Latest news with #AboriginalDeaths
ABC News
7 days ago
- ABC News
NT police union raises alarm over death in custody risk in watch houses
The Northern Territory's police union is warning a death or serious incident in custody is only a matter of time under dangerous conditions inside police watch houses. 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. Their caution comes amid national attention on Aboriginal deaths in custody, after the NT coroner last week delivered her inquest findings into the 2019 police shooting of Kumanjayi Walker in Yuendumu. It also follows the recent deaths in custody of Warlpiri man Kumanjayi White in Alice Springs and a senior Kardu Rak Kirnmu elder at Royal Darwin Hospital. In a statement, the NT Police Association (NTPA) said 92 detainees were kept in the Palmerston police watch house on Monday, including 76 overflow corrections prisoners. "This is officially out of control," NTPA president Nathan Finn said in a statement. The growing pressure on police comes just four months after the NT government promised to stop housing corrections prisoners at watch houses in Palmerston and Alice Springs. Corrections Minister Gerard Maley told parliament on March 18 that all prisoners had been moved out of the watch houses and into prisons in Holtze and Berrimah. Mr Finn told the ABC he was "extremely concerned" by another spike in corrections prisoners held inside watch houses. "It's going to end up in a situation where a police officer is hurt, or an inmate in that facility is hurt or killed," he said. "We've got no contingencies if someone gets violent. "If someone has a mental health episode inside that facility, it's further placing our staff at unacceptable risk." Former detainee Willis John Carlow, who was released on Tuesday after 10 days in the Palmerston watch house, said the conditions were "horrible". "We had to s**t in front of everyone and there was no space, just 10 other people — 16 other people — in one space," he said. "You've got to eat while they're taking a s**t so it was pretty bad." Another former detainee, who was also released on Tuesday but wished to remain anonymous, said the women's cells were stained with period blood. "We're all in this room with someone else's period blood all over the sheets and it's just pushed into a pile against the wall." She said the female inmates had created a barricade of mattresses around the cell's toilet for privacy from male correctional officers walking past. "You've got one blocked toilet and then one toilet that barely works and we're supposed to be drinking water from bubblers on top of the toilet," she said. "There was a pregnant woman in there who had stomach pains … and for two weeks in a row was asking to see medical [staff]." The NT's prison population has soared in recent months, partly driven by the NT government's introduction of tougher bail laws. Data from the NT corrections department shows 2,847 prisoners were being held at correctional facilities on Tuesday, including 1,492 at Darwin Correctional Centre. About half of those prisoners are people on remand who have not yet been sentenced or found guilty. The overflow of prisoners is playing out in the courts. More than 185 court matters were listed between just two sitting judges at Darwin Local Court on Tuesday, giving judges about three minutes on average to process each matter. Mr Finn said the NT government had failed to support its "tough-on-crime" agenda with appropriate infrastructure to cope with rising prisoner numbers. Mr Finn also claimed overcrowding inside watch houses was preventing police officers from making arrests. "We've heard from a number of members coming through that limitations in watch house space has led to arrests not being made," he said. NT Police and Mr Maley have been contacted for comment. A department spokesperson said correctional staff have not operated out of the Palmerston police watch house since mid-March.
SBS Australia
18-06-2025
- SBS Australia
Decades on from the Royal Commission, why are Indigenous people still dying in custody?
Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that this article contains the name of an Indigenous person who has passed away. The raw numbers are a tragic indictment of government failure to implement in full the Commission's 339 recommendations. We are potentially further away from resolving this crisis than we were 34 years ago. Kumanjayi White was a vulnerable young Warlpiri man with a disability under a guardianship order. He stopped breathing while being restrained by police in an Alice Springs supermarket on May 27. His family is calling for all CCTV and body camera footage to be released. Days later a 68-year-old Aboriginal Elder from Wadeye was taken to the Palmerston Watchhouse after being detained for apparent intoxication at Darwin airport. He was later transferred to a hospital where he died. Both were under the care and protection of the state when they died. The royal commission revealed 'so many' deaths had occurred in similar circumstances and urged change. It found there was "little appreciation of, and less dedication to, the duty of care owed by custodial authorities and their officers to persons in care." Seemingly, care and protection were the last things Kumanjayi White and the Wadeye Elder were afforded by NT police. The royal commission investigated 99 Aboriginal deaths in custody between 1980 and 1989. If all of its recommendations had been fully implemented, lives may have been saved. For instance, recommendation 127 called for 'protocols for the care and management' of Aboriginal people in custody, especially those suffering from physical or mental illness. This may have informed a more appropriate and therapeutic response to White and prevented his death. Recommendation 80 provided for 'non-custodial facilities for the care and treatment of intoxicated persons'. Such facilities may have staved off the trauma the Elder faced when he was detained, and the adverse impact it had on his health. Indigenous people continue to be over-represented in prison populations. Bianca De Marchi/AAP More broadly, a lack of independent oversight has compromised accountability. Recommendations 29-31 would have given the coroner, and an assisting lawyer, 'the power to direct police' in their investigations. "It must never again be the case that a death in custody, of Aboriginal or non-Aboriginal persons, will not lead to rigorous and accountable investigations." Yet, the Northern Territory police has rejected pleas by White's family for an independent investigation. Northern Territory Labor MP Marion Scrymgour is calling on the Albanese government to order a full audit of the royal commission recommendations. She says Indigenous people are being completely ostracised and victimised. "People are dying. The federal government, I think, needs to show leadership." Member for Lingiari Marion Scrymgour says governments have taken their eye off the ball regarding Aboriginal deaths in custody. Mick Tsikas/AAP It is unlikely another audit will cure the failures by the government to act on the recommendations. Instead, a new standing body should be established to ensure they are all fully implemented. It should be led by First Nations people and involve families whose loved ones have died in custody in recognition of their lived expertise. In 2023, independent Senator Lidia Thorpe moved a motion for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social justice commissioner to assume responsibility for the implementation of the recommendations. While the government expressed support for this motion, there has been no progress. Another mechanism for change would be for governments to report back on recommendations made by coroners in relation to deaths in custody. Almost 600 inquests have issued a large repository of recommendations, many of which have been shelved. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese recently conceded no government has 'done well enough' to reduce Aboriginal deaths in custody. But he has rejected calls for an intervention in the Northern Territory justice system. "I need to be convinced that people in Canberra know better than people in the Northern Territory about how to deal with these issues," he said. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says a different way must be found to engage respectfully with Indigenous communities on issues such as deaths in custody. Mick Tsikas/AAP Albanese is ignoring the essence of what is driving deaths in custody. Reflecting on the 25-year anniversary of the royal commission in 2016, criminology professor Chris Cunneen wrote that Australia had become much less compassionate and more ready to blame individuals for their alleged failings: "Nowhere is this more clear than in our desire for punishment. A harsh criminal justice system – in particular, more prisons and people behind bars – has apparently become a hallmark of good government." There are too many First Nations deaths in custody because there are too many First Nations people in custody in the first place. Governments across the country have expanded law and order practices, police forces and prisons in the name of community safety. This includes a recent $1.5 billion public order plan to expand policing in the Northern Territory. Such agendas impose a distinct lack of safety on First Nations people, who bear the brunt of such policies. It also instils a message that social issues can only be addressed by punitive and coercive responses. The royal commission showed us there is another way: self-determination and stamping out opportunities for racist and violent policing. First Nations families have campaigned for these issues for decades. How many more Indigenous deaths in custody does there have to be before we listen?
The Guardian
16-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Patrick Dodson condemns decades of inaction on suicide hanging points in Australian prisons
