Kumanjayi Walker was killed in Yuendumu nearly six years ago. His family is still fighting for change

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4 days ago

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that this article contains the names and images of Indigenous people who have died, used with the permission of their families.
"Ceasefire."
It is a word that has reverberated in the remote town of Yuendumu, after a police officer fatally shot a 19-year-old teenager.
The same agonising call came again on Tuesday from Warlpiri elder Ned Jampijinpa Hargraves, a day after the NT coroner delivered her findings into the teenager's death.
Speaking in Warlpiri and then English, Mr Hargraves told reporters gathered in Yuendumu on Tuesday that "we need to let the world know what has been happening to us".
Nineteen-year-old Warlpiri-Luritja man Kumanjayi Walker died after being shot three times by then-constable Zachary Rolfe in a dark house, the day of a family funeral — a death the NT coroner on Monday ruled was "avoidable".
The handing down of those findings was delayed by another tragedy — the death of 24-year-old Warlpiri man Kumanjayi White in May, after he was restrained by police on the floor of an Alice Springs supermarket.
"We were this close to end it, but again something happens, and another one gets killed," Mr Hargraves said.
"In future when we welcome the police, it needs to be two ways of working and understanding."
Mr Walker's cousin Samara Fernandez-Brown said she was "relieved" the coronial inquest had ended but the community wouldn't stop fighting for change, including for an ombudsman for police complaints.
"When we heard the coroner say that there was structural and entrenched racism in the NT police we felt validated; as a family, to us, we felt racism killed Kumanjayi," she said.
She also welcomed the coroner's finding that her cousin didn't reach for the former constable's gun in the scuffle that night.
On Monday, Coroner Elisabeth Armitage found that Mr Rolfe "was racist", and that he was a beneficiary of an organisation — the NT Police Force — that had "the hallmarks of institutional racism".
"While it was not possible for me to say with certainty that Mr Rolfe's racist attitudes were operative in his decisions on 9 November or were a contributing cause of Kumanjayi's death, I cannot exclude that possibility," she said.
Mr Rolfe was acquitted of all charges related to Kumanjayi Walker's death, including murder, in his 2022 Supreme Court trial.
On Tuesday Mr Rolfe released a statement saying he was entitled to the presumption of innocence and didn't accept any coronial findings "inconsistent with his rightful acquittal".
"He does not accept a finding that he subverted [Yuendumu] Sergeant [Julie] Frost and instituted his own plan. He does not accept the criticisms that he failed to adhere to operational safety training, or that he ignored his training at all," the statement said.
"Constable Rolfe was violently stabbed despite his polite and calm disposition, all of which is self-evident from the body worn video that he wore when this incident occurred …
"Insofar as some may hold a view to the contrary, this was never about race."
The NT Police Association said in a statement that its officers "do their best to respond, protect, and serve, while often knowing the root causes lie beyond their reach".
"For years, commissioner after commissioner has introduced policies and training aimed at addressing these challenges and eliminating harmful attitudes within the force, specifically racism," the statement said.
"Yet too often, these measures are not upheld or enforced."
NT Police Acting Commissioner Martin Dole, meanwhile, responded to Mr Hargraves's claims that he had reneged on a planned meeting on Monday.
"I'm sorry that Ned feels that way and I apologise that he feels that way," he said.
"But I did have consultation with several of the elders and we thought it was best that that meeting take place in future days."
Mr Hargraves said he remained disappointed in the commissioner and was "strongly against" him returning to the community.
"I won't talk to him again, I won't ever talk to him. I don't want to," he said.
First Nations people across the country felt the impact of the findings handed down on Monday.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner Katie Kiss told News Breakfast the reality of deaths in custody affected many Indigenous families.
"There isn't one Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander person in the country that isn't touched by this experience, and it reflects on the fact that on any given day it could be any one of our children or grandchildren," she said.
Since the landmark Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody in 1991, almost 600 First Nations people have died in custody, with 13 lives lost this year alone.
In a statement, Indigenous Australians Minister Malarndirri McCarthy said Kumanjayi Walker's family and the wider Warlpiri-Luritja community had suffered a profound loss and were experiencing deep grief.
"I acknowledge the important work of Coroner Armitage and encourage the Northern Territory Government to carefully review and consider the recommendations in full," she said.
Shadow Indigenous Australians Minister Kerrynne Liddle told RN Breakfast she hoped the Northern Territory government would act on the coroner's calls for better community policing, youth and mental health supports.
The federal government should also be held accountable, she said, noting the "significant" investment it makes into territory services and policing.
Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe said Aboriginal deaths in custody were not unique to the Northern Territory and the federal government must be held accountable.
"This is a national crisis, and as long as the federal government does nothing … they are complicit in these deaths," she said.
On Tuesday, kids on school holidays were running around the basketball court in Yuendumu, unfazed by the glaring sun, their smiles wide as they sank in the hoops.
Ms Fernandez-Brown echoed the coroner's calls for more of these Yapa-based community services.
"Everything we do is for our people, it's to make sure the futures of our young people get to be safer, which is more relevant this week because it is NAIDOC week and we are looking to the future as well," she said.
An internal police anti-racism strategy is expected to be released soon, but the Northern Territory government's review into racism in the NT police force, initiated by the former Labor government, was scrapped after the CLP won government last year.
Kumanjayi Walker's family continue to call for a ban on guns worn by police officers surveilling Aboriginal communities, something the coroner said police should discuss with Yuendumu leadership.
Senator Thorpe urged Northern Territory authorities to hear the family's wishes.
"The family cannot be ignored here. To bring healing and some kind of justice, we must listen and adhere to what that community and that family needs," she said.