Paola Magni: Making the rules
For many people, moving to Australia is the dream, but this wasn’t the case for Italian forensic scientist, Dr Paola Magni. While making Perth her home was not part of a grand plan, a combination of opportunity and innate curiosity has led to her making a very full life here.
“I have always been fascinated by Australia because of my love for nature. I was a city girl, but I loved hiking, I had a microscope and I watched all the nature documentaries, so I studied Natural Sciences in university. I found myself winning a scholarship in the middle of nowhere in Kazakhstan, where I studied the genetics of amphibians. It was an honour, but I wasn’t changing the world or making an immediate impact.”
After taking some time off to rethink and refocus, Paola decided to change one of her classes to entomology – the study of insects – a decision that would change her path forever.
“During the class, the professor highlighted that insects are everywhere, they are the most present organism in the world, but hardly studied. And it came up that some entomologists are using insects in criminal investigations. I saw myself studying manta rays in the Maldives rather than insects on a dead body – but I thought it could be interesting.
“What really drove me was how entomologists jump into a case and provide an idea on how to solve it from a perspective that nobody else thinks about. You’re not playing by the rules, you’re making the rules. That was the switch for me. You have the body and the bugs – I can be the connection.”
Fast forward a couple of years since that class, Paola was able to write a thesis on forensics entomology thanks to a unique collaboration with the forensic pathologist’s department of the Italian Health Service. Her work included investigations into the bugs collected on the scenes of suicides, suspicious deaths and animal cruelty cases. However, while her thesis become a book and she landed a job at the forensic pathologist’s department, there was little room to grow or learn, because she could not perform any research activity in the area.
It was a chance meeting at a conference in London with the director of the Centre of Forensic Science at the University of Western Australia, that gave Paola the opportunity she was looking for to complete her PhD.
“He invited me to Australia to join their group for six months. That was the beginning of it all. I came here in 2010 and it was a huge shock. It was much quieter, everything closed early, and I had to drive auto instead of manual, and on the other side of the road!”
Despite the infrastructural and cultural changes to get used to, Paola returned to Perth for good in 2013, with the drive to continue making an impact in forensic science. She admits that it was a sliding doors moment – if she wasn’t successful in winning an academic position to follow her dream, she would have closed her science research chapter for good and stayed in Italy to pursue a career in science education. But, she did, and has made Perth her home.
Now working at Murdoch University, Paola is married with two children. While career opportunities brought her here, it is with immediate warmth that she says she stayed here for love. In 2023, Paola was named a finalist in the 2024 WA Australian of the Year Awards, and has since been named the 2024 Australian Science Communicator of the Year. These are just two of the many accolades received in these years, one being also nominated Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy. Her friends describe her as “the most famous Italian in Australia”.
Paola admits that being Italian in Australia can have its advantages and challenges. While there are benefits to people knowing a little about your culture and language, there are a lot of stereotypes. But there is opportunity to educate and learn from one another, especially in such a multicultural nation.
“My generation are almost all Italian-born with Italian parents, but my mum is from the south and my dad is from the north. In Italy, that was pretty diverse in itself. Here, it’s diverse 2.0. I love it because it’s even better if you are diverse; it is a conversation starter and brings different things and tales to the table.”
Paola’s drive for going where opportunities take her seems even more innate when she talks more about her mum, who flew from Italy to join her at the Australian of the Year Awards ceremony in WA.
“She left the south of Italy when she was 16 to work as a teacher, so she understands. When I left for the six months, everyone said you can go, but you have to come back. The second time, I said, ‘I’m not coming back’. People can make you feel guilt for leaving, but my mum was the only person who said, ‘I gave you roots to stay, but I gave you wings to fly’.”
Not only is Paola recognised for her groundbreaking work and research within forensic science, she is a powerful advocate for ending violence against women, as the Ambassador for Red Shoes Australia, a role that has been more than 20 years in the making.
“In my work as expert witness, I found that in the majority of cases there were female victims. In 2003, I bumped into the Red Shoes in Turin (a public art exhibition in which each pair of shoes represents a woman who has died from domestic violence in one year), and I came to a realisation that some of the women’s shoes could belong to ones that I worked on – it was incredibly emotional. I wrote a letter to the artist, moved to Perth and the domestic violence movement was getting bigger. I proposed to the WA Museum that we bring the exhibition to Australia.”
During the 16 Days in WA campaign in 2022, 392 pairs of red women’s shoes representing the total number of women murdered in Australia between 2015 and 2020 (Australian Criminal Intelligence National Homicide Monitoring Program – 2015 to 2020) were placed at the public entrance of the WA Museum Boola Bardip.
In 2023, the exhibition was replicated in Kalgoorlie with 61 red shoes laid on the ground of the WA Museum of the Goldfields, representing the victims of that year in Australia. And this year preparation is ongoing for the exhibition hosted by the Museum of the Museum of the Great Southern in Albany, during the same period.
The aim of the exhibition is to ensure women across the country who have disappeared due to violence become visible again, and the hope is that the number of shoes year by year will reduce, even disappear if possible.
“Through forensic science, I want to help the victims, but also help the justice system – that’s what I’d like to develop and shed light on. I want to develop programs to explore how STEM disciplines can help prevent and investigate domestic violence. Give them the disciplines to explore how to tackle the problems. Give them more control.”
Keep up with Paola’s work and impact at paolamagni.com.au
Do you know an Australian who is making a remarkable difference to our society? Nominate them in the Australian of the Year Awards at australianoftheyear.org.au/nominate