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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2011-07-06 Daily Xml
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SHE COULDN'T SAY GOODBYE

The Hon. A. BRESSINGTON (16:28): Today I rise to bring members' attention to a newly written book called She Couldn't Say Goodbye. It was written by Mr Peter Russell and Sharon McKell. Sharon McKell is the mother of Emma Pawelski, the young girl, 21 years old, whose body was found dumped in a national park. Emma had a history of substance abuse and to this day they still have not been able to secure a prosecution against the person who murdered her.

This book is a mother's outpouring of a family dealing with a child with an addiction and the struggles that that family and the young girl herself went through. I knew Emma personally and knew her for three years before she was murdered. Emma was a lovely, sweet person who would give the shirt off her back to anybody in need.

She loved life. She aspired to be an actress and performer. Unfortunately, heroin took over her life and destroyed her dreams and, eventually, because of her association with people in the seediest side of the drug culture, Emma was thrown into prostitution and everything else that that entails as well.

Sharon McKell, her mother, supported Emma through her treatment and rehab, as did her grandparents. Emma was clean for 14 months. She did the DrugBeat program and was clean for 14 months but, sadly, her associations with the drug culture and things that she found out while she was involved in that drug culture and people she associated with, we all believe, led to her murder.

I guess this is probably one of many stories of young people who lose their lives to substance abuse and in the most horrible of ways, and it is just another family telling another devastating story of not only the loss but also the years of struggle that precede that loss. I know to this day that Emma's younger sister, Hannah, who says a lot in the book, still has not recovered from the loss of her sister. Hannah says:

She tried so hard to get her life back on track but she was distracted. I wish I could have pulled her from the rut she had got herself into, but the drugs had taken over and she couldn't free herself from the life she was living. She enjoyed living life on the edge, so I know there were some good times out of it…I loved her so much too, yet at the same time I didn't know her very well. I didn't know the pain she felt and why she did what she did. There's so much to question, yet no answers.

As I said, I wanted to bring this book to the attention of members of the parliament and encourage them to read it. It is a simple book—it is plainly written—but it does tell a very potent story. It also shows the human side of addicts, who we quite often want to cast aside or criminalise.

I guess society has a view that they are less than human or subhuman. These are real people with real struggles. They suffer real pain, and many of them try very hard to get their lives on track and repair the damage done to the relationships between them and their families. Unfortunately, when a young person passes in such a violent way, there is no so-called closure for the family. I urge members to read this. I have copies of it in my office if they would like to borrow a copy. It is called She Couldn't Say Goodbye: The Story of Emma Pawelski.

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