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(DRAMATIC PULSATING MUSIC)

(TRAIN HORN BLARES)

(SOMBRE VOCAL MUSIC)

(WOMAN PRAYS IN HEBREW)

(BAKING PAPER RUSTLES)

WOMAN: Even if I don't pray three times a day,

I definitely have a very deep spiritual connection to God.

I will just talk to God, you know?

"Please, God, make the dough work today,"

'cause of the one day of filming,

I don't want the dough to not work, things like that.

But, like, I will talk to God at all different times.

It's the judges and the lawyers

and it's all the annoying people who are doing all these things,

but God is running the world

and this is what's coming from him,

so I have to accept that

and I think I'll feel that way also about the verdict.

I will hope that she's found guilty,

but that will test my faith, for sure.

Yeah.

(GENTLE BIRDSONG)

NICOLE: My sisters and I are each on such different journeys

in regards to faith,

and we just respect each other where we're at.

-(CAT MEOWS) -Good boy, Stormy.

Good boy. Leah's gonna come pick you up now.

Good boy.

Oh, he's so scared. Poor thing.

(STORMY MEOWS)

I just wanted to let you know,

I'm really struggling with, like,

really low blood pressure at the moment,

so I've got some medication

that pushes up my blood pressure

and I'm gonna try and time the medication

to fit in with the breaks in court.

(VOICE FADES) I'm just going to need somewhere

that I can lie down with my feet up.

NICOLE: Whoa, Dassi, that's close.

Chams, it's not that close.

NICOLE: You're, like, half in this lane.

DASSI: You're being such a side-seat driver today.

Do you want me to get out and you drive?

-NICOLE: No, thanks. -DASSI: I'm nervous.

NICOLE: Are you still waking up in the middle of the night

and not being able to fall back asleep again

or has that changed?

No, that's a... that's a forever thing for me.

I always sleep better when me and you and Elly are together.

NICOLE: Hey, we're five minutes away from you.

I forgot my toothpaste, my brush and my toothbrush.

Do you have a new one?

-ELLY: I should have. -DASSI: And toothpaste.

Because I also don't have toothpaste.

And toothpaste, 'cause Dassi didn't bring.

'Cause I was relying on Chams's toothpaste.

-ELLY: Love you. -MAN: Say, "I love you, Mama."

-She's too busy. -Too busy.

Yeah, there's too many things going on.

OK, alright.

I love you.

Love you too.

ELLY: Thank you for taking care of everything today.

Danny and I did quite a bit of preparation today.

He's not my therapist,

but I don't have a therapist at the moment,

so he's doing all the preparation with me

and he's really good.

-'Bye, Maddie. -DANNY: Say, "Bye-bye, Mama."

-(MADDIE SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) -The bear goes to sleep.

-Bear goes to sleep. -OK, that's OK.

Alright, love you.

DANNY: Bye-bye.

-ELLY: Hello. -NICOLE: Hello.

OK, so put her in the back next to you,

'cause there's no room in the boot for that.

-I'm sitting like that? -Yeah, that's fine. Perfect.

-ELLY: Yeah, OK. -I'm sitting on this side.

ELLY: Alright. OK.

(CAR DOOR SHUTS)

(TRAFFIC HUBBUB)

ELLY: Nicole, Dassi and I

decided that to be in the best headspace for trial,

we should rent a apartment close to the courts.

O...3, right here.

We're actually doing this now.

DASSI: So that we can be there to support each other,

but also so that we can separate, as much as possible,

that trauma from the rest of our lives

because we all knew that we were gonna struggle with that.

Are you sure we're in the right place,

and and this is not someone else's place?

We all knew that it had an impact

on our partners or kids or friends.

We wanted to separate that as much as possible.

Can I have this bedroom?

-Um, do you want to toss a coin? -Should we work it out, Dassi?

There's three different study spaces, which is great.

DASSI: We're not doing any prep tonight.

No, I don't... Are you doing prep tonight?

No. Until it actually happens...

NICOLE: But it's happening this Tuesday.

-I know. I know. -NICOLE: This Tuesday.

But in my mind, it's like, "Maybe it's not for sure,"

so I don't want to get into that headspace.

I feel you, but this now

has made it, like, one step closer to feeling real.

ELLY: Being together through trial and before trial

was the best decision we made.

That became our haven

away from all the horrors of the courtroom.

-(SOMBRE VOCAL MUSIC) -(CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK)

REPORTER: Ms Leifer, do you have anything to say

to the alleged victims?

NEWSREADER: On to the case of a school principal

wanted in Australia

for more than 70 counts of sexual offences.

REPORTER: The allegations dated back two decades

to Malka Leifer's time

as the head of the ultra- Orthodox Adass Israel School.

NEWSREADER 2: Where she's charged with 74 counts

of rape and sexual assault.

REPORTER 2: Malka Leifer fled Melbourne

after the first allegation surfaced.

REPORTER 3: Malka Leifer has been holed up

in an ultra-Orthodox settlement in the West Bank.

MAN: This was someone that's actively pursuing little girls.

NEWSREADER 3: The ongoing fight to extradite Malka Leifer,

straining relations between the two countries.

REPORTER 4: As the trial of Malka Leifer

gets underway in Melbourne,

the question is,

why did it take 15 years

to bring her to justice?

And what is the cost to the alleged victims?

(SOMBRE VOCAL MUSIC FADES)

(SPARSE MUSIC)

DASSI: I grew up incredibly isolated

from the world outside of my community.

(TRAM BELL DINGS)

The Adass community is based in East St Kilda.

It's around 250 to 300 families

that live almost in a 4-block radius

and don't really go out of that 4-block radius.

MAN: Adass is its own little world

within the Jewish community

and even within the Orthodox Jewish community.

Very, very insular.

It's a very fundamentalist part of Judaism.

WOMAN: It has very deep traditions

that bind family ties.

It's a insular, caring community

that takes care of each other.

WOMAN 2: Girls helped around the house.

They got off school two weeks early

before major festivals like Passover

so they could clean the house.

Even when they were kids,

they were being geared up to being wives.

Men and women were kept completely separate,

in different schools.

ASHLEY: They would do the absolute bare minimum

as required by the government -

very basic numeracy and literacy -

but otherwise it is entirely based

in Jewish text, Jewish learning.

Therefore, their exposure

and understanding of the world around them is negligible.

They don't have internet at home, don't have TV at home.

BEN: It's built on secrecy, privacy.

Anything that arises, it's all taken up within the community.

If you have a dispute, there's no need to take it outside.

Everything is kept in-house.

-(SIREN BLARES IN DISTANCE) -(TRAFFIC HUBBUB)

(UNEASY MUSIC RISES AND FADES)

So this is the, um, $9.20

that I have received with my summons

for the Malka Leifer trial,

and that's for help to get to the court

by tram or by public transport, whatever I feel like.

So I'm feeling a little bit rich.

Feeling a little bit rich today.

NICOLE: We haven't been prepared in any way

how to speak on the stand or told how to do this.

We've just been given a page of charges.

It gives us the location or the particular for each charge,

so whether it was an office or at camp,

depending on each incident,

where the abuse happened.

And then I need to read through my statement

and all the detail has to be memorised

in chronological order.

So I'm just trying to be comfortable

with saying words that I find very difficult to say.

ELLY: I have a timeline that I've drawn up

from the day I was born until today

with any significant events over the years,

and then I can visualise the timeline

when I'm answering questions.

Especially with trauma,

there's just so many details of events

that sometimes blur into each other

and I just don't wanna get overwhelmed

with the amount of questions

that are asked in different ways.

(MURMURS)

DASSI: Because I know what it's like to be in that headspace,

I'm just terrified of going back there.

Like, I'm seeing her in my head all the time

and I'm seeing what she did to me again and again and again,

because I'm reading about those incidents

again and again and again.

(DASSI CONTINUES MURMURING)

I don't even have to close my eyes.

It's just constantly playing there.

When I'm in there, I don't want to be around anyone.

I don't want to be a parent.

My daughter's staying with her dad.

But I need to get into that headspace to be on the stand.

ELLY: I will go home soon.

I need to be a mum

and put this to the back of my head

and be there for my daughter.

That's the most important thing to me.

I just want to give her the best version of me

and that's not with these...

