Dilemma Imbroccata (1995)

THE GERMAN PRISON SYSTEM – a topic that interests politicians when elections are looming, and the media whenever scandal is involved – is expensive and largely ineffective: over half of the people released from prison re-offend within five years. Locking people up does not rehabilitate them. Instead, the influences of prison subculture prevail.

Caroline Kearney faced a heart-breaking dilemma. She was 31 years old and had six children when her husband died in 1866. She had hoped that her sons would inherit the sheep station they owned in the Wimmera in Victoria. But she had no right to it herself. Her husband's will offered a reasonable annuity to support her and the children. But, it had a catch: for that support to be paid, she had to move to Ireland with her children and live in a house her brothers-in-law would choose. English-born, she had migrated to Australia with her family when she was sixteen.