The former Labor senator and Aboriginal deaths in custody royal commissioner Patrick Dodson has condemned inaction on known hanging points as 'totally unacceptable' and joined calls for national leadership on justice reform. Guardian Australia revealed last week that 57 Australians had died using hanging points that prison authorities knew about but failed to remove, often despite their use in repeated suicides and explicit warnings from coroners. Dodson, a Yawuru elder often referred to as the 'father of reconciliation', was one of the royal commissioners who worked on the 1991 Aboriginal deaths in custody royal commission. That royal commission told state governments to remove obvious hanging points from their prisons, a recommendation that was universally accepted. Despite this, Guardian Australia has revealed how obvious hanging points have been allowed to remain in prisons like Brisbane's Arthur Gorrie, where 10 hanging deaths occurred using the same type of exposed bars between 2001 and 2020, despite repeated, early coronial warnings that they be removed. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Even at the relatively new Darwin Correctional Centre, which opened in 2014, more than 20 years after the royal commission, cells were designed with an obvious and well-known hanging point, which was used in two hanging deaths in its first two full years of operation. The hanging point was not fully removed from cells until 2020. 'It's totally unacceptable and this is where people need to be empowered and take action against those agencies based on their duty of care,' Dodson told Guardian Australia. 'They have a duty of care. They've been told 30 years ago to get rid of these things.' Indigenous Australians remain vastly overrepresented in prison populations and hundreds have died in custody – 101 of those by hanging – since the 1991 royal commission. Official data shows the rate of Aboriginal hanging deaths is at a 17-year high, correlating with Australia's surging prisoner population. Guardian Australia revealed last week that in 2020, after the hanging death of young Indigenous man Tane Chatfield, the New South Wales government told a coroner it had audited Tamworth prison for hanging points but could find none. An independent inspection of Tamworth prison less than 12 months later found 'multiple hanging points' including some that had been purportedly removed. Guardian Australia asked every state government what has been done to address the problem. You can read their responses in full here. Dodson said the federal government, through the standing council of attorneys general, should take a national leadership approach on reforms that reduce Indigenous incarceration rates and reduce deaths in custody, including by removing hanging points. His voice adds to that of a group of crossbenchers, including David Pocock, David Shoebridge, Lidia Thorpe and Zali Steggall, calling for federal leadership on the issue of hanging points after the Guardian's investigation. Dodson said the federal government should establish a national Aboriginal justice commission to progress nationally coordinated reforms and ensure state governments are responding the recommendations of the 1991 royal commission, many of which remain unmet. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion He said the attorney general, Michelle Rowland, should ensure the issue is listed on the next agenda of the standing council of attorneys-general. 'The other thing that the attorney general should be doing is convening a group of the Aboriginal leadership in this space to discuss, have a discussion with them about the need for [an Aboriginal justice commission] and its importance,' he said. 'I think we need a structure, otherwise, where does it end, you know?' The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social justice commissioner, Katie Kiss, said that the removal of hanging points from prison cells to reduce self-harm was a 'key recommendation' from the 1991 royal commission 'The failure to implement this – and all other – recommendations exacerbates the ongoing national shame that is Aboriginal deaths in custody,' she said. 'The treatment of our people, particularly when it comes to the administration of the justice system, is a deep stain on this country. They are being failed by an oppressive system that continues to deny their rights.' Kiss said 'immediate, tangible steps' must be taken to ensure that incarceration is a last resort, including investment in preventive measures to stop people from being detained in the first place and to ensure their safety and wellbeing if they are detained. 'We need to end this cycle of abuse, injustice, and trauma. In many cases, duty of care is not being administered – from the point of arrest, within police custody, in prisons, and detention facilities,' she said. 'People's lives are at stake and their human rights must be upheld.' A spokesperson for Rowland said any death in custody was a tragedy. The spokesperson said the attorney-general was working with her state and territory counterparts to 'accelerate progress on justice targets and achieve government commitments under the National Agreement on Closing the Gap'. 'The Attorney-General strongly encourages state and territory governments to review their practices and continue to work toward effective solutions that ensure the safety and dignity of all Australians in the justice system,' the spokesperson said. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@ or jo@ In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counsellor. Other international helplines can be found at
The Guardian
11-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘We won't give up': Kumanjayi White's family hold vigil demanding independent investigation
The lawns of the Alice Springs courthouse have once again become a scene of grief and rage, amid calls for an 'emergency intervention' following two Aboriginal deaths in custody in the Northern Territory in as many weeks. The family of 24-year-old Kumanjayi White, a Warlpiri man with disabilities who died after being restrained by police at a supermarket last month, held a vigil on Wednesday, reiterating their demands for an independent investigation, the release of CCTV footage, and for the officers involved to be stood down while the investigation proceeds. It was their third vigil since he died. 'Hear us when we say: we won't give up,' the man's grandfather, Ned Jampijinpa Hargraves, told the crowd. 'We will fight for justice for our loved one. We will fight for justice for all yapa (Indigenous people) who have died in custody. Every single one.' Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email As hundreds rallied across the nation in solidarity with the Warlpiri community on Saturday, another Aboriginal man died in custody in Darwin. The 68-year-old from the remote community of Wadeye died in the ICU at Darwin hospital about a week after Australian federal police arrested him, following reports he was 'intoxicated' and unable to board a flight out of Darwin. Northern Territory police said the cause of death was undetermined, pending a postmortem examination. He has been remembered as a senior elder who lobbied for bilingual schooling and better education funding for his community. One of the country's largest legal organisations, the North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency, has since called for the federal government to stage an 'emergency intervention'. The organisation's acting chief executive, Anthony Beven, told the ABC the government should hold a forum with First Nations leaders and federal and NT authorities to address the effects of the punitive justice measures enacted by the CLP government. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion Asked about the request at the National Press Club on Tuesday, the prime minister said he would 'need to be convinced that people in Canberra know better than the people in the Northern Territory to deal with these issues'. Meanwhile in the NT, police responded to persistent calls for Kumanjayi White's death to be investigated by an independent body. 'The Police Administration Act establishes the Northern Territory police force for the purpose of preventing, investigating and detecting crime, so that's not something we can just hand to somebody else,' the acting commissioner, Martin Dole, said on Tuesday. Warlpiri leader Karl Hampton, a spokesperson for White's family, said the response was 'just an excuse'. 'In terms of legislation, that can be amended,' he said. 'But my concern is that we see the territory at the moment in a flux, almost to the point of a crisis … the systems are broken in the Northern Territory.' Indigenous Australians can call 13YARN on 13 92 76 for information and crisis support; or call Lifeline on 13 11 14, Mensline on 1300 789 978 or Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636