..memories...

..being a dark cloud over our time.

(SWITCH CLICKS)

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

NICOLE: My sisters and I shared one room.

There was a bunk bed where my two sisters slept.

I slept on a trundle that was pulled out at night.

Above that were three shelves.

The bottom shelf

was all these little miniature beds, bookshelves,

tiny little china plates, forks and knives.

Plenty of times, inserted myself into that world

because that world on that shelf

looked a whole lot better than the one that I was in.

(CLOCK TICKS)

DASSI: The feelings that I felt every single day

as a child - fear and hunger.

My mother was very abusive.

There was a lot of physical, mental and emotional abuse.

My father supported my mother in the abuse.

And he wasn't a safe person himself.

ELLY: I just can't understand

how anyone could do what they did.

That little me didn't deserve that kind of pain.

School was a haven for us...

..in comparison to our home life.

Malka Leifer chose vulnerable people from complex backgrounds.

DASSI: I think my first interaction with her

was when I was around 16.

And she pulled me into her office and she said,

"I know about the abuse at home."

She said she wanted to support me.

There was nothing I wanted to hear more in that moment.

ELLY: Someone had given me a small amount of care,

asked me about me.

That casual conversation

made me feel like a million dollars.

NICOLE: For me, it was the connection.

As a child, always looking for

that kind of connection and attachment and never had that.

I think that's what drew me in.

ELLY: There started to be touch,

a small touch,

just a hand on a shoulder or a hand on the leg.

NICOLE: She would put my hair behind my ear

or keep her hand for a long time on my thigh.

That's how it slowly escalated.

ELLY: There was no reason not to trust her.

DASSI: She's a leader in the community,

equivalent to a rabbi.

There was this trust that we wouldn't say anything,

but at the same time we didn't know to say anything

because we didn't know that it was wrong

and she knew that.

(PEOPLE CHATTER)

DASSI: In 2008, I was in Israel,

married to my ex-husband

and I was trying to understand

why it felt so wrong what had happened with Malka Leifer

and I was trying to understand why I was having thoughts

I was having, the dreams I was having,

the flashbacks I was having.

CHANA: Dassi got married to the person her parents chose,

pushed her into.

She had her hands on a computer for the first time in her life.

It was my first kind of foray

into this world outside of my community.

Landing up on these sexual websites

that I didn't understand at all.

I was at the time really struggling to get pregnant

and I thought, "Well, God was making me infertile

"because I was looking up stuff on the internet,"

and it was actually that

that led me to go see Chana Rabinowitz.

Dassi's describing and feeling

that she was a bad, terrible person

and that she needed to be punished.

I just remember that slowly built up

to ask her very quietly, "Somebody hurt you?"

And I responded, "Yes."

She said to me...

.."You need to tell me who it is."

And I said to her, "I can't. I can't do that."

I mean, I had still such a huge amount of fear of Malka Leifer.

I just remember her

going into herself and whispering.

Hearing her reveal that it was Malka Leifer was a shock.

Leifer brought me in

to do some work for the Adass Israel School

while I lived in Australia.

I told her to call Nicole

and the next thing I remember is, you know,

Nicole calling me up later that night and saying,

"What did you say and what's gonna happen next?"

And I remember just being utterly terrified.

NICOLE: All I remember is telling Chana Rabinowitz,

"It's true, because she also did it to me."

And I had no idea what was going to unfold

after I said those words.

CHANA: A woman who works for the school

spoke to her daughter

who revealed to her that she had also been a victim.

That woman then went to the rabbi in the community.

That's when it opened up and they believed it,

when it was more than a few accusations.

Those allegations were then taken to the school board

and the board met at a private home.

At that meeting,

Leifer was confronted with the allegations.

She denied the allegations.

The focus then became

to get her out of the country as quickly as possible.

And within four or five hours,

she and some of their children had left the country,

and that was facilitated by the connections

of some of the board members.

REPORTER: This is the Adass Israel Girls School

in inner Melbourne.

The Melbourne Adass community -

it's very small, ultra-Orthodox,

and is considered reclusive,

even by the wider Jewish community.

Today that anonymity was pierced

when the 'Australian Jewish News'

published reports that the female principal

of the girls school, Malka Leifer,

a mother of eight, had been stood down

because of allegations of improper behaviour

with her students.

ASHLEY: The source was someone who knew the family

and was a parent at the school.

This guy was really emotional.

He was in tears at one stage,

and he was saying, "These girls,

"their lives have been destroyed by this woman.

"They won't be able to marry.

"They'll be seen as unclean

"and not worthy by the Adass community."

TED: At the meeting of board members,

their first instinct should have been,

"We have to report this to police."

Their first instinct instead was,

"We have to get Leifer out of the country."

Shove it under the carpet,

send the problem somewhere else away from the community.

That was the way that it was done.

They wanted to protect their community.

The president of the board

is a very responsible, upstanding person

whose life has been... (SCOFFS) ..so affected by this

and he totally believed

that they were doing the right thing for the community.

WOMAN: If Leifer had have remained in the country

and faced the music at that time

that the allegations first came out,

we could have had a different case.

Potentially done and dusted, average two to three years.

May have had more complainants come forward,

if they felt safe enough to do so.

That moment in time

where they collectively chose to send her overseas

instead of turning her in to the police

or opening up an investigation

defined the next 15 years of our life.

NICOLE: She possibly left Israel to begin with

to come to the other side of the world

because she was fleeing the fact

that she had abused in that country as well.

WOMAN: We know that she allegedly molested

at least one girl in the school in Bnei Brak

and then we know she moved to Melbourne.

(MAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

(WOMAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

(MAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

They told her, "OK, you need to move.

In the Haredi community,

that's how it goes.

If they move the abuser

to another school or another city,

they know it is gonna hurt another kid.

I assume there is at least one, two or three people

in Australia that knew.

They're smart enough not to ask the question.

DANIELLE: When the sisters first made their statements,

they were so lengthy, there were so many incidents.

All the girls did such an incredible job

in providing their version of events and their story,

especially to a stranger.

DASSI: I sat down with Danielle in an interview room.

I didn't know how to say some of the things I needed to say.

But she was incredibly patient and kind

and I felt understood and heard and believed.

NICOLE: When I gave my police statement in 2011,

everything seemed so simple and straightforward.

Papers to Canberra, go and pick her up from Israel.

DANIELLE: No-one saw that it was gonna take so long

to bring her back

and the lengths that she went to

to remain out of the country.

I was disappointed that the system in Israel

hadn't processed the extradition promptly,

but Israel is a complicated place.

Its politics is very complicated,

particularly within the ultra-Orthodox communities.

DASSI: In 2014,

Elly and I decided to travel overseas.

We were tourists exploring this new land in this new way,

'cause we're both not religious at the time.

By that time, I had divorced Josh.

We had a brilliant holiday

and I remember sitting on the beaches with Elly

drinking a pina colada

and suddenly hearing that Malka Leifer

has been arrested in Israel.

REPORTER: Six years after fleeing,

the law caught up with Leifer.

NEWSREADER: Today, authorities in Israel

arrested Malka Leifer

over the alleged sexual assault of students

at a Victorian Jewish girls school.

The mother of eight is wanted to face prosecution.

NICOLE: It came so out of the blue.

Whose desk did that paper land on that said,

"OK, go and arrest her now"?

I still don't even know that properly.

She starts playing the system immediately.

MAN: It was not easy from the beginning.

The district court would not even detain her,

and second,

she had really good lawyers,

very good lawyers.

(MAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

MATAN: Leifer was diagnosed by the district psychiatrist

unfit to stand trial.

She actually did not show up to most of the court hearings.

The court didn't grant permission for her not to come.

She just didn't come.

MATAN: Each time, she was hospitalised

a few days before the court hearings.

She's not well the day before she arrives at court.

Isn't that one plus one equals two?

How could a judge, a senior judge, not see through that?

DASSI: Nothing really changes,

just doesn't turn up at court hearings.

The court hearings can't go ahead

because that's the law in Israel.

AVITAL: We were at an impasse.

It just kept on getting delayed.

REPORTER: Malka Leifer has managed

to avoid seven court hearings,

with her lawyers arguing that she's unwell,

suffering panic attacks and depression

whenever a court date nears.

