spent the first few months couch surfing before his aunt gave him somewhere to stay. He's finally got some stability and routine back in his life and has decided he wants to go back and finish the apprenticeship he started years ago.

And he has found an employer willing to give him that opportunity.

He's got a year left to complete, but before he can start he needs his own tools. He's currently receiving the Disability Support Pension, which means there isn't a lot of funding available to help cover the cost of the tools he needs, and unfortunately Insideout Pathways isn't in a financial position to purchase the lot for him either.

So we're putting it out to the community to see if between all of us, we can get this young bloke what he needs to start work.

We're looking for a socket set, hammer, screwdriver set, impact wrench and a toolbox.

None of it needs to be brand new either. Whether you're a mechanic or tradie with some decent tools sitting around, or you own or work for a business that could help us out with something on that list, please reach out!

One thing we've learned through IOP is just how much people are willing to do for someone they've never met when they're actually given the opportunity to help.

There is something pretty powerful about that.

This young man has spent a chunk of his life feeling like he was on his own. He didn't have the stability growing up that a lot of people take for granted, he's experienced homelessness, he's been through prison and now at 24 he's trying to put some decent foundations underneath himself.

He doesn't need someone to come along and save him. He just needs people in his corner.

His aunt has given him somewhere to live. An employer has given him an opportunity. And now theres a chance for a few complete strangers to help him with the last thing standing between him and getting back into his trade.

Nobody has to do too much. And that's the whole point.

Community: people who don't have to know you to care what happens to you.

This young bloke is having a crack at rebuilding his life. Let's make sure he knows there are plenty of people in his corner while he does it 🧡

** EDIT: If anyone would like to donate a few dollars to go towards getting this young man started, bank details can be found below:

Account name: InsideOut Pathways Inc
BSB: 633 000
Account: 232 260 364
Reference: Tools

Anything over $2 is tax deductible so if you would like a receipt please email me on [email protected]

We'll close this one off by 12pm tomorrow (friday 18/09) and I will let you guys know how we went 🙏

11/09/2026

If you believe sentences are too soft, young offenders need to be locked up for longer, and "adult crime, adult time" is the answer, I'd like you to read this woman's story.

Because if there's anyone who should agree with you, it's her.

Her father was killed by a drunk driver.

Years later, her husband was murdered by a teenager, who went on to reoffend after being released.

Two heartbreaking losses, both caused by other people's actions.

I'd say most people who argue for harsher laws have never lived through anything close to that level of pain. But she has. Twice.

And not one person would blame her for wanting the system to hit harder.

You'd expect someone with her history to be the loudest voice saying longer sentences are the answer. You'd think she'd be the first to argue that the only way to stop people is to keep them locked away for as long as possible. You'd think she'd be cheering for "adult crime, adult time" louder than anyone else.

But shes not.

Before I go any further, I'd just like to thank this person and acknowledge the strength it would take to relive and share her story. She doesn't owe us any of it. She gave her story so people could understand what really happens behind the headlines, and I'm genuinely grateful she trusted us with something this personal.

When her father died, her mum fell apart.

There was no support, no counselling, no intervention.

She turned to he**in.

That addiction turned her family's whole world upside down. It led to a life of crime to support her habit, resulting in years of prison sentences. Six months. Twelve months. Eighteen months. Over 13 years.

And every time mum went inside, her childhood got ripped apart again.

She grew up in cars, caravan parks, drug houses and strangers' places. There was no stability. She went to over 10 different primary schools. Always on the move, always on the run from DOCS.

She was a child looking after her younger siblings, trying to protect them from a system she'd watched fail countless kids.

At 9 years old, she was made to stay with her mum's partner's parents. She begged not to be placed there.

No one listened.

She ended up living through abuse no child should ever see. She was beaten, often unfed, and eventually hospitalised with scabies and malnutrition.

But that was the state's solution.

Remove her mum. Punish her mum. Send her to prison again and again.

And leave the children to live with the consequences.

She ran away at 13 and found her late father's family. They loved and cared for her, but she struggled to believe she deserved it because she'd spent her whole life carrying the judgement that came with her mum's addiction.

Most of the kids she knew grew up around housing commission and were going through the same things. She's lost friends to drugs, prison and exploitation.

When she got a bit older, Wesley Mission gave her a house so she could raise her siblings properly.

She worked 3 jobs. At a Chinese restaurant, a Thai restaurant and a seafood shop.

Her brother developed schizophrenia after years of trauma and she spent 6 years battling a mental health system that wanted to over medicate him rather than help him.

Today, her sister is in the Navy, another sister has a family and career, and her brother is stable, medicated and living independently.

She held that whole family together when she was still a kid herself.

After surviving all that, she finally built a safe, stable life.

And then her husband was murdered.

During the trial, she listened to the young man's upbringing.

He also had a he**in addicted parent, and a lot of his story was similar to the conditions she survived.

It didn't excuse what he did. But because of everything she'd lived through herself, she understood how someone raised in that environment could end up making the wrong choices.

He did his time, in maximum security.

No support. No rehab. No structure.

"Prison turned him into a monster just to survive", she says.

Not because he wanted to become one, but as a young person, that's what the environment demanded of him.

So when he was released, he didn't walk out better.

He walked out worse.

And he reoffended.

The length of his sentence didn't matter, because nothing about locking him in that environment addressed what brought him there in the first place.

Prison didn't undo the trauma. It didn't teach him how to live differently. It didn't give him stability, connection or belonging.

It punished him.

Then eventually sent him back into the community.

For her as a victim, the sentence did nothing for her pain.

"No matter how long the sentence is, it will never change the impact on your life."

"You still have to navigate your pain."

"Longer sentences don't fix behaviour. They deepen the damage."

She described a moment of hatred that almost consumed her during the two year trial.

Her grief, her childhood trauma and her anger collided.

She collapsed on the kitchen floor imagining ways to make him feel what she felt. She said she could feel hate taking over her body.

And in that moment, she realised the hate was going to destroy her long before it destroyed anyone else.

"Forgiveness wasn't about him. It was about saving myself."

She learned to understand a truth that the "tough on crime" gang refuse to see.

If prison doesn't change people, the length of the sentence doesn't matter.

You can add another year. Add five. Add ten.

Eventually, most people come home.

And if what happens inside leaves them more traumatised, more disconnected, more institutionalised and less equipped to live outside, what exactly have we made safer?

What actually keeps communities safe, she believes, is human connection. Support. Stability. Understanding.

"One person caring can change someone's whole life direction."

And she knows this because she's lived it.

When someone reached out for her; Wesley Mission... or her father's family, her life shifted.

When no one reached out to her mother, everything fell apart.

That's the part punishment keeps missing.

Her mum didn't need another prison sentence.

She needed help.

Her children didn't need their mum repeatedly disappearing behind a prison wall.

They needed safety and stability.

And locking that young man in a violent system for years didn't undo what had already happened to him. It just added more to it.

None of that means pretending what people do doesn't matter.

It means asking a much harder question.

Do we actually want fewer victims?

Or do we just want harsher punishment after another victim has already been created?

She is exactly the person pollies imagine when they argue for tougher sentencing.

She is the person the public thinks they're defending when they call for harsher punishments.

She is the person who could justify carrying hate for a lifetime.

But she's the one saying,

"Longer sentences won't fix anything if people walk out more broken."

She doesn't want revenge.

She wants change.

Real change that stops the next child from going through what she did. The next teen from ending up where her husband's killer did. And the next family from losing someone they love.

There's nothing tough about waiting until another person is dead, another child is traumatised or another family is destroyed, and then demanding a longer sentence.

Tough would be doing something before it gets to that point.