How the West was Won

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On the night of September 28, 1983, in Roeburne, W.A., five off-duty police arrived at the Victoria Hotel after a social night of drinking at a local golf club. One of the officers verbally abused an Aboriginal man waiting to be served at the bar. This man, Ashley James, was followed out of the hotel where one of the policeman knocked him to the ground. James retaliated and an all out fight began with the off-duty police. People who tried to help him or rescue him became involved.

One such rescuer was John Pat. He was trying to pull Ashley James away from the fight. As he did so, a policeman walked up to him and punched him in the mouth. A witness testified that John Pat 'fell back and didn't get up. I heard his head hit the road'.

The fight was over after fifteen minutes when police reinforcements arrived with a van. Despite his concussed and senseless condition witnesses stated that John Pat was picked up by the hair and kicked in the face. They also testified that they saw a policeman kick him. Residents who live nearby, and prisoners, testified that police systematically beat six others including the unconscious John Pat.

Dr John Hinton, a forensic pathologist, found that Pat had died of head injuries, which caused a brain haemorrhage. He had received 10 blows to the head; and half a dozen bruises above his right ear. His lips were cracked and there were scratches on his face. Apart from the head injuries, Pat had two broken ribs and a tear in the aorta, the major blood vessel leading from the heart.

What followed after John's death has all the classic features of a police cover-up. John Pat's body was washed before the police scientific photographers took pictures. The body's position was changed.

During the inquest, Detective Sergeant Scott admitted under cross-examination that it appears Roeburne Police had deliberately falsified the police records.

Robert Joseph Walker died on the morning of Tuesday. August 28, 1984, while a prisoner in Freemantle prison, Western Australia, eleven months to the day after John Pat's death. Robert was 25 years old.

At about 4a.m. on that morning, prison officers went to move Robert from his cell after noticing that he had cut his wrists. When Robert emerged onto the landing outside his cell and saw a prison officer standing there holding a gun he screamed, "They're going to kill me. Murder, murder." At this point, other prisoners awakened and witnessed a "brutal and unlawful assault" on Robert, which resulted in his death.

The bulk of the 20 minute long assault took place on a grassed area overlooked by and in full view of a large number of cells. After some 17 minutes on the lawn, the medical orderly administered an injection of the drug Largactil; Robert s body went limp, and he was handcuffed and carried away. At 5.15a.m., Dr David Bockman, prison doctor, pronounced that "life was extinct".

First official statements, not forthcoming till some 12 hours after the death, made no mention of the prisoner allegations. The prison officers involved were back on night duty the following night and were not ever subjected to police questioning. The prisons department put out stories in the mainstream press first of suicide, then of Largactil overdose, and on September lst and 2nd, a 'mystery illness' as the cause of death.

A post mortem conducted on the day of death by Dr Pocock, State forensic pathologist, did not find the cause of death and described only minor injuries to the body in highly technical and thus mystifying language.

A second autopsy conducted in Adelaide found that Robert had died from 'acute brain damage due to an obstruction of the blood supply to the brain caused by compression of the neck.

Dr Manock, responsible for the finding, demonstrated a strong element of "professional colleagueship" in his relationship with Dr Pocock. They exchanged several phone calls before and after the second autopsy and at the inquest into Robert's death before Coroner David McCann, both testified in agreement that the injuries to the body were consistent with force of a "restraining nature", that Robert had most likely been strangled by a kind of headlock in the course of duty.

However, on cross examination, Manock conceded that he couldn't exclude at all that the injuries to the body, including the fatal injuries, were caused by numerous baton blows, kicks and punches as described in the very consistent evidence from 41 prisoner witnesses at the inquest.

After a delay of months, McCann found that 'the death arose by way of Misadventure' i.e. "death caused by another unintentionally and in the course of doing something lawful".

Significantly, four of the five prison officers involved declined to give evidence at the inquest; the fifth, Holbourne, gave evidence after having been granted immunity from prosecution.

Over the past two decades, an average of 6.3 Aboriginal people have died in prison each year, with 17 deaths in 1995 - the peak year. Among non-Aboriginal prisoners, 47 per cent of deaths have been suicides and 30 per cent were due to natural causes (the remainder were accidental deaths or homicides). Among Aboriginal prisoners, there have been more deaths from natural causes than from suicides over the years, but for the last four years suicide deaths have exceeded those from natural causes.

Among the key issues identified in this paper:

- A doubling of both the number of Aboriginal deaths and the number of prisoners in Australian prisons.