-(CHILDREN EXCLAIM) -(BIRDS TWITTER)

(CHURCH BELL TOLLS)

WOMAN: There was one of the Australian sisters

who lived here in Manchester.

She was visited and really pressured

into somehow putting a stop to this case going forward.

BEN: Family's all in Melbourne

and my sister Dalia was in Manchester.

Dalia was a principal of an ultra-religious school.

Highly religious observant woman,

very well respected and senior in her community.

A pair of fixers

came from Israel

solely to harass and threaten Dalia and her family.

NICOLE: They would basically make her life miserable.

They threatened her with losing her job,

marriage prospects for her children,

her name in the community,

if Dalia does not tell us to drop the case.

YEHUDIS: If you're a boy and you grow up in the Haredi community

and you're not the type

who's gonna become a respected rabbi,

there's really, really limited options,

but one of those options for prestige is becoming a fixer.

SHANA: Not completely unlike the political fixers.

It's a combination of PR and bullying.

For a long time, people blamed the rabbis

that the issue of sexual abuse

isn't being resolved because of the rabbis,

but I think it's much more about these fixers.

They have a tremendous amount of power.

They spread misinformation campaigns

in order to run the victims out of town

or back them into a corner usually

so that they will drop the case.

NICOLE: Even though it was stressing her out,

she was not telling me,

"Stop what you're doing because this is impacting me,"

but I could see it was really, really, really stressing her.

DASSI: It was during that same period of time

that Dalia started suffering with chest pains

for the first time in her life

and ended up in hospital.

And then a week or two later, she passed away.

YEHUDIS: That story is held as kind of a cautionary tale.

"Look what happened to the Australian sisters' sister."

You could have that knock on your door

and nobody's heart can withstand that type of pressure.

REPORTER: For almost two years now,

Malka Leifer has managed to evade extradition proceedings.

Finally, in 2016,

a judge decides that she is actually mentally unwell

and she is not gonna face justice.

REPORTER: Overnight, an Israeli judge

ruled she was mentally unfit to face extradition

and lifted a home detention order

that had been in place since 2014.

Malka Leifer is now free in Israel.

REPORTER 2: Malka Leifer has been holed up

in an ultra-Orthodox settlement in the West Bank

hiding from her dark past.

NICOLE: Even after she fled,

there were allegations that she had abused in Immanuel

during those years as well.

REPORTER 2: Daniel and his daughter had lived in Immanuel

for several years

when, in 2016, the Leifer family moved to town.

Leifer was by that stage on the run.

Daniel says authorities in Immanuel turned a blind eye

and alleges Leifer

was soon teaching and abusing his daughter.

(MAN SPEAKS ENGLISH)

MAN: This was someone that's actively pursuing little girls,

actively grooming them.

(WOMAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

(PHONE RINGS)

(CONVERSATION IN HEBREW)

(DOG BARKS)

SHANA: The community in Immanuel is extremely ultra-Orthodox.

In some ways, even more insular

than some other ultra-Orthodox communities

because its geographical location, it's isolated.

A very large percentage of them

definitely do not have internet.

Large portions of the community live under the poverty line.

MAN: I do believe that the ultra-Orthodox community

breed child sexual abuse.

Why is that?

There is no sex education.

ELLY: There was no sexual education in our school,

in our community, at home.

Kids are not even taught the names of genitalia,

the words to use.

I didn't hear the word 'vagina'

until I had bridal lessons before I got married.

BEN: It was just such a taboo subject.

One would never speak about it

and one would pretend that it just doesn't exist.

NICOLE: Sexual abuse is completely compartmentalised,

stigmatised and packed away.

So when someone sees an abuser,

they don't see an abuser and the impact on the victims.

They see a person who's in distress,

who needs help, who needs to be saved.

(MAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

You have therapists who operate within the community

who will purport themselves to be specialists

when they've read a couple of books.

There'll be a specific person

whose specialism is managing the sex offenders

and they will say, "Absolutely,

"we'll make sure he goes for therapy.

"We'll make sure that he's watched in the synagogue

"or we'll make sure that she's not allowed to babysit."

Malka Leifer is "babysitter" for two family.

When I see this,

I call this family

and say, "You know this Malka Leifer?"

"No."

"You hear this problem with girls?"

"No."

(EZRA SPEAKS HEBREW)

(TRAM BELL DINGS)

DASSI: Ben. Hello.

-BEN: Hello. -ELLY: Hey, Ben.

-How's it going? -Thanks for coming, Ben.

-Really nice to see you. -Pleasure.

Can we, like, forget about trial for a second

and, like, just eat dinner?

-I've really forgotten. -(ALL LAUGH)

Place mats, place mats, place mats.

We don't wanna get the table dirty.

Thank you so much, Ben. This is really of generous of you.

-Are you turning 30 this year? -Yes.

NICOLE: That's gonna be post-trial,

so we can really have a nice celebration.

You're the youngest, our baby brother.

DASSI: The last 30 in the family until all our kids.

ELLY: Do you want to have a dirty 30?

(ALL LAUGH)

All of my sisters have this beautiful loving energy.

Every one of them, though, loves differently.

And when I say "loves differently",

they all love unconditionally the same,

but they all express it in their own way.

And Nechama's way of expressing that

is being able to listen to you,

be a soundboard, make sure that you're alright.

You won the first, I won the second

'cause I haven't won in ages.

BEN: Anyways, guys, we are on.

NICOLE: No, no. You...

BEN: Dassi likes to banter, great debates,

read books and chill, nature.

-Els. -Yeah, this is very frustrating.

BEN: What's your thoughts about putting something down?

I'm trying.

BEN: And Elly's the youngest sister.

Just affection, deep heart, loving.

Bubbling with all those good energies.

(ALL EXCLAIM)

-ELLY: Oh. -DASSI: OK.

Ben, I know we're not gonna talk trial but trial started today.

You're gonna be in court with Chams,

so you might wanna prepare yourself mentally.

You're gonna be there on Friday,

so that's when Ian cross-examines me,

so you're gonna hear, like...

DASSI: All the insinuations of that,

"She's lying, she's making it up."

Am I mentally prepared for it? No.

But I support you guys and always will.

It is gonna be brutal for all of us and you're gonna...

Being our sibling, you're gonna feel that

because you're close to us and you love us.

And it's just pain to be able to also see you

go through that turmoil and to see you

go through all the anguish.

At the same time, it's also good to be able to finally

be able to say, "OK, we're here,"

and to uncover the truth and to let the world decide.

NICOLE: Yeah.

BEN: My sisters are such incredibly good people.

How we grew up, you never felt safe.

There was times that we were beaten,

times that we were not given food.

ELLY: Our mother withheld food from us.

Most nights we didn't have dinner.

We often did have to steal from other kids' lunchboxes.

I feel awful even saying that now,

but I was hungry at school.

I was hungry at home.

I was hungry all the time.

BEN: My sisters definitely helped a lot.

The moments that I really recall

was when Nicole was already married

and I was still at home.

I was the only one at home

and I would go over to Nicole's house.

She would give me food and we would spend time together.

It was a very strong connection.

-DASSI: Thanks for coming, Ben. -BEN: I love you guys.

Dassi, give me a hug.

So, about eight months ago,

I started a campaign

to bring awareness to the fact that

she continues to avoid extradition courts in Israel

and is living a completely unrestricted life.

So in 2017,

I started campaigning to bring Leifer back.

ELLY: Once we made the decision to go public

and for the three of us to put our face to the campaign,

it was all just, like, go, go from there.

DASSI: And the campaign took off,

and Elly, Nicole and I decided to travel to Israel.

-Nechama. Yes. -Nechama.

NICOLE: We just knew that we needed to talk to anyone

and everyone that would listen to us.

DASSI: This case has been in the courts for a couple of years

and there's been absolutely no movement.

I still have nightmares and flashbacks.

I have nightmares that she's gonna come into my room.

I have issues with my sexual relationships with other people.

That bond and that ability to keep pushing each other

really helped us to get through those times.

DASSI: Having to continue to campaign for justice

and share our story over and over and over again,

I was literally living in survival space.

REPORTER: It's been two years

since Malka Leifer last appeared in court.

