NT coroner to hand down long-awaited findings into 2019 police shooting of Kumanjayi Walker

Australia Broadcast Center

10 hours ago

The Northern Territory coroner will today hand down her long-awaited findings and recommendations following an almost three-year inquiry into the 2019 police shooting of Kumanjayi Walker.
Note: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that this article contains the name and image of an Indigenous person who has died, used with the permission of their family.
Mr Walker, 19, was fatally shot by then-NT police constable Zachary Rolfe during an attempted arrest in the remote community of Yuendumu, 300 kilometres north-west of Alice Springs.
Mr Rolfe was later charged with murder, manslaughter and engaging in a violent act causing death, but was acquitted by an NT Supreme Court jury in 2022 after a six-week trial in Darwin.
Mr Rolfe's lawyers argued the three shots were fired in self-defence, as Mr Walker had stabbed the officer in the shoulder with a pair of scissors during a scuffle.
The former officer was dismissed from the force in 2023, after penning an open letter criticising the upper echelons of the NT Police Force and the coronial process.
Because Mr Walker died in custody, his death was subject to a mandatory coronial inquest under NT law.
The inquiry, conducted by NT Coroner Elisabeth Armitage, heard from more than 70 witnesses over 66 sitting days, across almost three years.
With the coroner's wide scope of inquiry came a string of legal arguments and appeals, launched largely unsuccessfully by Mr Rolfe and other NT police officers in an attempt to limit the questions they could be compelled to answer.
The inquiry was initially scheduled to run for three months in 2022 but faced several extended delays, and as of late 2023, it had cost the Northern Territory government more than $3 million in legal fees and travel expenses.
The coroner's report is expected to be lengthy and complex, addressing allegations of racism, perjury, cover-ups and violence raised by witnesses at the inquest.
Her extensive investigation heard allegations that racism was "normalised" within the NT Police Force and images were tendered of racist mock awards handed out by the force's most elite unit, described as 'disgraceful and abhorrent' by the then-police commissioner.
Through an 8,000-page download of Mr Rolfe's personal mobile phone, the coroner uncovered the use of racist, homophobic and sexist language among officers on the Alice Springs beat.
She examined Mr Rolfe's 46 prior use-of-force incidents from his three years on the front line, and heard the then-constable had lied on applications to multiple police services.
His private text messages, previous romantic relationships, "concerning" behaviour and allegations of perjury were dissected in open court and ultimately, the coroner was urged to find Mr Rolfe should never have been employed as an NT police officer, let alone deployed to Yuendumu on the night Mr Walker was killed.
Much of the evidence heard by the coroner had been ruled inadmissible at trial by Justice John Burns, who found earlier alleged use-of-force incidents and text messages on Mr Rolfe's phone did not have "significant probative value".
Judge Armitage also examined Kumanjayi Walker's upbringing, brushes with the law and the level of poverty plaguing communities in the bush.
She also examined body-worn camera footage of an earlier incident in which Mr Walker threatened police officers with an axe.
Over almost three years, the inquest delved well beyond the night Mr Walker was killed by Mr Rolfe.
At the opening of the inquest, Elisabeth Armitage posed the question: "Do I know the story of Kumanjayi Walker and constable Zachary Rolfe? Do you?"
Today she publishes that story.
Judge Armitage is expected to begin delivering her findings from 11am.