Fighting for a father's freedom

Updated

The decision to fly a drone over an anti-government rally landed James Ricketson in a Cambodian prison for 15 months. This is the inside story of the Australian filmmaker's ordeal and the fallout for his family.

How far would you go to help a family member who was locked up in a third-world prison overseas?

Jesse Ricketson, 36, was confronted with this reality last year, when his father, filmmaker James Ricketson, was jailed in Cambodia, accused of spying.

It was a nightmare that tested relationships between many members of the extended Ricketson family, but none more acutely than the relationship between father and son.

'We thought he was going to die'

For 15 months, Jesse Ricketson took the 40-minute motorbike ride to visit his father in Correctional Centre One (CC1), Prey Sar Prison, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. Everything a prisoner needs in CC1 must be brought in; he took him food, medicines and creams for his skin infections. Underwear, books, writing materials and money.

"Jesse and his partner Alex relocated to Phnom Penh, they were there virtually the whole time James was there, because we were worried about his welfare," James's eldest brother Peter Ricketson says. "There was one stage when we thought he was going to die, he'd lost so much weight, and he had skin sores all over him — scabies, parasites."

"I couldn't abandon him in a Cambodian jail," says Jesse, a television editor and drummer. "I couldn't go back to my life and just get on with it, it was just not really an option."

James Ricketson has been a filmmaker since the 1970s, working on and off in Cambodia for more than 20 years.

He found himself in jail after flying a drone over an anti-government rally. The seemingly routine filmmaking technique turned into accusations of conspiring to bring down the Government. With a deep love for Cambodia and its people, the allegations came as a shock to the AFI-winning director.

"I was probably foolish to film with the drone, and then probably foolish to give the footage to the [Opposition] CNRP," James Ricketson admits.

"I thought it would be sorted out in a few days, because I clearly wasn't guilty of any crime."

According to Human Rights Watch Asia, James was an obvious political prisoner, caught up in the country's political turmoil.

"This was a politically manufactured farcical plot," says Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch Asia.

"The Cambodian People's Party and Prime Minister Hun Sen wanted to use this to be able to eliminate any political opposition, and that's exactly what they did."

But James wasn't going down quietly.

"Day number three and I still haven't been told which country I'm spying for," James would yell to the hovering media and public as he was ushered to and from court.

"James became a very different person in prison," Jesse says. He felt a duty to do all he could to help, but the loving, caring father with whom he'd grown up having wild adventures became increasingly frail, angry and aggressive.

"So many times I would go into prison and we'd have a big kind of yelling fight … we would carry in this advice like, 'You need to be contrite and apologetic', and he would just slam his fist on the ground and say, 'I will not apologise, I haven't done anything wrong'."

James felt he needed to be the person in charge of his own fate.

"I did not want decisions made by my family that turned out to be wrong and have them feel responsibility and think, 'Oh God, if only we hadn't done X, Y or Z'. I wanted to take that responsibility onto myself."

Now, back living on Sydney's northern beaches, James's health is improving, but the experience has taken its toll on the family's complex ties.

"He just wants to get on with it, but it was so much hurt and so much trauma that it's caused throughout the experience, I don't feel, at least at this point, like I can just get on with it," Jesse says.

Father of one, saviour to many

Jesse's parents split up when he was little, but he spent lots of time with his dad in a rundown rental at Palm Beach, outside Sydney.

"He was a great father," Jesse says. "Very attentive, loving dad, always up for fun and adventure and silliness."

Filmmaker Rachel Ward and her young children spent endless evenings with James and his only child on the beach and was struck by how close they were despite being very different.

"Jesse recognised that he just had a 'gift' of a father, but he was never as madcap as James," she says.

In the late 1980s, when Jesse was five, James met a young woman called Roxanne while researching a film project about street kids. She was a recidivist and sometimes violent offender who also self-harmed. James felt compelled to help her.

"I started calling James Dad from the get-go," Roxanne Holmes says.

Although James never technically adopted her, Roxanne moved in with Jesse and his dad.

"She became my older sister who was just completely wild and exciting," Jesse says.

But James's Cambodian imprisonment would test that relationship too.