Her lawyers were there in person

and they claim two of her alleged victims

may have consented to what happened.

I ended up in a psych ward about four times in those years

due to the stress of the campaign.

Well, this is a case that is fast making a mockery

out of Israel's legal system.

REPORTER 2: 44 court hearings so far.

REPORTER: ..been to court 45 times.

REPORTER 3: The case has been adjourned until 21 September.

REPORTER 4: Some pretty extraordinary

legal gymnastics...

REPORTER: ..adjourned until March

so that more psychiatrists

can be called on to give evidence.

NEWSREADER: The ongoing fight to extradite Malka Leifer,

straining relations between the two countries.

MAN: Point of contention here between Australia and Israel...

NEWSREADER: The Prime Minister says the government

will be unswerving in pursuing justice.

MALCOLM: I can't think of another extradition case

quite like this.

This was a matter of enormous importance to us.

50 hearings, 30 psychiatrists,

a complete frolic from the judge

and a farce of a process.

Probably after 10 hearings, I'm thinking,

"I don't understand this."

(KEYBOARD CLICKS)

TED: We need Malka Leifer extradited.

The indifference that is being displayed

by the Israeli judicial system

is really child abuse in its own right.

-(SOMBRE MUSIC) -DASSI: Wow.

(SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY)

NICOLE: There was a bunch of messages on that.

DASSI: OK. Yeah.

TED: They've all gone up?

People have come out here to support.

It's just incredible.

It's triggering, but this is the visible sign

for those that can't come forward

to know that people understand why they can't come forward,

but they're there for them anyway.

It's making me emotional.

TED: When abuse becomes normal,

speaking up about being abused becomes abnormal.

So it's a self-reinforcing defect in a community.

DASSI: But when I started the campaign,

I went to Ted Baillieu.

And he said to me,

"Dassi, if I can be of any assistance,

"if there's anywhere you need me to be,

"I will turn up and I will be there for you."

Thanks for coming.

And anytime I asked him to be anywhere, he would be there.

TED: The school's still got stuff to answer for.

But the fact that they didn't stop this,

that's already one step forward.

-TED: Yeah. -NICOLE: Yep.

TED: Dassi sued the school and a civil case followed.

Was overseen by now former Supreme Court Judge Jack Rush,

and he presented an incredibly damning report,

damning of Leifer,

damning of the school board

and awarded substantial damages.

We do know from the civil case

that previous allegations had been raised

when Dassi's allegations were raised.

The board had asked to meet Dassi

because she'd sought an apology from them.

And then the school board messaged me and said,

"Who will you be bringing along as your support person?"

And I said, "Just Ted Baillieu, the former premier of Victoria."

First thing I said,

"Excuse me, but if you don't mind,

"I'm going to record this meeting,"

and I put my phone down and put it on record.

-(PHONE PIPS) -DASSI:

TED:

ABE:

They prioritised the welfare

of their relationship with their insurer,

before the welfare of the kids.

DASSI:

ABE:

DASSI:

TED:

ABE:

They wanted to praise themselves

because they had stayed silent.

And to my understanding,

despite all the promises in that meeting,

the apologies that Dassi sought were never made.

(CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK RAPIDLY)

DASSI: We feel frustrated that this has taken so long.

It's important for us to be here,

for everyone to see that

there are victims waiting every day for this to end.

MATAN: Thinking about the moment I would have to face them

and tell them it ended,

"There's nothing more we can do

"in order to extradite Malka Leifer to Australia,"

I was very afraid of this moment.

(GALLERY HUBBUB)

DASSI: We were stuck with Malka Leifer

faking her mental illness and getting away with it.

And we met Shana and we said to her,

"We need to have proof of Malka Leifer

"living her life that we can take to the Israeli police."

SHANA: That was really the only thing

that would really make a difference in this case,

was bringing proof that she was living a normal life.

And I just remember being, like, "I think we could do that."

(LAUGHS) "That's something

"we actually could probably help you with."

DASSI: She had spoken to Meyer Seewald,

who was her partner at JCW, Jewish Community Watch,

an advocacy group for sexual abuse survivors.

There's definitely a risk of immediate harm.

DASSI: And they had agreed to pay for a private investigator

to follow Malka Leifer for 10 days.

"Dear victims of Malka Leifer,

"I'm sorry for the pain and the suffering that you went through.

"I'm sorry for the revictimisation

"that happened to you when people in the community

"helped her and not you.

"I want you to know that my mission

"is to bring Leifer back."

It's been years and basically no-one has done shit.

And we have connections to Israel. Let's try to use them.

MAN: Shana from Jewish Community Watch came to me.

She said, "Listen, they have a medical statement

"that said that she can't do anything."

What was described is that she was so dysfunctional

that she could barely stand.

The psychiatrist described her like a sack of potatoes.

TZAFIR: She talk all day on the phone.

Talking and talking and talking.

Sunday, she went down from her apartment

to the bus stop with all her kids.

She was talking to them, laughing with them.

She's strong,

taking all her own grocery herself.

No-one help her.

(PEOPLE CONVERSE IN HEBREW)

(MALKA AND SHOPKEEPER CONVERSE IN HEBREW)

TZAFIR: After three weeks,

we take all the videos

and give them to the police.

I sat with them for two days

to explain what we're seeing.

(LEIFER SPEAKS INAUDIBLY)

A simple private investigator

for five days following her

and we're able to get all the proof

and no-one else could have gotten this proof before?

-(CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK) -(PEOPLE CHATTER)

MATAN: Maybe I was very optimistic,

but I believed that this is going to be

a rather short situation

in which we come to court.

We say, "This woman lied. She was faking her illness.

"Here are the movies." And everything solved.

And it just didn't work that way.

(YEHUDA SPEAKS HEBREW)

Lawyers for Malka Leifer argue

she's mentally unfit to face a trial,

despite an undercover police sting revealing otherwise.

Malka Leifer has been in a high-security prison here

for more than a year.

NEWSREADER: 10 years have passed with no end in sight.

NICOLE: We were fighting against something

that was bigger than it should be.

Obviously she's being protected by her community

but not just that, it's more than that.

There were people in Israel

who definitely did not want her extradited.

This lady's gotten away for years. How?

I'll try to speak in English

because I was a dropout in high school.

That's why I became a minister.

(LAUGHTER)

For us in Israel, the main story was not Malka Leifer.

The main story was Yaakov Litzman.

Israeli police have recommended

a senior minister

be charged for allegedly interfering

in a Melbourne child sexual abuse case.

REPORTER: The country's deputy health minister,

who's from the same religious sect as Malka Leifer,

appeared to have interfered with the extradition,

by pressuring state psychiatrists

to find she was mentally ill.

AARON: I spoke with sources who told me this,

Australian Haredi community of Malka Leifer

raised a lot of money.

I mean, millions and millions of dollars to help Malka Leifer.

And they use it to get one famous rabbi here in Israel

and one famous PR guy,

and according to my sources,

they have influence on Yaakov Litzman.

This was an extreme misuse

of governmental power.

(IN ENGLISH) Good morning, everybody. Welcome to Israel.

DASSI: We do know that he did instruct the psychiatrist

to falsify the medical records

and ensure that Malka Leifer

was never found to be sane enough

to continue extradition proceedings.

And according to Israeli standards,

Malka Leifer cannot be trialled here in Israel.

Then by definition,

Israel cannot send her back to Australia.

NEWSREADER: Israeli police say there is sufficient evidence

for Litzman to be charged with fraud and bribery.

(PROTESTERS CHANT IN HEBREW)

I attribute at least three years

of re-traumatisation to Litzman.

(PROTESTERS CONTINUE CHANTING)

It feels very deeply betraying,

particularly of someone ultra-Orthodox and religious.

(SOMBRE VOCAL MUSIC)

(MEN CONVERSE INAUDIBLY)

(CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK RAPIDLY)

REPORTER: A huge development in the Malka Leifer case.

REPORTER 2: A panel of psychiatrists in Jerusalem

has ruled that Malka Leifer

has been pretending she is mentally ill.

REPORTER 3: This decision means Israeli authorities

can proceed to an extradition hearing.

(MATAN SPEAKS HEBREW)

REPORTER: Israel's Supreme Court

rejected her appeal of an extradition order.

