Town fights for dad
Man faces being sent to country he left at 1
APOLLO Bay residents are rallying to free a local man who has been languishing in a detention centre for five months facing the prospect of deportation to a country he barely knows.
Christian Feetham has a criminal history, but says he turned his life around since he was released from jail in 2014.
The 42-year-old father of three says the uncertain nature of his situation meant living at the detention centre was “probably worse than prison”.
Mr Feetham’s parents married in Apollo Bay, and moved to New Zealand for his father’s work, where Mr Feetham was born. They moved back to Apollo Bay permanently when he was 13-months-old.
He is a fifth-generation Australian on his mother’s side, and his father is English.
Mr Feetham had an Australian permanent residential visa — but now he has failed a “character test”, and it has been cancelled. He faces deportation to New Zealand and being banned from returning to Australia.
He was made a ward of the state when he was 11.
“I had a lot of childhood issues with my father, hence ending up a ward of the state,” he said.
“I was just a country kid at heart, then got introduced to all the street life of St Augustine’s boys’ home (in Geelong).
“I’ve spent four years in prison (over) a couple of different incarceration periods ... mainly for driving offences and some drunken assaults.”
In 2013, Mr Feetham pleaded guilty to 36 charges relating to a two-year crime spree, which included assaulting his estranged sister, with whom he has since mended his relationship.
He said he realised he needed to turn his life around during his last prison stint and to be there for his three Australian-born children.
He went on to work in construction and on the family farm in Apollo Bay, enter a stable relationship, see a psychologist and signed up to volunteer at the local show.
“I am reformed,” Mr Feetham said.
“My last act of violence dates back to 2012. I’ve put all that stuff behind me.”
The Migration Act was amended in 2014, meaning non-citizens who failed a character test could be stripped of their visa.
Australian Border Force attended his employer’s Gee- long depot in April to tell Mr Feetham his visa had been cancelled. He said he attended the corrections office in Geelong in late April in relation to a Community Corrections Order, and was surprised to be greeted by ABF officers.
Officers from the detention centre took him to Maribyrnong. He has been there since, and is sharing a room with six others. He has applied for ministerial intervention and Australian citizenship by descent.
A Department of Home Affairs spokeswoman said “while we can’t comment on individual cases, the Australian Government takes seriously its responsibility to protect the community from foreign nationals who choose to engage in criminal activity”.
“There are strong provisions under the Migration Act 1958 that allow the minister or a delegate to cancel a visa if the person is considered to not be of good character,” they said.
“A person can fail the character test for a number of reasons, including but not limited to where a non-citizen has a substantial criminal record.”
Members of the Apollo Bay community are rallying around Mr Feetham, with locals planning a “walk in support of Christian” event.
Letters of support vouching for Mr Feetham, including from two retired Apollo Bay police officers, have been sent to the Federal Government.
His mother, Barbara Henriksen, who has moved back to Apollo Bay to work on the farm, said the ordeal had been an “absolute nightmare”.
“We desperately need him here,” Ms Henriksen said.
“(The community has) been so supportive . . . that’s what’s kept us going.”