A mother-of-four serving time in prison for her role in a kidnapping has burst into tears while discussing the gaping hole left in her children’s lives, but says they don’t visit her in jail as it’s ‘not a good place’.
Brittany has been behind bars at for three months at Dillwynia Correctional Centre, in Sydney’s northwestern outskirts, after becoming what she described as an ‘unwilling’ driver in an abduction.
The mother-of-four, who admits to previously being hooked on ice, was handed a three years and six month sentence and will not be eligible for parole for more than 12 months.
While she sits in a cell, her children are in her father’s care hitting major life milestones – and memories she will never get back.
Brittany (pictured) is behind bars at in Sydney’s northwest after being sentenced to three years and six months for kidnapping
‘I don’t get to bond with them,’ she said through tears.
‘I miss all that. I’m missing it all.
‘I never thought I would end up in here’.
The mother-of-four is one of a number of prisoners who are sharing their stories for Channel Nine’s new series Australia Behind Bars, which premiered on Thursday night.
Of the almost 3,300 women in locked up in jails across Australia, more than 2,000 are mothers.
Brittany said becoming a parent at a young age likely delayed her first encounter with the prison system.
‘I had my first born when I was 14 years old,’ she told the program.
‘She was just a breeze of a kid. She was awesome.
‘It was hard. I lost a lot of my teenage years, but I suppose it was probably a good thing. I am in jail now, so I hate to see where I would have been if I hadn’t had her.’
The mother-of-four (pictured with her kids) burst into tears speaking about how she is missing out on her children’s lives
If Brittany gets parole, it will be more than a year before she gets to see her three youngest children.
She said her incarceration has greatly affected her kids and it has been ‘a lot for them to take in’.
While she is entitled to visitation rights, her father is yet to bring them to see her.
‘They know I’m in here. It isn’t something I have hidden from the kids,’ she said.
‘I don’t want my kids to think I am somewhere where I can come home to them.
‘My dad, my parents, think it is better that my kids don’t see me in here.
After reflecting for a moment, she added: ‘It’s not a good place for kids to come.’
Around 50 per cent of the inmates held at the Berkshire Park female facility have a history of substance abuse.
Brittany is serving time at Dillwynia Correctional Centre, Australia’s largest female prison (pictured)
Brittany said drug addiction played a pivot role in her being put behind bars.
‘My drug of choice was ice and it was definitely that circle of friends that I was hanging around because of the ice scene that’s where you know, everything sort of just went to shit,’ she said.
‘I found myself to be the unwilling driver of a kidnapping. It went a bit out of control.
‘If I had of known what was going to happen that night, I wouldn’t have given anyone a lift.
‘My heart breaks for the victim. It does.’
Brittany said she was finally starting to pick her life up while she was on bail for the kidnapping charges, but she guesses ‘it was just too late’.
Meanwhile, she has missed out on key moments in her children’s lives – like the siblings learning how to kayak and her youngest son’s first day in preschool.
If she gets parole, the earliest Brittany (pictured in her cell) will be able to see her three youngest children is still more than a year
‘I haven’t even picked him up from school yet,’ she said, breaking down.
‘He goes to kindergarten next year and I won’t be there for his first day.’
The new observational prison series, hosted by Melissa Doyle, follows the harsh realities of daily life behind bars for inmates and correctional officers alike.
The first episode of the eight-part program also featured police officers conducting raids at Wellington Correctional Centre, near Mudgee in Central West NSW, where they discovered contraband moonshine in a prisoner’s cell, made from fermented bread.
Viewers were also given a first-hand glimpse of female officers escorting a prisoner to hospital following a heroin overdose and frisk searching her when she returned.
As well as the other two jails, the show will also explore the tensions at one of the country’s most notorious prisons – Silverwater’s Metropolitan Remand and Reception Centre – which has been home to some of the nation’s most ill-famed murderers, rapists, and bikies.
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