Malka Leifer will finally fly back to Australia.

MAN: It's an absolute momentous occasion.

Today we have just heard Judge Lomp rule

that Malka Leifer is fit to face justice.

Dassi, Elly and Nicole, please, the floor is yours.

We are so incredibly happy and excited.

We've been fighting six years for this.

We can't stop smiling.

There's just so many emotions flooding through us now.

SHANA: Every single victim that comes forward in a public way,

there's just a huge dent

that gets made in the wall of silence.

Do you actually realise what this means?

Like, she's coming back to Australia.

SHANA: Dassi, Nicole and Elly

took that to a whole nother level in terms of exposure.

They fought really hard

and they advocated for themselves

in a way that I had never seen anybody advocate for themselves

before on such a public scale.

(JET ROARS OVERHEAD)

When I learned that

Leifer was being extradited back, absolute elation.

REPORTER: She was photographed getting onto a plane,

which is reportedly headed for Frankfurt, in Germany,

before she'll be flown to Australia.

DANIELLE: And being in the height of COVID,

each country had their own restrictions,

so it was a bit of a mad rush to get her out of the country.

(POIGNANT MUSIC)

(PHONE CHIMES)

DASSI: Fuck! Oh, my gosh.

I am shaking. I'm literally shaking.

I believe you.

When's the last time you've eaten?

All of a sudden, a photo popped up

on my WhatsApp group

of Leifer getting onto the plane

and I literally could not breathe for half an hour.

Like, literally, I felt like someone

was constricting my oxygen.

Not just hearing about it.

Actually seeing her,

this person that's dominated

every single waking moment,

sleeping moment of my life

for the last 13 years is actually...

Yeah, it's...too surreal to even...to even contemplate

and to even try and explain

to anyone else other than my sisters.

REPORTER: Malka Leifer touching down on Australian soil

for the first time in 13 years.

I need to hear that nothing happened to her on the plane

and she actually walks off the plane

and then to put it into words again.

From 2008 till now...

..it's 13 years, it's a whole lifetime.

DASSI ON PHONE:

OK. OK. OK.

OK, so...

It wasn't Victoria Police's jurisdiction

in any of the other countries.

The moment the wheels landed, turned to her,

"You're under arrest for sexual abuse allegations

"in relation to Hadassa Erlich,

"Elisheva Sapper, Nechama Meyer.

"Don't have to say or do anything.

"Do you understand?"

Grunted at me. Multiple times.

NICOLE: Dassi, you've literally got to change the hashtag

to "LeiferIsBack".

DASSI: I'm just gonna write,

"Leifer has arrived in Melbourne."

Just write, "She's touched down."

DASSI: Something like that.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

DASSI: ..police cars there.

NICOLE: Yeah, but then there was one

further back, there.

REPORTER: She was driven off the tarmac

at Tullamarine last night

and into police custody.

I think the minute she landed in Australia,

it was a very physical sensation of her being in close proximity.

I feel we're connected again, not in a good way,

but my whole body felt it.

(POLICE RADIO CHATTER)

(TRAM BELL DINGS)

(TRAFFIC HUBBUB)

NICOLE: They've just taken out paragraphs upon paragraphs.

Half of this page is gone. Most of this page has gone.

For the first time, I wavered on my ability to do this.

I got a phone call last week

and the prosecutor let me know

that they are redacting a large part of my statement,

from the day I got married until Malka Leifer left in 2008,

which is a year and a half.

I asked her why.

I will not find out the reason until after trial.

But I'm assuming just the age, consent, perhaps.

If I was married and I should have known

that she was abusing me.

But abuse is not just the sexual abuse, it's the emotional,

it's the mental, it's the coercive control.

So it just feels like a complete invalidation

and misunderstanding of abuse and power.

I finished Year 12 and started teaching directly under her,

and she abused me for six and a half

out of the seven years that she was here.

She was part of my wedding day,

and she abused me

throughout all of that year and a half.

I got married in August 2006 and became pregnant.

Did not make any difference to the level of abuse.

She was a big person,

and I was so conscious

of her big body on top of my body, squashing my baby.

The instinct to protect my child is what stopped me

from being alone with her in a room again in that position.

But it continued for the next year and a half.

There are no charges for that time,

and that cannot be spoken about at all or it will be mistrial.

In a way, it feels almost like I'm lying

'cause I'm stopping at a certain point.

If it's not my whole story, then why should I go up on the stand?

(SOLEMN MUSIC)

How many court hearings, for real?

How many court hearings have we had?

74 court hearings in Israel.

And then another bunch here as well.

At least 20 here.

This is the justice that we were waiting for.

-We can do this, guys. -We can.

-Hug. Aw! -On camera?

(CHUCKLES)

I'm gonna cry.

No. Elly, you're so not crying now.

-You're so emotional. -(LAUGHS) I'm so emotional.

You'll be emotional for all of us.

-Yeah. -OK, OK, shush, shush, shush.

I just need to read through my charges.

No, no, no, don't ask me. I just need to read my charges.

DASSI: Yeah, don't read it now, Chams.

-You've done your... -I'm scared I forgot something.

DASSI: You've got it all. You know, it's in your memory.

You're not gonna know every single detail.

Like, that's impossible.

Our memory doesn't work like that.

(CAR DOOR CLOSES)

-OK. -Breathe.

-Just remember to breathe. -Keep on breathing.

OK.

-(PEDESTRIAN SIGNAL TICKS) -(QUIET CHATTER)

DASSI: Just sitting here together and...

ELLY: Starting to feel the anxiety a bit of...

-Yeah. -..Nechama being on the stand.

We know she's absolutely giving evidence now.

DASSI: It's just starting to feel a bit...

-ELLY: Overwhelming. -DASSI: Overwhelming.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

NICOLE: It's huge to acknowledge abuse

that happened two decades ago,

trying to describe incidents that happened 17 years ago,

and it's so confronting.

I just need to remember to ask for breaks,

to go really slowly, and to just try and see him

as just an old man who cannot get under my skin.

We heard very specific details about the offending.

How Malka Leifer would groom the girls.

How she would develop an initial relationship with them,

then isolate them.

And then they went into really granular detail

about the offending itself.

Malka Leifer would remove their clothing

and remove her clothing, touch them in various ways.

It was really, really quite challenging to listen to.

The central defence strategy of Hill

appears to be that the evidence might be contaminated

because of collusion,

that they've shared stories with each other

over the course of the abuse

and that's contaminated

everybody's recollection of the abuse,

which means that the evidence is tainted

and that the jury should take that into account

when they're determining guilt.

NICOLE: Ian literally said to me outright,

"You are constructing this story."

He said, "I want to suggest to you

"that nothing happened in Year 11 and Year 12.

"I want to suggest to you

"that she did not assault you at all,

"altogether, in all the years."

That was what he was doing throughout the entire day.

So it really chips away at your story.

In sexual assault trials,

it's one person's word against another's

or three people's words against another's,

and they're the ones essentially having to prove their case.

They are essentially on trial.

Malka Leifer's not sitting in the witness box

being cross-examined and she doesn't have to.

That is her right under this system.

DASSI: You're done.

-I know. -DASSI: Can I keep punching you?

You can keep punching me, but I'm just not feeling anything.

I'm just so, like, in shock. I'm literally in shock.

DASSI: I know, I know, I know.

(SPARSE MUSIC)

NICOLE: Today was absolutely brutal.

Saying so openly about rape and how she did it and positioning,

it's just been the most massive day of my life,

and to be honest, there's parts of me

that feel that they don't want to live till tomorrow.

(BREATHES SHAKILY)

(SPARSE MUSIC)

-LEAH: This is great. -DASSI: I know, I told you.

-LEAH: It's colour by number. -DASSI: You don't have to think.

You're not sitting there thinking,

"Oh, what should I paint?"

You're literally just following something

that's already decided where you're gonna paint.

We'll take an Uber from here. We'll go to the court.

And then I'm on, and this is the first time

that I'm gonna have to give my evidence in chief,

which means I have to talk through all my statements.

LEAH: Mm-hm. And what do you need?

Like, what's good for you? Do you like to just...

Just a hug, I think, to calm my nervous system.

OK. Alright.

It was so difficult to support Dassi through that.