- In the decade before the Royal Commission, 12.1 per cent of deaths in prison were of Aboriginal people. In the decade since, that has risen to 17.2 per cent. At June 1998, Aboriginal people comprised 18.8 per cent of the prison population; in 1988, this figure was 14.7 per cent.

- While the average age of Aboriginals at death has not changed, the proportion of Aboriginal men aged 20-24 who died has increased from 7.7 to 27.5 per cent of all Aboriginal deaths.

Where does the cycle start to begin?

Differences in Juvenile Detention Rates suggest that the basis of adult over-representation in prison is indeed laid down early in life. For those aged 10-17 years in 1993, Aboriginal persons were 24.2 times more likely to be in custody than non-Aboriginals. For those aged 18-21, the representation rate was 9.6.

Source: Dagger, D. Persons in Juvenile Corrective Institutions, No. 62. (Australian Institute of Criminology, 1993)

The Next Contact with the Justice System

Differences in rates of Police custody may help to explain indigenous over-representation in adult prisons. A 1972 report of the Vera Institute of Justice, noted that:

"Judges consistently behave as though someone who comes to court from a jail cell is more apt to be guilty, and to deserve harsher treatment, than is a comparable defendant who walks into court off the street because he has been free on bail".

This is likely to be in part the result of the distressed appearance of the defendant, without access to clean attire or the reassurance of friends and relatives prior to the court hearing, and in part the result of court officials' assumptions of guilt induced by the fact of police custody itself.

Police custody rates per 100,000 population, by Aboriginality, for August 1992 show that Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders were 27.9 times more likely than non-indigenous Australian to be in police custody.

Source: McDonald, D., "National Police Custody Survey 1992: Preliminary Report", Deaths in Custody, Australia, No. 2, Australian Institute of Criminology, Canberra, 1993.

Indigenous People in Adult Prisons - the Current Situation.

Indigenous rates of imprisonment in adult prisons, as at 30 June 1992 varied between about 4 times the non-indigenous rate (in Tasmania) up to over 20 times in Western Australia and South Australia.

Source: Walker, J., and Salloom, S., Australian Prisoners 1992, Australian Institute of Criminology, Canberra, 1993.

Variations in Over-representation by Offence Type

An important factor in determining rates of imprisonment is the nature of offences committed. The National Prison Census cannot provide details of all offences committed, or alleged to have been committed, by persons who are currently in prison, but does provide data on the `most serious offence', or charge, for which the person is, at the time, in prison. For offenders with multiple offences/charges, this is generally defined as the offence which will, or could, determine the maximum time the offender spends in prison in this episode. It is clear from the data that indigenous people are over-represented in virtually every offence category. Indigenous people are most over-represented in offence types involving violence, breaking and entering, breaches of justice procedures and driving offences, but are very much less over-represented in fraud and drug offence categories.

Over-representation-ratios by most serious offence vary between 3 times (for fraud) and around 30 times (for assaults). Aboriginal people are 12 times more likely than others to be in prison for homicide and 16 times for breaking and entering.

Source: Walker, J., and Salloom, S., Australian Prisoners 1992, Australian Institute of Criminology, Canberra, 1993.

The Employment and Educational background to Indigenous Imprisonment

If the rates of imprisonment (on 30 June 1992) are calculated, depending firstly on whether the prisoners are indigenous people and secondly whether they were unemployed at the time of arrest, the following results emerge:

Unemployed indigenous people were 258.5 times over-represented in prisons relative to non-indigenous people who had been employed prior to imprisonment. Their unemployment status was a more significant factor, however, than their Aboriginality.

Sources: Walker & Salloom 1993. ABS 1992.

Another substantial effect is shown if education is analysed in the same way. The poorly educated indigenous person has almost fourteen times greater chance of imprisonment than his better educated cousin. Non-Aborigines who failed to complete school were also ten times over-represented compared to those who completed school.

Sources: Walker & Salloom 1993. ABS 1992.

These simple calculations represent an overwhelming argument in support of increased efforts to improve the self-esteem, cultural identity, educational opportunities, economic potential and job prospects of indigenous people. Although there is undoubtedly scope for major improvements in the way the criminal justice system treats indigenous people, it is social and economic policies such as these which are far more likely to be effective in reducing disparities in rates of imprisonment than the so-far futile attempts that have been made to solve the problem through alterations to the criminal justice system itself. More fundamentally, however, they will have a predictable and dramatic effect in reducing the levels of victimisation in indigenous communities, particularly of women and children.