The maverick filmmaker

James Ricketson was a student in the inaugural year of the Australian Film and Television School with the likes of Philip Noyce and Gillian Armstrong.

"What I love about filmmaking is the opportunity to immerse myself in worlds that are different from my own," he says.

From the start his projects had a humanitarian bent. His 1993 feature film Blackfellas, which won two AFI Awards, portrayed the difficulties of the Noongar Aboriginal people in Perth.

His activism was not confined to the screen; he took part in protests, and became a prolific letter-writer to politicians and organisations that he felt were not meeting his expectations.

"I don't see myself as an activist, or as a provocateur, I just see myself as being an active member of the society, trying to provoke other people to express their own opinions," he says.

He became a thorn in the side of many organisations; Screen Australia, responsible for providing funding to filmmakers, banned James Ricketson for allegedly repeatedly harassing staff.

Falling in love with Cambodia

James's campaigning continued in Cambodia, where he rallied against non-government organisations that he felt were not acting ethically.

But what first drew him to the country was his interest in street kids.

"Having had that experience with Roxanne … on a whim, I had a little bit of money, I flew to Cambodia and made a little documentary," James says.

His first trip to Phnom Penh was in 1996, where he noticed a young girl who would run around the street below his hotel balcony. Her name was Chab Thy, but he came to know her as Chanti.

"He gave us $20, a bunch of bananas and a bottle of drinking water," Chanti told Australian Story.

James started filming Chanti, and as a friendship with her family developed, he realised he was no longer an impartial observer. Chanti began to call him "papa", and he would travel back and forth to Cambodia for years, camera in hand, documenting her life.

The filmmaker did what he could to help the family financially.

Defending Chanti saw James get into trouble with the law in Cambodia. In 2014 he was found guilty of defaming an NGO he'd accused of "stealing" two of her children, and he was given a suspended sentence. The two children were ultimately returned to their mother.

A step too far

Political tensions were mounting in Phnom Penh. The Cambodian People's Party had ruled for more than 30 years, with Hun Sen the Prime Minister since 1985. But since the 2013 election campaign, the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) had become a serious threat. Campaigning for the 2018 election would soon be underway.

On June 2, 2017, James decided to fly his new drone over an anti-government rally. According to James, when the opposition party asked for the footage, he obliged.

"I must confess, that didn't occur to me that it was untoward at the time," James says.

Cambodian-based journalist Luke Hunt believes it was a provocative move in the political climate.

"I tend to think James was totally blinkered. And he just wasn't thinking. If you want to behave like that, you've got one hell of a recipe for trouble."

While sitting by the riverside with Chanti the next day, James was surrounded by police who took him away for questioning.

James says what began as an interrogation over his visa, quickly descended into allegations of espionage.

James was 'malnourished, covered in sores'

Jesse and his partner Alex were camping in a remote national park in Washington, USA, when Jesse got a message from a friend that read: "I'm so sorry to hear about your dad; I hope you're okay".

"And I was like, 'What the f*** has happened?'" Jesse recalls. "'Has he died?'"

After discovering James had actually been arrested, the couple flew straight to Phnom Penh.

"He was in his orange prison jumpsuit, very glad we were there," Jesse says.

The couple initially returned to their travels, but as the days and weeks went by, prison life took its toll. James's brother Rob was shocked to find James in a bad state six weeks in to his incarceration.

"He was malnourished, he was covered in sores and fleas and bedbugs, and he looked scared. That's when we realised, this is a hellhole," Rob says.

CC1 at Prey Sar Prison is notorious for its overcrowding, and James says he was packed in "like a sardine", at times sharing a cell with 140 men.

"The worst thing about those first weeks was getting scabies, which made it difficult to sleep, because your whole body's itching the whole night," James says.

Jesse and Alex then made the decision to drop everything and move to Cambodia full time. Their first priority was his wellbeing, but quickly discussions turned to strategies to get James out.

And that's when tension between father and son began.

Back in Australia, family members knocked on doors in Canberra. "The advice we got from DFAT and other political sources was that yes, they would work on James's behalf," Peter Ricketson says.

"But that we were not to engage in over-the-top media campaigning … because it looks like it's white Western power telling a developing country how they should be running their legal system."