You have got the power in that room, and I've told you,

you're the most resilient human I know.

I was constantly questioning myself,

wondering whether I was actually saying the right things.

I think once I get on the stand...

-You'll be brilliant. -..and I start talking...

LEAH: I found it impossible to emotionally detach myself

from what the sisters were going through.

All I wanted for them was relief.

I've taken my meds, but I'm taking my meds with me.

ELLY: Yeah, if you feel yourself dropping...

Otherwise I'll crash after four hours, yeah.

ELLY: Yeah. Very good.

NICOLE: And lunchtime, get something to eat.

I might not need every half an hour break.

NICOLE: She doesn't think she can eat,

but you'll have to force yourself to have something.

LEAH: I could feel her mental health,

the roller-coaster of it.

I can always tell Dassi's going through stress

when she starts speaking even more quickly with less breaths.

What's your heart rate?

What's yours?

-83. -61.

-So high. -But you're not...

(SPARSE MUSIC)

DASSI: It was torture to be cross-examined.

Effectively on trial,

because that's what it's like to be a witness.

You are on trial.

My whole life was open to being subpoenaed,

my medical records, messages between myself and friends,

so that they could use it against me on the stand,

which is what they did,

putting to me over and over again

that I was lying, that I had made this up.

The first time that she touched me...

..she had taken me out of school and to her home

for an afternoon to have private lessons.

And I remember her coming home

and checking to see if her husband was home,

realising that she had the house to herself

and locking the door and telling me to go to the couch.

She said to me,

"This is what a mother that loves you does,

"and I'm like a mother to you."

Not having had any experience of what a loving mother does,

there was a time that I believed her.

I didn't know how to make sense of it,

and I remember going back to school and just wondering

what on earth had just happened and why had it happened.

I just wanted to literally get a blanket and pull it over my head

and just be like, "Go away!" to everybody.

NICOLE AND ELLY: Yeah.

And then, like, instead,

I have to sit there and talk more

and talk about more things that are horrific.

ELLY: In detail.

In, like, the most detail that you could ever think of.

NICOLE: ..that you've ever spoken to someone about.

-Yeah. -ELLY: To a room of strangers.

Exactly.

ELLY: The whole process is massively re-traumatising.

-FRIEDA: Hello, Dassi. -DASSI: Frieda!

FRIEDA: How are you?

-Entrez-vous. -Whew!

-It's been a long day. -WOMAN: Hey.

You look pretty good for someone who's just endured...

DASSI: This has literally taken over my life,

and that's why I just wanted to come here

and just have some time, like, away from all of that,

'cause my whole family is just, like, filled up with that drama.

Have you ever wanted to be a lawyer?

DASSI: No, but I keep being told I should be a lawyer.

DASSI: Henry is Josh's father.

Him and Maralyn, his wife,

I hadn't really known them when I was married to Josh

because they weren't religious

and we didn't have a lot to do with them.

MARALYN: When do you think this will be over?

Like, can you see an end of the...

-DASSI: They said six weeks. -Six weeks?

DASSI: I hadn't actually seen Frieda, Henry's sister,

at all since my wedding,

but she came to visit me while I was in hospital.

They were just incredibly supportive people

and continue to be to this day.

MARALYN: Now, this has literally...

DASSI: In 2011, I was in a psychiatric hospital

with my daughter,

suffering from really bad postpartum depression.

I'm self-harming and I'm suicidal.

It was my first exposure to actually sitting down

having conversations with people outside of my community.

I really struggled with this idea

that I had been taught throughout my whole life

that I was superior to them because of the way I lived

and the way I covered my hair and the way I dress.

And if that was wrong, then what else was wrong?

(PENSIVE MUSIC)

CHANA: Sadly, perhaps not for them,

but, I think, for the community,

Nicole's the only sister

still an active part of the Orthodox community.

And I say 'sadly' because the community failed Elly and Dassi.

Even when the revelations came out, they weren't supported,

they weren't apologised to, they weren't...

They weren't cared for.

ELLY: I'm gonna vomit.

I'm literally scared of my mind going blank.

DASSI: If you're going blank, ask for a break.

NICOLE: I brought you, just, like, a few caramel

and two other chocolates if you just need something sweet

to give you a bit of energy, OK?

-ELLY: Thank you. -So I've got that for you.

DASSI: You have to eat something that has protein.

I'll see how I feel in lunchtime.

-Yep. Yeah. -ELLY: OK. Should we go?

-NICOLE: Yeah, fine. -OK, let's go.

DASSI: Els, you need a plan for the weekend,

something nice to do together, you and Danny, you really do.

I can babysit Maddie on Friday night or Saturday night.

But you're gonna need that after this intensity.

I think it's really hard on Danny.

NICOLE: Yeah, I think so too. I...

I'm feeling for him, but I know that he's... He's OK, but...

-DASSI: He is, he will be OK. -NICOLE: He's solid.

And you can't think too much about him.

He's your support person.

ELLY: I understand defence lawyers are there for a purpose.

However, my experience being cross-examined by him

was...I...I felt degraded.

I haven't shared things

that have happened with my father

because I don't have the mental capacity

to deal with that particular event.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

Ian insinuated that because of previous things

that happened at home with my father

that I understood what sex was,

and therefore what happened with Malka Leifer was consensual.

He wanted me to crumble.

DANNY: I think you... you withstood

some of the worst cruelty

I've ever seen.

I mean, the judge jumped in and said, "You can't say that."

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

ELLY: It got to me that Leifer was there listening. (SIGHS)

(SOMBRE MUSIC CONTINUES)

That was one of the most traumatic things

that I've ever experienced in terms of re-traumatising.

There's just no humanity.

How do we get to a point where one can do that to another?

It's so cruel.

Just got to pretend like these things don't happen,

and then my body takes a hit from it.

Which is probably why I...can't get pregnant.

(UNEASY MUSIC)

NICOLE: They're all aware of the story,

they all see it in the news, and nobody wants to come forward.

I was so angry this morning.

Like, I was getting so angry about the fact

that people can get up on the stand

in support of Mrs Leifer

and not have to worry about the community.

And the community will... "Oh, the community will understand."

-And they won't... -NICOLE: And support them.

But if anyone dare to stand up against her

or dare to stand up on behalf of us,

immediately they'll be ostracised.

Just getting so angry

about those twisted, twisted values

and how they've made no progress to support victims.

NICOLE: They can't handle it.

I don't have anger, even for Malka Leifer,

because anger doesn't serve me.

I just have a disappointment in the lack of enough growth.

The community as a whole hasn't moved far enough for me yet,

and that's what I'm deeply disappointed in.

People don't realise that by being silent,

they're actually enabling.

Oh, gosh, guys, here it is.

We weren't allowed to discuss any form

of what we said in our evidence, giving the evidence,

but also, for the rest of the trial,

we weren't actually allowed to watch the proceedings together.

Ha. He didn't let him finish the question.

He's also leaving the jury hanging

with that particular information

'cause it's the second time he's brought it up now,

to show that I read Dassi's statement when I never did.

We each sat in our own room...

(SCOFFS)

..listening to the trial, but having to kind of, like,

scream across the rooms and say things here and there

in order not to be, I guess, in contempt of court.

DASSI: It doesn't make any sense, and I think

it's the most ridiculous thing in the world,

but here we are, each watching it.

We can talk about it,

but we just can't watch it together

on the same screen.

The next witness is up. Goodbye.

(HOPEFUL VOCAL MUSIC)

Hi. My name's Danny.

I was just hoping to chase down a result, please.

Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

-Do you have it? -DANNY: I do, but...

Do you have... Did you hear it?

I didn't hear it. Didn't hear it.

Whatever it is, it's going to be OK, yes?

-Mm-hm. -OK.

Yay. (LAUGHS)

-It's still in... -It's hard not to be excited.

NICOLE: After suffering secondary infertility

for two years

and having had four pregnancy losses,

I became pregnant.

-It's good news. -It is good news.

(SNIFFLES)

I remember thinking, "This isn't the right time,"

at the same time thinking this little life

would give me the strength to get through trial.

She's not gonna take it away from us.

No.

DASSI: We basically found out that two of the charges

relating to Elly might be dropped

because of a quirk in the law.

The legislation changed around the time

that the incidents happened.