Many reasons have been put forward to explain why indigenous people are over-represented in Australian prisons. This page has had only limited space to discuss some of the key issues which can be described in quantitative terms. One cannot help but conclude that the principal causal factor is the generally low status of the indigenous community in Australia, both in socio-economic and in cultural terms. There is little doubt that this is being addressed, but it cannot be said that the beneficial effects are yet visible in terms of lower Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander imprisonment rates.

Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody

The report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody was launched in 1991. The Royal Commission, established by letters patent in October 1987, investigated the deaths of 99 Aboriginal people between January 1980 and the end of 1990. The report makes 339 wide-ranging recommendations to government designed to reduce the number of black deaths in custody. The report was greeted with enormous hope by the Indigenous community as a blueprint for change, however, to date, governments have failed to adequately implement its recommendations.

Indigenous Deaths in Custody: 1988-1996 was a report prepared by the Office of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission to evaluate governments' implementation of the Royal Commission recommendations. It used information from coronial inquests into the deaths of 96 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who died in custody after the Royal Commission's recommendations were supposedly implemented. It also examines another seven deaths that occurred after contact with police and prisons. The report suggests a new approach to implementation by government and highlights legal and other avenues for individuals seeking redress following a death in custody.

The Indigenous Deaths in Custody Report goes on to state that “The death rates of Aboriginal and non­Aboriginal people were similar when the number of custodial deaths were compared with the number of custodial deaths were compared with the number of people in custody. However, as in previous years, Aboriginal people were over­represented in the number of custodial deaths compared with the number of Aboriginal people in the community. Seventeen Aboriginal people died in custody in 1994; this represents 26 percent of the deaths, although Aboriginal people make up less than 2 percent of the Australian population. This over­representation in the number of deaths reflects the over­representation of Aboriginal people in custody.

The ages of those who died ranged from 18 to 69 years, averaging 34 years. Moreover, 38 percent of the deaths for which this information was available were reported to have been self-inflicted. The most frequent cause of death for Aboriginal people was hanging, followed in frequency by deaths by gunshot and from illness, with smaller numbers accounted for by other causes. By contrast, illness was the dominant cause of death among non-Aboriginal people in custody.

With regard to the offences, which resulted in the deceased detainees being in custody, the five most serious offences (namely homicide, assault, sex offences, robbery and other offences against the person) accounted for 63 percent of the cases. In addition, 44 percent of the people who died were serving a sentence of imprisonment at the time of death and 30 percent were being held on remand. All but two of the 21 remaining cases had also not been convicted of any offence but died while police were attempting to detain them.

Applying a consistent definition of deaths in custody (i.e., deaths in institutional settings), the number of deaths during the 1994 calendar year was higher than the number reported in any of the previous four calendar years. The increase over the previous years' deaths has occurred entirely among Aboriginal people in prison custody.

No Aboriginal people were reported to have died in police lockups during the year, although three died in other forms of police custody. The 1994 year continued the recent trend of having relatively low numbers of deaths in police lockups throughout Australia.

Institute Director, Adam Graycar, notes that "the total number of people who died in prison custody during 1994 is equal to the highest figure recorded in Australia since data were first collected in 1980. The number of Aboriginal prison deaths in 1994 is substantially higher than that observed at any time over the last 15 years." This is noteworthy considering the attention given to the implementation of the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and the criticisms, from official and community sources alike, about the pace and quality of action.

Aboriginal deaths in custody

A dead issue?

Reporting of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues has shown some signs of improvement. But mainstream media reporting of the failure of governments to implement recommendations of the Royal Commission Aboriginal Deaths in Custody has been virtually non-existent.

Wendy Bacon and Bonita Mason report how the media have failed to analyse why the deaths are continuing.

The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody is in danger of becoming a tragic farce. A fundamental objective of the Commission was that the number of Aboriginal people imprisoned be rapidly reduced. Instead, more people that are Aboriginal are being locked up and more are dying in Australian prisons.

Key Aboriginal spokespersons have been warning for three years that there has been little real change. Although politicians all claim to be doing everything possible to reduce deaths in custody, many recommendations of the Commission have not been implemented.

Investigative media reports into deaths in custody, spurred by sustained Aboriginal activism, played a role in bringing about the Royal Commission. And in their report, the Royal Commissioners commented on the importance of the media's role and made recommendations on how overall reporting of Indigenous affairs might be improved.

