Skip to playerSkip to main contentSkip to footer
  • 7/8/2025
A warning this next story contains the name and image of an Indigenous person who has died and is being used with permission of their family. Almost three years after the inquest into the 2019 police shooting of Kumanjayi Walker began the Northern Territory Coroner has made 32 recommendations in a report which concludes the 19-year-old's death was avoidable.

Category

📺
TV
Transcript
00:00The Northern Territory coroner was fairly scathing of former Constable Zachary Roll,
00:06finding that he was a racist and held racist attitudes which may have played a part in his
00:12actions on the night Kuminjai Walker died. She couldn't definitively say whether or not his
00:18racist attitudes played a part in the outcome that night when he shot Kuminjai Walker three
00:24times during a fatal arrest attempt. The coroner said he also held contempt for senior officers,
00:32that he was dismissive of safety regulations and that he had a tendency to rush in to get his man.
00:40The coroner made some scathing findings of Zachary Roll and late this afternoon the former Constable
00:46released a statement of his own rejecting many of the coroner's findings about him. He said the
00:54he does not accept criticisms by the coroner that he failed to adhere to operational safety training
00:59or that he ignored his training at all on the night Kuminjai Walker died or in any of the other
01:05five incidents that the coroner identified as times that she found Zachary Roll had unnecessarily used
01:13force. This statement from Mr. Roll goes on to say that this might be the appropriate vehicle
01:19for the Supreme Court to give clear guidance as to the proper scope of a coronial inquest going on to say
01:26this case in this case the coroner went far beyond her remit. This is an issue that Zachary
01:32Rolfe and his lawyers have raised several times throughout the coronial inquest. A statement released
01:37this afternoon doesn't say that Mr. Rolfe intends to appeal or seek a judicial review of these findings.
01:45However it does indicate that this is something that he is considering. Earlier this afternoon we
01:52heard from members of Kuminjai Walker's family. They sat down after taking in this 680 page report by the
02:00Northern Territory coroner saying that they were grateful that coroner Elizabeth Armitage travelled here
02:06to Yundamu yesterday to hand down those findings. They say that they feel validated by many of the
02:12coroner's findings of widespread systemic racism within the Northern Territory police force. They've
02:19also been grateful for some of the recommendations that the coroner has made about the community of
02:25Yundamu. The solutions have already existed and were here prior to the intervention and we're hoping that
02:34these recommendations around community authority and a leadership group allows us to get back to that spot
02:40and so like I really welcome that change and I welcome that there is going to be a return to
02:46you know community controlling. The Northern Territory police force itself has also responded today. The acting
02:53police commissioner Martin Dole addressed the media earlier alongside his executive director Leanne
02:59Little who was brought on board throughout this coronial process in order to address some of these issues of
03:05racism which were raised at the inquest. Leanne Little has said that there is it is clear that there
03:10is a racism issue within the Northern Territory police force. Here's what she had to say.
03:15What was tolerated in the past will no longer be acceptable and that's not just a statement that is a
03:25commitment and it is a promise that means that we will take necessary actions. We are working to rebuild
03:33trust not through words alone but through sustained partnerships. Ultimately whether any of these 32
03:40recommendations made by the coroner are implemented is up to the Northern Territory government. The Northern
03:46Territory government has said that it will take the time to consider these findings and recommendations
03:51but has noted that much has changed in the six years since Kumanjai Walker died.
03:57New Student in this year says that it was truly useful because we were right in the past and they
04:02got a wonderful department. It was really useful to us on that they are not always looking for us.
04:04It was very useful to us at the moment. You will remember us saying that we will be annealing
04:06that we can find a little more important, but we will need to make sure that we are in the past.
04:10The second time of the 조항 system is a very important service for the state of the organization
04:16that we have in the past. The pastoral system, you can find out that we are in loss of our country.
04:18There is a significant service that we have in the pastoral system with our own posts that we have in the pastoral system.

Recommended