Youth detention: NT detainee Dylan Voller's parole denied
A juvenile detainee featured in a Four Corners story into youth detention in the Northern Territory, Dylan Voller, has failed in his bid for parole.
The program, which showed footage of Voller restrained to a chair and wearing a spit hood, sparked a royal commission into the Northern Territory's youth detention system.
Voller was 17 at the time he was restrained, but is now an adult at the correctional centre in Darwin.
The parole board did not release its reasons.
"For a number of important reasons, including protection of victims, maintaining the privacy of a prisoner's family, preserving clinical relationships that have been established between a prisoner and his or her rehabilitation providers and the safety and wellbeing of the prisoner, it is not the normal practice of the parole board to publish its reasons for refusing parole," the board said.
However, citing procedural fairness, the board said its detailed reasons for decision were provided to NAAJA, who represented Voller in his application for parole.
Parole gives better chance or rehabilitation: lawyer
Voller's lawyer Peter O'Brien told 783 ABC Alice Springs there would be a better chance of Voller being rehabilitated if he was released and monitored while on parole.
"If he's going to be properly rehabilitated it should occur within the community. We've seen what can happen in these institutions and that is totally contrary his prospects for rehabilitation," he said.
"Rehabilitation very rarely occurs in the jail environment.
"The longer he's kept in custody, the less opportunity that the state has and the parole authority and corrective services have to oversee him in the community."
Mr O'Brien said he did not believe the media attention surrounding Voller since the Four Corners expose had affected the decision of the parole board.
"It would be scandalous if that was the case, it would be a totally irrelevant consideration," he said.
"One of the things they would be considering is the impact of his continued incarceration and the impact of the instance of abuse that's been made public through that program."
Mr O'Brien said Voller wanted to give evidence at the recently announced royal commission into abuse in the Don Dale detention centre as a parolee.