There has been passing media interest in the issue. However, the coverage has been based on isolated news events, such as the publication of official reports. The full impact of what is happening remains hidden. There has been little in-depth analysis or reporting of what is happening on the ground. The media has lapsed into a passive, rather than an active role.

A recent example of this is the media coverage of the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) report - Deaths in Custody Australia, Australian Deaths in Custody & Custody-related Police Operations, 1993-94 released in March. The report has become an annual event since been the Royal Commission gave the AIC the task of monitoring, and regularly reporting on, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander deaths in custody.

The report's release was picked up by major metropolitan print and ABC radio outlets around Australia but, overall, the coverage was brief, even cursory, and often buried late in the paper. Reports were focused on details; some taking on the quality of a well-written list.

The report contained devastating news for those concerned about the implementation of the Royal Commission's recommendations. It said that 24 Aboriginal people died in custody during 1993-94 - this is the highest figure in the past four years and four times the previous year's figure of six. The report also said that deaths in police custody have gone down but that all deaths in prison custody are at their highest level since figures were first collected in 1980-81.

According to the AIC, "The central reason appears to lie in the increasing rates of imprisonment of Australians in recent years. The more people are locked up, the more people die in custody." The number of Aboriginal people imprisoned has increased by 50 per cent since 1988 and in some states it has more than doubled.

Adam Graycar, Director of the AIC, said in the report, "While the Aboriginal population is less than two per cent of the total population, it comprises 16 per cent of the prison population and Aboriginal people account for 19 per cent of deaths in prison custody. This unacceptably high incarceration rate of Aboriginal people, combined with [a poor] health status, presents a truly regrettable and preventable situation."

The report concluded, "Key recommendations of the Royal Commission are either not being fully implemented or, when they are, are not operating effectively. In order to significantly reduce the number of deaths in custody, there is clearly a need for strong action by all governments to implement the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and to evaluate their effects on the frequency of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people alike who die in custody."

While nearly all major metropolitan papers covered the release of the AIC report, only four made a clear and direct link between the report of the deaths and the failure to effectively implement the Royal Commission recommendations. The Cairns Post, the major daily newspaper servicing people in north-eastern Australia, did not cover the story at all.

At the time of going to press, no media outlet has asked - what has happened since then? A quick phone call to the AIC establishes that deaths in custody are continuing at the same high rate this year.

They have produced all these wonderful reports that float around at the bureaucratic level but they're not getting down to the coal face - to the people who should be putting them in place. Racism and lax attitudes are still there - it's the whole culture. There needs to be a sea change, as they say.

"I have covered many Royal Commissions and they seem to me to be simply a way of defusing public anger and concern and exhausting critics of the government by a process of legal attrition.

"Sometimes they even conceal the truth by creating an illusion of action, when the bureaucracies move along behind the scenes at their usual glacial pace."

Despite the implementation of the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, indigenous Australians are still dying in custody.

If I can help raise the status of indigenous Australians, and thereby contribute to the reconciliation which is so important to Australia, please contact me.

The imprisonment rates of Australian indigenous people have very great potential to cause international embarrassment - particularly as the Sydney Olympics approaches. The report of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody highlighted the significant over-representation of indigenous people in Australian prisons. The Report of the Inquiry into the Implementation by Governments of the Recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody - entitled "Justice under Scrutiny" - showed how difficult an issue indigenous imprisonment is for government bodies in Australia to solve.

Trends & Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice

No. 131

Aboriginal Deaths in Prison 1980 to 1998: National Overview

Vicki Dalton, assisted by Robyn Edwards

ISBN 0 642 24133 3 October 1999

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The aims of the Watch Committee are:

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- to educate the public, or any section of it, on the words and spirit of the Recommendations and foster support for their implementation;

- to hold government and all other relevant bodies accountable for the progress or lack of progress in the effective implementation of the Recommendations;

- to enter into any arrangement with any institution or organisation the objects of which include or are similar to, or compatible with, those of this organisation;

-to disseminate, whether by written publication or otherwise, information and material of any nature whatsoever relating to the support and implementation of the Recommendations;

- to act as an effective lobby group, statewide, nationally and internationally about all issues of social justice relating to Indigenous Australian peoples;

- to support and encourage the development of an effective national network of organisations or individuals supporting the aim and objects of this organisation;

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- to foster the commitment of all sections of the community to social justice for all Indigenous Australian peoples.

DEATHS IN CUSTODY

A TIMELINE

Eight years after the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths In Custody was announced, and four years after it made its report, deaths in custody are rising. Governments around the nation are failing to implement key recommendations despite ongoing warnings and protests from Aboriginal organisations and their supporters.

