SHE is no longer a headline name but a decade ago Cornelia Rau figured tragically in a controversy which tested and damaged the hard-line immigration policies of the Howard government.

Her 10-month ordeal, forced through institutions in three states, led to questioning of the government’s policy of mandatory detention of those suspected of being in Australia illegally.

Another challenge today is coming from another woman, known as Abyan, who is being held in a detention centre on Nauru where she says she was raped and impregnated. Flown to Australia for an abortion, she has since been returned to Nauru without the procedure having been performed.

An ugly fight has now broken out over whether Abyan, 23, changed her mind about the abortion (the government’s explanation) or was quickly spirited back to Nauru after she asked for trauma counselling (according to refugee advocates and her legal team, which has called the manoeuvre “gobsmacking”). Now 14 weeks pregnant to her alleged attacker, her fate remains unknown.

As in the time of Cornelia Rau and now, voters have broadly supported the government’s detention policies, but the emergence of specific cases with identifiable individuals have created doubts about their worth, and the ability of ministers and managers.

Cornelia Rau and Abyan are quite different women — for starters, one is of German background, the other Somali — and their personal stories are distinctively separate, aside from the shared element of tragedy.

But both cases have intensified scrutiny of bipartisan detention policies and the competence of the government to implement them.

Ms Rau was an Australian resident who had arrived here as an 18 month-old toddler. In 2004, aged 39, she was in Sydney’s Manly Hospital for treatment for schizophrenia. In late March that year she discharged herself and travelled to north Queensland.

In the small town of Coen she was approached by police concerned for her welfare. She told them she was a German tourist and gave a false name.

Handed over to immigration authorities, Ms Rau was taken to the Women’s Correctional Centre in Brisbane and held there for six months. In August she was sent to a hospital for a mental health assessment.

In October 2004 she was transferred to the Baxter Detention Centre in South Australia.

In February her family in Sydney recognised her from a photograph in a newspaper article and Ms Rau was moved to the Glenside Psychiatric Hospital.

The case raised the complaint that compulsory detention in immigration cases now meant people could be jailed without charge, and the policies were criticised for lacking safeguards.

Mandatory detention was introduced by a Labor government, but it was the Coalition government of John Howard which had to deal with the consequences of the Rau case.

In February 2005, then Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Palmer was asked to investigate the episode, and even before it reported changes were made to procedures.

The Rau case drew public attention to the legal and ethical argument for compulsory detention, much as the situation of Abyan is today.

The Somali woman claims she is pregnant following a rape in Nauru, where she has been held. She was brought to Australia for medical consultations but was taken back to Nauru late last week.

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton today said she had been given access to specialists and interpreters but had declined to undergo a termination.

Abyan’s legal representative in Australia denies this, as does a letter said to have been authored by her.

This is a complex situation which, like that of Ms Rau, involves a woman’s health, and the empathy and assistance provided by official procedures and authorities.

Ms Rau’s case was at the time called “highly unusual”, and so is this one today. But like the controversy 10 years ago, the current debate could see further changes in immigration policy and treatment of detainees.