Two of the six Aboriginal children teargassed by police while in custody in Australia are being countersued by the Northern Territory Government for damaging the prison in an escape attempt, according to court documents.
Prison footage broadcast by Australian Broadcasting Corp this week showed the boys stripped naked, hooded and strapped to a chair, thrown by the neck into a cell and held in solitary confinement. The video from a juvenile detention center near Darwin in the Northern Territory was shot between 2010 and 2014.
Documents from the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory lodged last month by the boys, whose names were redacted, outline in vivid detail mistreatment by staff at the facility, including beatings with batons and the use of tear gas.
The documents were part of a lawsuit filed by the prisoners against the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre and its guards, seeking damages for the abuse they suffered while in custody.
In a July 4 response to those claims, the Northern Territory Government countersued, seeking more than A$160,000 (US$120,000) in damages for an escape attempt in which two of the boys stole a car, before using it to ram a roller-door and re-enter the prison.
The government is seeking interest on the damages and the reimbursement of its legal costs.
Lawyers for the two boys named in the escape, Jake Roper and Dylan Voller, declined to comment on the case.
Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull ordered a Royal Commission into the treatment of children in the detention center, the most powerful inquiry in the nation, although he has rejected calls for a national inquiry.
UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Juan Mendez said that the use of hoods, restraints and tear gas could violate the UN treaty barring torture.
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