• update, regarding the previous. (Picture is dad with his mother, Heather, in deportation centre)

My father, Stephen Pokrywka, as you all might’ve seen in the last update was granted parole. Shortly after, he was placed on the list to be deported.

After being granted parole. 

You can imagine our whole family, it shattered and confused us. It continues to do so.

Advocating for my dad has taken up my whole life, every breathing second and every thought- and that’s not to complain as I REFUSE to give up; but I am tired and broken. 

Activist Gerry Georgatos has taken on my dads case and has been a huge role in getting closer to the day we are hoping and praying for; he is amazing, and I highly recommend every one to support Gerry in any way possible as well. He has helped many people, and without him I don’t think I could have held out. A strong man who helped me and my family hold hope, and a great man in general.

To not have him is to mourn someone who isn’t dead, and to have our chance stripped away was brutality in all forms and inhumane.. 

I want to stress the impact this is having on us first of all.

This form of rehabilitation as we like to call it, “Prison”, has turned into hell and a nightmare. The punishment continues on, and after this, it will forever. For all of us.

Tell me, what crime did I commit? What crime did his youngest daughter commit? His elderly parents? Grandchildren, newly born and/or waiting for pop. What crime did we commit as a family to be robbed because of one regrettable decision of getting into a car with a man who had drugs in his vehicle…. who is already out of prison? 

Time has been served. 

Why does this mean my father has to serve this sentence for life? As a child, as a daddy’s girl, a sibling, a friend, I want to scream. Give him back! Why! Why! Why ?!? It’s not fair!

It isn’t fair. It is cruel. Inhumane. And I refuse to sugarcoat that fact.

Is this what our country stands for?
The mental, physical imprisonment of a WHOLE family and community for a non violent, drug related crime, and the assumptions of a man you based on a piece of paper.

• On a night that passed quickly, the officers who did their job and may not even remember my dad. But I remember.
  
• The judge who looked me in the eyes the whole time at my dad’s sentencing with a strange gaze, and went on to another case after his lunch break. He probably doesn’t remember. But I remember. 
  
• Waiting for the phone to ring to answer questions regarding my dad’s character at 15 years old, in trial. They might not remember, but it traumatised me. 
  
• The phone calls that lasted 10 minutes, waiting every day and night, the worry when one didn’t come. I was scared because if something was wrong, how could I even get to you?
• The Hospital admission late 2023/early 2024 where I cried for my father for more than 12 hours, and was able to talk to him for 40 minutes, the longest time we had talked in the past six years at that time. He should’ve been next to me.
  He should be here.

This is AUSTRALIA! We are supposed to be a country of all. And continuously it has shown we are NOT. It’s time to CHANGE. Enough is ENOUGH.

I would like to say thank you. Thank you for everyone reading, supporting, signing, boosting and believing. Along with family, friends, and strangers across the internet, I did not expect for this to go anywhere.

This petition has been up almost 4 years, and I still count every signature as a blessing and it puts a smile on my face. Thank you for looking over our family in spirit. 

Let’s do this. Like our family likes to say, “We got this”. More than ever, it’s time to fight.

Suicide rates climb, deportation rates not slowing down, and a government who is confused why we have such a high mortality rate for suicide. “It takes a village.” Give me my village back.

Do not set my family up for failure.

Let us have our chance.