ELLY: Guys, here we go. The news.

"Two charges against former Melbourne principal

"Malka Leifer dropped

"as abuse trial nears end."

NICOLE: Does it say why in the article?

ELLY: Of course that's the headline.

NICOLE: Mm-hm. Fucking hell.

ELLY: It just makes it seem like she was acquitted.

It says my name and then the rest of it's just ramble.

NICOLE: Yeah, and 'The Australian' just literally says,

"Accused paedophile principal

"found not guilty on two charges."

That's the whole fucking...

I knew that would make the headlines like that.

And the jury has to be smart enough to take all that in

and everything the prosecution says, and the defence,

and then come back somehow with some guilty verdicts.

-But it seems so impossible... -It does.

..for them to overcome all of that.

ELLY: That's true.

NICOLE: Els, how was your appointment?

DASSI: Could you hear the heartbeat?

-Yeah. -Did you get another picture?

-DASSI: Did you take a video? -Yeah, took a video.

-NICOLE: Can we listen to it? -Yeah.

But it's a bit, like, scratchy.

-NICOLE: That's OK. -DASSI: Doesn't matter.

(HEARTBEAT PULSES OVER WHITE NOISE)

-NICOLE: Definitely hear it. -DASSI: Oh, my gosh, Els.

NICOLE: That's beautiful. Can I see the picture?

-This is the blob. -DASSI: Can I see?

Wow.

ELLY: So it's just, like, it's starting to get...

-You know, it's starting to... -All clear.

-Can I see? -ELLY: All clear, yeah.

ELLY: So we're gonna have weekly scans,

and then, at 10 weeks now, they can find out the sex.

-NICOLE: Are you going to? -ELLY: Yeah.

DASSI: Can we get home as fast as possible?

My blood pressure is crashing really badly.

Like, I might faint.

And that would really not be good.

They keep repeating how brutal it's going to be,

and we know that, but when they keep repeating it, it...

Just hearing Ian's voice during all the arguments,

he comes across as someone so intelligent,

and then he puts these absolute statements forward.

Yeah, that's what scares me.

ELLY: Yeah.

That was the first time that I heard everything

that happened to you and everything that happened to you.

(SIGHS)

DASSI: Thinking about going into hospital.

Old coping mechanisms are coming up,

self-destructive coping mechanisms.

I'm using up energy I don't have

to fight these self-destructive urges

because the feelings with all of this trauma

is so overwhelming.

NICOLE: Dassi, I'm terrified.

What if I didn't do a good enough job?

I'm so scared.

I can see that you're very scared,

but you gave your evidence, you did the best that you could.

He's finished his fricking closing arguments,

like, finally.

You're gonna be in such a state of anxiety

the whole time that the jury is deliberating

if you keep thinking like that.

I know, but I only have five charges,

but they were redacted a huge part of my statement,

and they redacted bits in my statement.

DASSI: If they find her guilty

that something that she did for me or Elly,

then why are you lying about it but we're saying the truth?

We think like that, but the way that Ian put it to them today

and the way that they're trying to discredit...

DASSI: The argument's stupid.

Yeah, but are the jury smart enough to think that?

DASSI: The jury either believes us or they don't believe us.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

NICOLE: OK. Moving out of the Quest today. Missing you, Els.

We'll send you this after.

This 3-, 4-day hiatus might actually,

I don't know, maybe it'll help us mentally reset,

but I don't really think it will.

And we're just going to be waiting for deliberation.

Yeah, moving back home and not sure how I'm feeling about that,

but we are leaving the Quest now.

Don't really have much else to say.

I can see.

'Bye. I don't think the 'bye' got on there.

We'll send it to Elly

and then she'll just get a sense of where we are today.

I think she'll appreciate that.

I can send her the bloopers as well.

Then they'll give her something to laugh about.

DASSI: She's resting today

'cause she had surgery yesterday

and she is recovering from that this morning.

What are you writing?

"Thank you. We enjoyed our stay here."

I would've written more, but my handwriting's a bit too shaky.

-Got it? -Yep.

NICOLE: Let's just make sure we check in with each other.

Do you want to make time for coffee tomorrow or Friday?

I have no idea how I'm gonna be feeling tomorrow.

NICOLE: Do you think it's going to feel weird

not living together now?

DASSI: Yeah.

NICOLE: I think we'll just end up calling each other,

like, 10 times a day.

DASSI: Back to usual life, hey?

-And we managed quite well. -DASSI: We did.

Like, we didn't have any, like...

DASSI: Did I drive you too much insane?

No, not at all. Did I drive you?

DASSI: Slightly, at times. (LAUGHS)

-In regards to what? -DASSI: No, you really didn't.

You were actually really good.

NICOLE: How are you feeling about the exposure and all that?

Going out, people are just gonna, like, recognise you.

That, for me, is something I'm struggling with.

I'm not ready to step into the community,

simply because trial's not finished yet.

There's no verdict.

We still have, you know, all those days of waiting.

Even if I stay home and far away from people as much as possible,

it's just a whole different level of exposure.

It's not that, like, I'm embarrassed

of what's out there, because I'm not.

It's just the way that Ian has said stuff

and the way it's come out in the media, it just feels so...

-DASSI: Horrible. -..not the truth.

So, what, do I just say, like, goodbye to you now?

-This is so weird. -DASSI: I know.

-This is really, really strange. -DASSI: Like, goodbye.

I know.

-OK, well, actually, goodbye. -(LAUGHS)

-Actually goodbye. -Yeah. Love ya.

-Hug? -I guess so. (LAUGHS)

-Love you. -We actually never hug.

Will you open the open the gate for me?

-It should be open, I think. -Oh, that's right.

NICOLE: OK. See you.

(CAR STARTS)

(PENSIVE MUSIC)

ELLY: On Saturday night, I was lying here in bed,

and I felt this...this...

..huge, um, breath come out of me,

and I sat up and I said, "Danny, I...I killed the baby."

We went straight to Cabrini.

They had called in a specialist.

She just said, "I'm sorry."

I remember staring at this light,

and as she was telling me the news, this light just dimmed.

I remember just thinking, "That's...that's...that's it."

All this... (SIGHS)

Like, this whole trial and...

This...this little...

You know, this little... you know, fighter

I felt that I had in me,

this little warrior, tried so hard...

..but it was... it was just too much.

I told myself that that's a trial baby

and now it will never be affected by Leifer again.

(POIGNANT MUSIC)

(POIGNANT MUSIC CONTINUES)

DASSI: This past little break from the court

grieving Elly's loss.

Spoke with my therapist yesterday

and we're looking at an admission to hospital.

How much more can a person survive?

I don't know and I don't want to find out.

NICOLE: We were told that when the verdict arrives,

there is no time for anyone to travel in.

So if we actually do want to be there for the verdict,

we have to be in close proximity to the court,

and we just have to sit and wait.

Wouldn't it be good if it comes before the weekend, though?

To go through a weekend waiting till Monday...

DASSI: It's so quick. Two and a half days.

I would say that's so quick.

When they're convicting someone of something so serious,

naming someone a paedophile,

that's a big thing for people to do,

so they take their time to do that.

The scariest part is, if she's not guilty in all 27 charges,

she goes back to Israel that day.

There is nothing to keep her back here for.

There's nothing that we can do.

And there's nothing we can do, nuh.

That's too scary to think about.

I literally cannot put my mind to that.

I can't process that.

If Leifer was found not guilty, she would be going back

to her community in Israel and saying,

"I've been found not guilty."

People trusting her with their daughters again.

Definitely allowed doubts to creep in,

especially with the way that my mental health was.

We did not hear any verdict today.

I am back in hospital...

..in the same ward that I was in 11 years ago.

And I've got an evening ahead of rising panic.

PENNY: The jury's just asked a question.

They want some direction on reaching a unanimous verdict.

There is what they've described as a deadlock.

They really are struggling,

and I have seen a jury being discharged

'cause they simply couldn't come to a resolution.

So what the judge has given is a perseverance direction.

DASSI: Did you see any of their faces when they walked in?

-Yeah, they looked sorry. -Yeah, I know.

But I don't know what 'sorry' means.

"Sorry that I'm gonna deliver a non-guilty?"

-Yeah, exactly. -"Sorry that I'm gonna..."