1983

* The high number of Aboriginal deaths in police and prison custody is highlighted by the brutal death of 16 year old John Pat, killed by police in Western Australia. After five police are acquitted of manslaughter, the Committee to Defend Black Rights (CDBR) is established and a campaign to stop the Aboriginal deaths in custody commences.

1986

* The Aboriginal-led CDBR builds a national campaign through lobbying, protesting, and networking with Aboriginal and other organisations. As the campaign gathers strength, a national tour by families of Aboriginal people who have died in custody, calls on the Federal Government to hold a Royal Commission.

* Mainstream media attention is negligible with Aboriginal deaths in custody rarely reported by more than a one sentence item in some newspapers. There is however extensive reporting in alternative newspapers and community radio.

1987

* Reports on the continuing deaths in custody finally begin to attract attention of mainstream media outlets, like the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and ABC's Four Corners.

* Following the deaths of seven young Aboriginal men in custody in a period of six weeks, the Federal Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Clyde Holding, announces a Parliamentary Inquiry into Aboriginal deaths in custody.

* A packed Sydney Town Hall meeting hears from relatives of Aborigines who have died in custody. Helen Corbett, chairperson of CDBR, says, "A Federal Inquiry ... will not work towards a solution on a national level, as deaths in police and prison custody are happening around Australia." The meeting supports the establishment of a network of local Watch Committees to monitor the problem, and calls for a Royal Commission to inquire into causes and solutions.

* Aboriginal groups and their supporters draw up plans to use media attention to Bicentennial celebrations in 1988 as a platform for showing Australia's human rights record to the world. With CDBR's Helen Corbett in Geneva speaking on Aboriginal deaths in custody to a UN meeting on human rights, the Federal Government in October announces it would open a Royal Commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody.

1988

* The Royal Commission's interim report is released in December.

1991

* The Royal Commission's final report is released in April.

* The Royal Commission after examining 99 deaths of Aboriginal people between 1980 and 1989 makes 339 recommendations. A central objective of these recommendations was to reduce the rate of aboriginal imprisonment. The Commonwealth says it will spend $400 million over five years to implement the report.

1992

July

* Amnesty International releases a report criticising the State and Federal governments over lack of action in implementing the recommendations of the Royal Commission.

September

* Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) reports that Aboriginal people are jailed at 18 times the rate of non-Aboriginal people, with NSW and the NT actually increasing their rate over the 12 months since the Royal Commission.

Helen Corbett, interviewed in alternative newspaper Broadside, says about the implementation of the Royal Commission recommendations, "The political will is not there. It's a question of state and federal governments showing to the international community it is taking steps to rectify the situation. Their interest is to promote themselves as doing something on the issue."

1993

March

* Amnesty International reports that imprisonment conditions for many Indigenous people are "cruel and inhumane". The report condemns governments for failing to implement the Royal Commission recommendations.

April

* The office of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner is created within the Human Rights Commission partly as a response to the Royal Commission into Deaths in Custody. Mick Dodson is appointed Commissioner.

November

* Daniel Yock, an 18 year old Aboriginal man is arrested and carried by paddy wagon to the Brisbane watchhouse. He dies on the way. Demonstrations by Indigenous people bring deaths in custody back into the headlines for the first time since the Royal Commission.

December

* A number of leading Aboriginal spokespeople are dissatisfied with the implementation of recommendations of Royal Commission, reports the ACIJ's multicultural newspaper, Voices.

Particularly critical is the NSW Watch Committee's Ray Jackson who says "The sum of $430 million has been spent and yet deaths in custody are still continuing. In fact, there have been 52 deaths since May 31, 1989 and nothing's changed".

* In WA, the Aboriginal Legal Service in Perth reports that WA Government is ignoring key recommendations of the Royal Commission. The study says that 43 per cent of the people sent to prison in Western Australia this year were Aboriginal, although Aboriginal people comprised only about 2.5 per cent of the state's population.

1994

February

* Australian Institute of Criminology reports a 40 per cent increase in deaths in custody in 1992/93. Its report says that since the Royal Commission cut off date in May 1989, 43 Aborigines and 225 non-Aborigines have died in custody. "There is clearly a need for strong action by all governments to implement the recommendations of the royal commission," it says. A total of 72 people died in custody in 1992/93, compared with 57 and 58 in the two previous years.

* The Federal Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Robert Tickner, releases the first of the Government's annual reports into progress on reform .The report, which examines 1992/93, finds that "the picture is not positive" on imprisonment rates of Indigenous people.

