Laquisha is 16. She lives with her auntie in Alice Springs. She goes to St. Joseph's. She keeps herself out of trouble by staying home and going to school.

She has been in court. She has been in detention in Darwin — 1,500 kilometres from home.

"Court is scary because you don't know whether if you are getting out or not, and your families will be sitting there watching you, sitting down with the youth justice people and yeah, it's just scary."

The fear is specific. It is not abstract. It is about what comes next:

"The bad things I've done. And then the judge has to sentence me or bail me out or good behaviour, so that's why I get nervous. Because then if you don't get bail, you have to go all the way to Darwin. And I don't like going to Darwin cause I have no family there."

In Darwin youth detention, the routine is stark:

"Just basically go to school every day, nine to three. And then go lockdown at 11 o'clock and come out at 11:30 and then do the same thing at three o'clock every time. And then we go into our cell at six thirty till the next day, and you have 12 minutes phone call."

Twelve minutes. Then a two-hour wait for the next call. No family visits. If you have enemies inside, you go into separation. It is mostly lockdown because there is not enough staff.

Asked what would be better than prison, Laquisha was clear:

"It would've been better hanging around with family instead of sitting in your cell by yourself without your family. Just 12 minute calls. And then have to wait for two hours every time for next call."

Asked why young people get in trouble in the first place, she answered with one word:

"Oppression."

She also named what happens closer to home — arguments with family, peer pressure, social media. She is honest about her own path: "Sometimes I just feel I have arguments with my family. That's why I go break in."

What is keeping her out now? Her caseworker. Her family. That is about it.

Laquisha wants her driver's licence. She wants to travel — Perth sounds like "a different planet" to her. She has never been.

For judges, Laquisha's account is the clearest description of what the system looks like from inside. Court is scary. Darwin is far. Twelve minutes is not enough. And the root cause, in her own word, is oppression.