Scores of Indonesian youths who were wrongly jailed as adults in Australia are a step closer to getting justice, after the Federal Court ordered the Commonwealth to enter mediation over their long-running claim for damages.
At least 120 Indonesians – now young men – are suing the federal government, alleging they were victims of a miscarriage of justice.
Many were subject to a discredited wrist scan that suggested they were years older than they really were.
But even if they win, one family will never be whole again.
Erwin Prayoga's grave marker — behind the family home on the island of Rote in West Timor — is barely legible. But it tells a tragic story.
Carved into a weathered piece of wood are the dates of his birth and death. They show he was only 16 when he died.
Yet, Erwin had spent two years in an adult prison in Australia, where at the age of 14 he was wrongly convicted.
As a child – under Australian policy – he should have been deported. Instead, he was jailed in maximum security prisons in Perth and Albany.
He was only released and flown home to Indonesia after he fell seriously ill and underwent surgery, apparently for appendicitis.
But the stitches later became infected, and within weeks of returning home to the island of Rote, he died a painful death.
'He was in so much pain'
"I'm angry because a month after he came home he got sick and died," said his younger brother Baco Ali, as he tended to his brother's grave behind the family home.
"He was in so much pain, he rolled around, threw himself on the ground, screamed in pain while holding his stomach," he told the ABC.
"We took him to the local clinic and they sent us to a hospital in Kupang, where he spent two weeks and then died."
Years later, Mr Ali is still searching for answers about how his brother died, and why he wasn't given better treatment in Australia before he was sent home.
He blames Australian authorities for Erwin's death, for wrongly jailing him in the first place and then not caring for him when he became ill.
"How could they let this happen to Erwin?" he asked.
"The Australian government is supposed to be decent. They should have made sure he had recovered before sending him home."
Escaping poverty
Erwin Prayoga had left Indonesia in 2009 to work as a crew member on a boat that was smuggling asylum seekers into Australia.
It was one of numerous boats around the time stopped with asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Myanmar or the Middle East on board.
It was common for crew members to be children, some as young as 12. Poverty on Rote and other Indonesian islands sends many children to sea in search of an income.
Erwin's boat was intercepted in waters off Australia's north-west. The asylum seekers on board were placed in detention, while he and the other crew were arrested.
A discredited x-ray method
Mr Ali said his brother repeatedly told authorities he was only 14, and therefore a child.
But the Australian Federal Police refused to believe him and relied on a controversial x-ray technique that scans the wrist bones to assess their maturity and age.
In Erwin's case, he was deemed to be 19 years old, and was ultimately jailed as an adult.
"The tool they used to measure his age wasn't the right tool," his brother said.
"Indonesians are different. We may be just children but we start working when we're still children. So our bones may be denser."
A subsequent investigation by Australia's Human Rights Commission found the x-ray technique was "inherently flawed" and had long been discredited in other countries.
"A mature wrist is not informative of whether a person is over the age of 18 years. Having a mature wrist is quite consistent with a person being under the age of 18 years," the commission's report said.
Erwin's story is far from an isolated case.
In April this year, the WA Supreme Court of Appeal overturned the convictions of six other young Indonesian men who had also been jailed as children in adult prisons.
The court ruled that a "substantial miscarriage of justice" had occurred and that the Crown's earlier reliance on the wrist x-ray evidence gave rise to a "serious doubt about the integrity of each plea of guilty".
More than 120 young Indonesians are now suing the Australian government for compensation for their wrongful imprisonment or detention as minors.
Like Erwin, many were also convicted on the basis of wrist scans that were interpreted to show they were adults.
The class action in Australia's Federal Court is in the name of Ali Yasmin, who once shared a prison cell with Erwin.
Now in his late 20s, Mr Yasmin was 13 when he left his home on the island of Flores to work as a crew member on a boat intercepted by the Australian Navy in 2009, with 55 Afghan citizens on board.
He spent almost three years in Perth's maximum security Hakea Prison after pleading guilty to people smuggling, before he was released in 2012 and sent home.
The WA Court of Appeal ruled his conviction was unsafe and constituted a miscarriage of justice.
Two other young men are now also seeking to have their convictions overturned.
But lawyers for the class action say overturning a wrongful conviction is not enough for the more than 120 claimants.
They want compensation, damages and other relief under the Racial Discrimination Act.
"The effects of spending long periods of time in adult prisons as a child are substantial, and they are ongoing for each of these young men," said lawyer Sam Tierney in Canberra.
"When a child is placed in that situation and exposed to a range of traumatic events, the impacts can remain with those people for many, many years after the incident."
The case has been brought against the Commonwealth, but specifically refers to Australian Federal Police, the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC), and the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions.
Now, after years of legal argument, the Federal Court has ordered all parties to enter mediation, to resolve once and for all what if any damages should be paid.
Mr Tierney said he believed there were many more cases than those included in the claim.
"We have no doubt that there are other young Indonesian men out there who were convicted as children," he said.
None of the government agencies being sued would discuss the case with the ABC while it was still before the court.
But in court documents, lawyers for the Commonwealth have objected to claims that it had known for decades the wrist x-rays were incapable of reliably determining a person's age.
They admit that previous court cases, as early as 2000, had raised concerns about the limitations of using wrist x-ray analysis, but say there were other decisions where courts had accepted the technology.
They also claim that despite detailed discussions between DIAC and other Commonwealth agencies in 2010-2011 – about the use of wrist x-rays and their reliability – the AFP's "likely preferred option" would continue to include the wrist x-ray analysis.
The mediation process is required to be completed by March.
But even if the Indonesian claimants, including Mr Ali, win their case for damages, it will never bring back his brother, Erwin Prayoga.
"I have been angry for a long time," Mr Ali said.
"I've been so angry that my tears have dried. In the past when I get asked about it, I would cry. But I've run out of tears."
Additional research and production by Ake Prihantari and Ari Wu.