James says he was prepared to go along with the "softly softly" approach for a few months, but as time went on, he became "antsy".

"I wanted to fight my case on a legal basis, not just keep quiet, roll over and just, accept whatever was handed down to me."

Reaching out to Australia's leaders

Jesse heeded the DFAT advice and urged his father to be contrite.

But Roxanne worked with James to mount a Facebook campaign to raise awareness about his case. She also set up a Change.org petition calling on then-Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop to intervene. It received more than 107,000 signatures.

Relations between Roxanne and Jesse strained. The wider family split into factions.

In a statement to Australian Story, a spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said the Australian Government, "made extensive representations to Cambodia about Mr Ricketson's case and his welfare, including at the highest levels".

Back in the prison, Jesse and his partner sat one side of the Perspex screen that divided inmates from outsiders in the visit room. James sat on the other side.

"We'd have a big kind of yelling fight," Jesse says. "He'd storm out … then we'd leave just feeling like he's just going to shoot himself in the foot.

"A million times I would just throw my hands up and be like, 'Right, that's it, I'm done, I'm out' … except I knew I couldn't leave."

But as the trial got underway, journalist Luke Hunt witnessed the strong underlying bond between father and son. "There's not supposed to be any contact [in court]," Luke says.

"Jesse would bring in a book, and he'd put it on the floor and slide it over. And James would pick it up, and he'd be going, 'Got the last one; good read'. They're very close."

After the guilty verdict and six-year sentence was delivered, Jesse felt numb watching his father being taken away in handcuffs.

"It was that sense that this was just going to go on forever," he says. "We were all still kind of imprisoned by it in our way."

The royal pardon and freedom at last

James had two options: appeal against the decision or seek a King's pardon. If he appealed, he ruled out a pardon; if he sought a pardon but didn't get it, he could not then appeal.

Three weeks later, guards came to James's cell and told him he had 10 minutes to pack. The King's pardon had come through.

When Jesse got word his dad was a free man, his feelings were mixed. There'd been so much arguing since the verdict.

They met up at the Immigration Detention centre across the road from the airport.

Father and son posed for a happy snap which James uploaded to Facebook before boarding his flight home. "It's lovely in the sense that it was the celebration moment," Jesse says. "It also felt a bit disingenuous; there was no appreciation. There was no gratefulness."

"There were lots of things that I would've liked to have said to Jesse and Alex that I haven't had a chance to say yet," James says. "Things that need to be said face to face.

"I love Jesse to death. Jesse loves me to death. He's very strong-willed. I'm very strong-willed. But I'm sure whatever problems that did arise between us over this past year, will be resolved."

A new home in Cambodia

Rather than follow James home, Jesse and Alex have decided to stay put, after building a life for themselves in Cambodia.

Alex works with an NGO that helps children. Jesse edits episodes of an Australian reality program from home and is the drummer in a Phnom Penh band called The Goldilocks Zone that's just recorded its first album.

But Jesse and Alex have unfinished business. They've become very close to Chanti and her family and are continuing the support James started 20 years ago.

He's worried termites threaten to bring down the shack they call home.

The couple recently returned to Chanti's village for the first time since James's release from prison.

Chanti's children squeal with delight when Jesse throws one after the other over his shoulder.

"Jesse is very nice and kind to me," Chanti says. "He helps me, and loves me like his sister and my children, like his nieces and nephews. He doesn't look down on us. He loves us all."

"They're just part of our family now," Jesse reflects. "We can't walk away from them."

Despite his conviction, James is still hopeful he will be able to return to Chanti and her nine children.

He's also launched a fundraising campaign to buy houses for other impoverished Cambodian families.

"At the moment it's difficult to get a definitive answer to the question of whether I can go back to Cambodia or not. I'd just like to be sure, if I go back that I'm not going be subjected to any further charges or imprisonment," James says.

"I want to go back, and I want to continue being grandpa."

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Credits

Producers and writing: Belinda Hawkins and Winsome Denyer

Photography: Belinda Hawkins, Winsome Denyer, James Ricketson, Reuters

Topics: prisons-and-punishment, human-interest, world-politics, human, sydney-2000, cambodia

First posted