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Ruth is concerned the new independent regulator Premier Jacinta Allan has promised to set up will not adequately address the raft of systemic failures she faced while seeking justice for her child.
“Expect this will be the system you will face if anything happens to your child,” she says.
Opposition education spokesperson Evan Mulholland said Luna’s case was one of the “most appalling” examples of child safety failures in Victoria.
“I can only hope that the government kept this case front of mind when they drafted the belated legislation they have brought before parliament,” he said.
Greens MP Anasina Gray-Barberio is horrified by the case. “It’s quite clear that we are here because of years of neglect and a Labor government that has refused to take this crisis seriously,” she said.
This masthead’s investigation is based on interviews with six government sources and others involved in the case not able to speak publicly, documents filed to the corporate regulator, correspondence from QARD and the Children’s Commission and court records.
The offender, the wife and her employer cannot be named to protect the true identity of Luna, who began attending the family daycare when she was two years old, and often went there after school or sometimes overnight on weekends when her mother had to work.
The daycare was registered with an approved family daycare business, the husband was a former nurse with a valid Working with Children Check, and they also had a daughter. Later, CCTV cameras were installed in the lounge room of the home where the children were cared for.
Ruth said she liked that the daycare was run by a mother. “They just looked like a really wholesome family,” she said, describing how she got to know the wife and her family through the years and trusted them. In late November 2022, that trust was obliterated.
Luna, after complaining of soreness around her genital area, was taken to the doctors. During the appointment, she told her mother that the daycare educator’s husband had been abusing her.
“That moment was just so surreal because I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t want it to be true. I didn’t want to be in the room,” Ruth said.
The abuse shattered their family. Ruth’s relationship with her partner fell apart, and Luna’s older sister isolated herself from friends and fell into a depression. At just 11 years old, Luna began self-harming.
“I watch my child suffer every day, and though I try to be her anchor, I often feel like I’m drowning,” Ruth would later tell a court.
After her initial disclosure, Luna was taken immediately to the Royal Children’s Hospital for a forensic assessment, while Victoria Police, and later QARD and the Commission for Children and Young People were alerted to the allegations.
The little girl told police that while she was left alone in the loungeroom, the husband would pull her pants down and rape her. She felt scared and tricked when it happened. The husband would smile at her weirdly and asked if she liked it.
“He’d do it to me, like, every day I went there,” she said.
Luna told police other children who attended the daycare were scared of the husband, and she feared other children might have been abused.
Soon after, the husband was arrested.
At the same time, the wife’s employer suspended her from running the daycare and QARD launched its own investigation.
The regulator has powers to issue fines, substantiate allegations, shut down services, revoke approvals, and even prosecute those who breach laws. The agency told Ruth it would be investigating whether the wife or her employer had breached their duties.
“When I got off the phone, and they said they will investigate, I expected them to do their due diligence,” she said.
But she said was only contacted once during the investigation, a breach of the regulator’s own guidelines, which instructs its investigators to keep in regular contact with families.
They never took a formal statement from Ruth, and she never met anyone in person. The QARD investigator did contact the police detective leading the case, who provided information about their ongoing investigation.
The next time Ruth heard from QARD was in March 2023, about three months after the husband’s arrest. The regulator informed her it was closing the investigation into the daycare after finding no wrongdoing.
“We cannot do anything because everything’s compliant,” Ruth recalls being told. This was gobsmacking to her and seemed so obviously incorrect. The daycare where her daughter was raped could not be compliant – if it were, it wouldn’t have happened.
A letter informing Ruth of the outcome detailed the investigation was limited to a single visit to the family daycare service office that employed the wife, not the home where the rape occurred.
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“They didn’t say to me, ‘Listen, we’re going to keep a close eye on this, we’re going to touch base with you when it goes to court’, it was just ‘We’ve done our work. There’s nothing further.’”
The regulator did gather enough evidence to ban daycare services from operating from the home in April 2023, but Ruth was never told about the ban, and QARD never published that it had taken the action – which it is legally obliged to do.
Meanwhile, the Commission for Children and Young People – an independent state body that oversees organisations’ investigations into reported incidences – was also alerted to an allegation that the wife was seriously negligent in her role as an educator. But instead of launching its own probe, the commission referred it back to the wife’s employer to investigate, in what experts say is a disastrous conflict of interest.
The wife’s employer found there was insufficient evidence to suggest she had been leaving the little girl alone, despite a judge later finding that is when the abuse occurred. The commission accepted the employer’s finding, and did not use its powers to advise the Working With Children unit to review the wife’s clearance.
In response to questions from this masthead, the employer said the family daycare provider treats child safety with “the utmost seriousness”, and was assisting the regulator with its ongoing investigations.
“We took immediate action in accordance with our legal obligations and have cooperated fully with the relevant authorities,” the employer said.
The wife, through her lawyers, declined to respond to questions sent by this masthead. “The basic premise of your questioning is not accepted,” the lawyer said.
It took two years from when the husband was arrested for him to finally be convicted, during which time he remained on bail.