The Guardian
10-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Crossbenchers call for federal intervention after ‘deeply shocking' revelations about prison deaths
Key crossbenchers have called for the federal government to intervene to drive reforms to state prison systems after revelations that 57 Australians died from hanging points that were known to authorities but not removed. A Guardian Australia investigation on Tuesday revealed that inaction to remove known hanging points from 19 prisons across the country had caused a shocking death toll, more than 30 years after state governments promised to make prisons safe in the wake of the Aboriginal deaths in custody royal commission. In one case, 10 inmates hanged themselves from the same type of ligature point at Brisbane's Arthur Gorrie prison over almost 20 years, despite early warnings that it be immediately addressed. Guardian Australia has spent five months investigating the deadly toll of Australia's inaction to remove hanging points from its jails, a key recommendation of the 1991 royal commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody. The main finding – that 57 inmates died using known ligature points that had not been removed – was made possible by an exhaustive examination of coronial records relating to 248 hanging deaths spanning more than 20 years. Reporters combed through large volumes of coronial records looking for instances where a hanging point had been used repeatedly in the same jail. They counted any death that occurred after prison authorities were made aware of that particular hanging point. Warnings were made via a prior suicide or suicide attempt, advice from their own staff or recommendations from coroners and other independent bodies. Guardian Australia also logged how many of the 57 inmates were deemed at risk of self-harm or had attempted suicide before they were sent into cells with known hanging points. In adherence with best practice in reporting on this topic, Guardian Australia has avoided detailed descriptions of suicide. In some instances, so that the full ramifications of coronial recommendations can be understood, we have made the decision to identify types and locations of ligature points. We have done this only in instances where we feel the public interest in this information being available to readers is high. In another, four inmates were able to hang themselves from the same hanging point at the Adelaide Remand Centre after the state government was explicitly warned to either remove it or minimise its risk. In many cases, prisoners who were known suicide risks – like Gavin Ellis, a beloved son whose mother still mourns his loss – were sent into cells with hanging points that had been used in prior deaths. The revelations prompted immediate calls from crossbenchers for the Albanese government to show national leadership on the issue and pressure state governments to engage in reform of their justice and prison systems. The independent senator David Pocock said the cases were 'deeply shocking' and highlight 'a widespread failure in our prison system'. 'I would support more federally coordinated action to better address these persistent failures, whether through a Senate inquiry or action by national cabinet,' he said. The Greens justice spokesperson, David Shoebridge, said the 57 deaths showed Australia's prison system was 'fundamentally broken and killing people, even though governments have been on notice for decades'. He said it was time for the federal government to intervene. 'Thirty-four years after the Royal Commission, First Nations people are still dying from government inaction and broken promises,' he said. 'It's impossible to imagine something more awful than families losing their loved ones because a hanging point, that the authorities knew had killed before, still hadn't been removed.' The deaths disproportionately affected Indigenous Australians, who remain vastly overrepresented in the system. Seven Indigenous Australians hanged themselves in 2023-24, a number not recorded since 2000-01. The independent senator Lidia Thorpe said Guardian Australia's findings revealed 'shocking negligence'. She said the federal government could not keep 'pretending this is just a state issue'. 'That's not only misleading – it's a shameful abdication of responsibility,' Thorpe said. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion 'The Prime Minister needs to show leadership. These are preventable deaths. This is life or death. And it's long past time for action.' Thorpe called for the coronial system to be overhauled, and 'real accountability mechanisms' to be put in place. She also wants to see someone tasked with the responsibility of overseeing and driving the implementation of the royal commission recommendations. 'Thirty years after the Royal Commission, people are still dying in exactly the same way. Governments are sitting on their hands while our people die in these brutal facilities,' Thorpe said. 'Implementing the Royal Commission recommendations won't just help First Nations people – it will save lives across the entire prison system.' The independent MP and former barrister Zali Steggall said the deaths represented a 'systemic human rights failure' that 'demands immediate action'. 'I call on the government for firm national leadership,' she said. 'There urgently needs to be commitment and a timeline for the implementation for reform and previous recommendation. 'It's been more than 30 years since the Royal Commission of Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and countless more inquiries, and little has changed. It's clear that a step change on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander policy is needed by the government who have done very little to push progress since the referendum.' In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Indigenous Australians can call 13YARN on 13 92 76 for information and crisis support. Other international helplines can be found at