-That's what I got as well. -I was trying to...

-They looked, like, sad at us. -Yeah.

Ian Hill's made it a lot closer

than a lot of us anticipated it would be,

and done a really good job

in placing doubt in the minds of the jurors.

PENNY: He's a fantastic barrister.

It makes it easy to see how he could get them

to come back with a not guilty verdict.

We'll wait, hope.

Hope dies. Go home.

I'm just, like, on the verge of tears. I don't want to talk.

NICOLE: Yeah, fair enough.

I can't imagine going through another weekend

of this kind of uncertainty.

One weekend was bad enough,

and then the whole next week and then another weekend.

And they're locked away in this room

where they're not coming to a decision for nine days.

It was torture.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

WOMAN ON PHONE: I just got the call.

They've got verdicts on everything.

We're reconvening at 3:45.

-Speak to you soon. -OK, OK.

-They've got... -'Bye.

ELLY: They've got verdicts on everything.

Guys, guys, guys. What time is it?

It's happening. 2:45.

We've got to wait another 40 minutes.

(ELLY EXCLAIMS)

(DASSI MUMBLES) We're getting a verdict today.

-We're getting a verdict today. -We're getting a verdict.

Actually getting a verdict today.

-Verdicts on everything. -Verdicts on everything.

DASSI: We're sitting just gripping each other's hands,

waiting for the court to quieten down,

for the judge to come in, for the jury to come in,

for the judge to ask the jury what their verdict is.

First five charges belong to Nicole.

And the jury foreman stood up and said, "Not guilty."

And then that continued for the second and the third,

for the fourth, the fifth.

None of Nicole's charges have been found guilty.

It was such a shock, but it didn't really settle in,

probably, till that night.

Something kicked in to be strong at that point

and not break down in that room.

And then they read charge six, and it's guilty.

And then, you know, it was guilty and guilty,

and then a couple of not guilties thrown in there again.

And to me it didn't make any sense,

but it was such a huge, huge mix of emotions.

NEWSREADER: 15 years after the former Elsternwick principal

fled to Israel,

Malka Leifer is tonight a convicted child sex offender

guilty of 18 charges, including six of rape.

REPORTER: She was found guilty of eight charges

relating to youngest sister Elly.

There were 14 charges linked to middle sibling Dassi,

the verdict guilty on 10.

But for eldest sister Nicole, a unanimous not guilty

on the five charges where she was the alleged victim.

JUDGE: Mrs Leifer, can you please say yes

if you can see and hear me...

LEIFER: Yes.

JUDGE: ..that your total effective sentence

is 15 years imprisonment.

I fix a non-parole period of 11 and a half years.

She abused the three of us for so many years,

and while today's verdict may not properly reflect that,

she is guilty and she will be held accountable.

Justice was served today.

We did our best. We did our best.

Today we can start to take that power back

that she stole from us as children.

REPORTER: Will your client be appealing, Mr Hill?

IAN: There's nothing to say at this stage.

REPORTER: Is this what you expected, Mr Hill?

NICOLE: Guys, I'm really... Really, I'm OK.

ELLY: Your strength makes me feel OK.

-I prepared myself. -DASSI: I know.

But we also know that she was guilty.

NICOLE: But Ian worked so bloody hard.

He wanted so badly to discredit me,

and that's why I prepared myself.

I did. So I'm OK.

NICOLE: Now I'm getting fricking sorry messages.

I don't want that.

Like, it's just not necessary.

We just never thought that we would reach, like,

this day, like, today.

-This is surreal, this moment. -It is.

What do we want to do? (LAUGHS)

-We're so, like, in shock. -ELLY: Someone needs to...

Someone else needs to make decisions right now.

NICOLE: Wherever we are, we'll be together.

We can be in a hotel.

I don't know. I can't go in a car yet.

I'll fricking jump out the window.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

It was a very difficult judgement for Nicole

and I think you can still see that in her eyes.

The judge in the Leifer case chose to exclude some evidence.

The history of the school itself and prior allegations

that the school had ignored,

and the story of Leifer being scuttled out of the country.

The verdict in Nicole's allegations

would have been different

had all that information been available.

DASSI:

I know. I know that. But she's got something.

She did get a win. Her win was with me.

I put up a Facebook post

so people would just stop telling me how sorry they are.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Apparently, ABC reported

that Adass issued a public apology to the victims

and commended how brave they were.

DASSI: Oh, wow.

But why didn't they give us their support

while the whole thing was going on?

Yeah, yeah, it's a completely...

DASSI: "Oh, my gosh, she's actually guilty.

"Oh, we should probably say something now.

"Not when we send her away or pay for her tickets."

So genuine, so authentic.

(POIGNANT MUSIC)

ELLY: What's the overriding feelings

that you guys are feeling now?

NICOLE: I'm just worried that no-one believes me.

(NOTIFICATION CHIMES)

DASSI: 'Australian Jewish News'.

Do you want to talk to them?

Um, they can call tomorrow. There's no rush.

They don't put out their paper till Wednesday,

so no rush for them.

DASSI: 'The New York Times' just sent an email.

NICOLE: Just send my number if you want me to...

I'll just forward you the email, Chams,

and then you can respond to them.

OK.

-ELLY: Is there more pizza? -There's more pizza.

It's kind of just small, small bite-size.

Chams, do you want some pizza?

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

-No. -Just to clink glasses?

-OK. -OK.

(REFLECTIVE MUSIC)

To guilty, guys.

NICOLE: I held it together pretty much until that night,

when I had a therapy session late that night,

and I think that was, like, the one and only time

she ever offered to keep her phone on.

I said no, because I wouldn't impose that on anyone.

DASSI: I think for any victim that gets not guilty,

it's not an ending.

There's just no closure.

I feel relieved because she'd been found guilty.

There was definitely that.

Then devastation because Nicole hadn't got justice.

And how do we walk away from that,

not being able to walk away from it together?

Receiving not guilty has made sure

that she will be in me for the rest of my life,

like, we will still be interconnected because of that.

No matter how much I try and move away from her,

my need to prove that she did that,

it just means that she'll be in my head,

goodness knows, maybe the rest of my life.

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

How could something so traumatising for so many years

fighting for justice turn out like this?

I don't know how to go on.

Getting justice is something that has kept me alive.

I don't know how to just take the not guilty.

There has been no minute, not waking or sleeping,

that I have been able

to escape the pain of the verdict.

-(TRAFFIC HUBBUB) -(TRAM BELL RINGS)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER AND LAUGHTER)

DASSI: The response from the book

has been overwhelmingly positive.

DASSI: Thank you so much for coming this morning.

WOMAN: Oh, look, you were the highlight for me

coming to this festival.

-Best of luck to you. -Thank you so much.

To know that words that I've written,

people have either been educated from, inspired by,

or in some ways it resonates with them

and they feel less alone in their journey,

I mean, that's such an amazing thing to hear.

So there's definitely a sense of pride.

(ELLY HUMS TUNEFULLY)

ELLY: A month after verdict, we fell pregnant.

The pregnancy was high risk.

There were many complications throughout.

Our little daughter came into the world quite early.

She fought all the way through NICU and special care,

and she's home with us now and continues to thrive

and grow and give us so much joy.

Ah!

NICOLE: I think right now, where I'm holding,

which is a year and 11 weeks since the verdict -

I'm still counting because it's still that significant to me -

I think I'm in a much better place.

A few months after, some kind of fire reawakened inside me

and I decided that Malka Leifer is just not going to shut me up.

So I opened up a TikTok account.

It just grew, and the amount of people that told me

it resonated with them gave me more confidence to keep growing.

I realised that I do have an ability,

and I know I have had for years, to be able to support others,

before I eventually, hopefully, study law next year.

So I am definitely in a stronger, better place

than I have been for a while.

TED: My view about Dassi has only been reinforced.

She's a remarkable young woman, as are her two sisters.

They've been through hell, they've survived.

All power to them.

DANIELLE: If it wasn't for the sisters

making as much noise as they did,

Leifer would still be in Israel.

They are the most resilient, courageous women

that I've ever had the honour of knowing.

MATAN: I really admire them for taking that step forward,

for being role models for other victims.

(AIRY VOCAL MUSIC)