In that time, the wife was cleared of any wrongdoing, retained her Working With Children check, and was able to run an NDIS-approved care service.
The NDIS Commission would not say whether QARD or the Commission for Children alerted the organisation to the allegations of serious negligence levelled against the wife, the charges laid against the husband, or the case in general.
“I watch my child suffer every day, and though I try to be her anchor, I often feel like I’m drowning.”
Ruth’s evidence in courtAn NDIS Commission employee, who refused to be named, conceded that while information was shared across departments, cases can “fall through the cracks”. They said if the family wanted the case to be investigated, they should file a complaint.
The employer, which has approval to hire up to 90 educators who all run daycares from their homes, also faced no action.
What both investigations failed to uncover, and what was unknown to the Luna’s mother, was that the daycare educator she trusted to care for her child had a history of leaving children alone.
“She had warning after warning,” the wife’s previous employer told this masthead, who requested anonymity over fears her business would suffer.
The previous employer said that during a compliance visit on the woman in June 2020, while children were being cared for in the home, she didn’t answer the door for a prolonged period.
It was clear to the visiting officers that she was not in the presence of the children, and was dismissed from the family daycare business soon after. The breaches were not reported to the regulator or Children’s Commission, the former employer said, because they did not meet the threshold of reportable conduct.
The next family daycare business to hire the wife never contacted the previous employer for a reference check. “I was very surprised [they never called]. We didn’t even know [who hired her],” she said.
Ruth said she was never informed about the sacking or the reasons the wife changed employers. The old employer said she has never been contacted by QARD; she first heard about the case after being contacted by a journalist in August.
Lawyer Manny Carbone, of Carbone Lawyers, who is representing Ruth, said it was “really horrific” to learn that the educator was fired for child supervision worries – and that it was never picked up by the regulator.
“One would think that any level of non-compliance in that area is something to be looked at. And sadly in this case, it’s all too late,” he said.
The husband was formally charged by police in January 2024 and faced a six-day trial in February 2025. The jury found him guilty on two charges of child rape.
At his sentencing hearing in June, the courtroom was packed with the offender’s supporters – including his wife and daughter.
“You breached the trust of your victim and her family,” Justice Robyn Harper told the man. He was found to have abused the girl on multiple occasions between February 2021 and August 2022.
Harper described the offending as humiliating, demeaning and objectifying. It was abhorrent and opportunistic, committed on occasions when the wife had left the girl alone. She sentenced him to serve a maximum jail term of 15 years and six months.
One of the first things Ruth did after the husband was found guilty in 2025 was contact the regulator. She thought a conviction had to trigger a new investigation.
The regulator asked the mother to hand over evidence of his conviction, sentencing information, the name of the lead detective, and details of his charges. The body even asked her to provide her previous communications with QARD itself.
Days went by, and then weeks. “I didn’t hear from [the regulator] for months, and then I had to call back again and ask them, “is anyone dealing with this case?”
“My job should be to look after my children after this. My job is to focus on healing, so I can accommodate my children myself to move forward, but I had to do the job of the regulator.”
She was passed around the department. Again and again, Ruth was forced to re-tell the story of the horrific abuse her daughter was subjected to. “It feels like you’re getting exposed for nothing. It’s like being bare naked in front of a crowd. Having to relive that blame – that it was my fault that this happened to my child, feeling that shame, but also feeling this anger.”
She is convinced if she didn’t chase QARD, it would have never reopened the case. “It wasn’t real until I proved it.”
“The fact the department had asked me: ‘Can you send us all the communications you’ve had with us previously?’. I [thought to myself] I’m not in good hands. My children are not in good hands.”
Ruth learnt there was a two-year statute of limitations from when an offence occurred, so even if the ongoing investigation established wrongdoing by either the employer or the wife, they would be unable to prosecute.
Ruth also contacted the Commission for Children after the sentencing in June. She remembers the employee telling her over the phone there was nothing they could do, but in a follow-up email, it said they would make enquiries.
She did not hear back from the commission until last week – the same day it received questions from this masthead about the case. The commission sent an email apologising for the delay and informing her it had reopened the investigation.
“We have now obtained more information relevant to the court proceedings which was not available when the investigation … was first conducted,” the email said. “I acknowledge that the time this has taken must be frustrating.”
A spokesperson for QARD gave conflicting reasons for not pursuing action against either the provider or the educator when asked by this masthead.
“Victoria’s early childhood regulator acted immediately to protect children’s safety,” a spokesperson said.
The Commission for Children, the Working with Children Check Unit, QARD and the NDIS Commission all refused to answer questions, citing privacy reasons.
Their silence is not a surprise to Ruth. “If you’re not getting answers, you’re getting an insight to what families have to go through,” she said.
The husband has appealed against his conviction, which will be considered next year.
Ruth is dismayed by the state’s government delayed response to the childcare crisis, and has serious questions about the legislation being pushed through parliament without consultation from families.
“I ask that we get it right this time. We’ve had years of children being abused and neglected. I want to be able to regain faith.”
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