"The number of Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders in prison and their imprisonment rates are increasing," it says. "Aborigines are still 14 times more likely to be imprisoned than non-indigenous Australians."

The report finds that NSW, WA and SA have higher indigenous imprisonment rates than the national average. It fails to mention that the number of people dying in custody is not falling.

Tickner refers the report to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs who begin an inquiry.

April

* The Criminal Justice Commission in Queensland finds the six police officers who arrested Daniel Yock are not responsible for his death.

June

* Lawyer Chris Cunneen completes a report for the National Committee to Defend Black Rights on 55 Indigenous deaths between 1989 and 1994. The report concludes that many deaths would have been avoided if governments had acted on Royal Commission recommendations. It finds 169 breaches of recommendations - the most common is the recommendation that police services move immediately to examine the delivery of medical serves to people in police custody.

* Australian Institute of Criminology reports that the number of deaths in custody has risen to its highest level since the 1991 Royal Commission report. The number of deaths in police, prison and juvenile custody rose from 64 in 1991 and 65 in 1992, to 74 in 1993.

Indigenous people who make up only one per cent of the population accounted for 11 per cent of the deaths. "This would appear to suggest that the recommendations of the royal commission are either not being fully implemented or, when they are, are not operating effectively," the report said. The report notes that none of the deaths were in a police lock-up.

* A new Deaths in Custody Watch Committee is formed in Western Australia. Committee member and chairperson of the Human Rights Commission Ronald Wilson says that in 1988 Aboriginal people were 43 times more likely than other people to be in police custody. By 1992 the level has jumped to 60 times. He says only 30 of the 339 recommendations have been implemented in WA. In reply, the WA Attorney General Cheryl Edwardes says the state's response has been "second to none." The committee attacks her claim as a "gross misrepresenation of the facts".

September

* Four people die in custody in Western Australia in 11 days.

December

* The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs report Justice Under Scrutiny is critical of governments' failure to involve Aboriginal people more in the implementing Royal Commission recommendations and of government reports which have "glossed over deficiencies and not accurately portrayed the implementation process." It notes that there has been "no substantial change" for Indigenous people as a result of extra funds supplied by the Commonwealth.It warns that annual reporting by government is in danger of becoming an "exercise in bureaucratic activity" and that "without reforms being implemented, further deaths are inevitable".

The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet has three months to coordinate a government response to the Justice Under Scruitiny report.

* A few weeks later, and a year late, the Victorian Kennett government tables its 1993 Implementation Report. The State Aboriginal Affairs Minister, John, said the report was "an indication of the depth and breadth of action taken by the State Government and Aboriginal community" in dealing with the recommendations of the royal commission.

But the Victorian Aboriginal Justice Advisory Committee's Wanda Braybrook says the committee is very concerned by the increasing prison rate. "Aboriginal people continue to be disadvantaged by their contact with the criminal justice system, and ... to suffer at a greater rate than any other section of the Victorian community," she said.

1995

February

*The Australian Institute of Criminology issues its report for 1993/4 which shows deaths in custody are rising along with rates of imprisonment.

*The deadline passes for Federal government to respond to the Justice under Scrutiny report. According to the Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs it requires a detailed response which will not be available until later in the year.

March

*Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner, Mick Dodson releases his annual report. He describes the first Commonwealth Annual report coordinated by the unit as a "self serving account of bureaucratic activity designed to bury failure in a sea of words, reports and committee meetings rather than expose it to public scrutiny and discussion. The report is a monument to the worst tendencies of bureaucracy run wild."

Wendy Bacon, Bonita Mason, Peter Cronau

More information

The Death in Custody Newsletter is produced six times a year by Jennifer Searcy. It is available from her at the Campaign for Prevention of Custodial Death, PO Box 847, Nedlands WA 6009, phone/fax (09) 386 4783. It is free but payment of $10 or $15 pa would help to offset printing and postage costs.

Justice Under Scrutiny, the report of the Inquiry into the implementation by governments of the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, is available from the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, Parliament House, Canberra, phone (06) 277 2321.

The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission's Second Report, 1994, prepared by Michael Dodson, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner is available from HR&EOC, Level 8 Piccadilly Tower, 133 Castlereagh Street, Sydney 2000, phone (02) 284 9600 fax (02) 284 9715.

Note to journalists: The ACIJ is continuing its research on Aboriginal deaths in custody. Journalists or others needing advice or able to assist the Centre in its work should make contact.

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