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Island of distress

By Tony Koch

29 March 2005 - MULRUNJIE (Cameron) Doomadgee, 36, bled to death in a police cell on Palm Island after an incident that left him with four broken ribs and a crushed liver.

The death of Doomadgee - who had been arrested with another man, Patrick Bramwell, for being drunk - sparked a riot on the island and a coronial inquest.

Following the incident during which Doomadgee sustained the injuries, he and Bramwell were placed in a cell and a security video was turned on several minutes later.

According to the spokesman for the Doomadgee family, Brad Foster, about 15 minutes lapsed before the arresting officer, Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley, entered the cell to check on the two men, who were lying on the floor. He did not appear to speak to either man or approach them, and his inspection took seven seconds.

Forty-two minutes later another police officer came in and observed that Doomadgee was a strange colour. He touched him and noticed he was cold, felt for a pulse and could not detect one. He then went out and Hurley came in and checked for a pulse, and thought he felt one.

An ambulance was called and arrived about 15 minutes later. The prisoner was dead. In that interval neither police officer, both of whom have training in resuscitation, attempted to revive Doomadgee - although, as the autopsy later revealed, there was no chance he could have been saved.

Shortly after, Doomadgee's sister came to the main office of the police station, which is attached to the cell block. She had brought lunch for her brother and asked to see him. She was told by the police to go away. She was not told that her brother was lying dead on the floor of the cell just metres away.

The family was not informed until about 3pm - four hours after his death - that Doomadgee was dead. The state coroner also was not informed until a similar time had elapsed.

The police began taking statements from Aborigines who had witnessed events leading up to the death of Doomadgee. Although there are strict protocols regarding the taking of statements from illiterate Aborigines - including one that requires the presence of legal representatives or another adult who understands the process - no such niceties were observed.

Foster says Palm Islanders, who had details of the first autopsy report read to them on November 26, a week after Doomadgee's death, had also become aware of the events recorded on the security video inside the cell, but not the one in the corridor outside.

He says with unconcealed frustration and anger that his friend's death was treated by police and government officials with gross insensitivity. "The people of this island have been asked to believe that Mulrunjie sustained these injuries during a scuffle with Hurley [during which] he allegedly fell on a four-inch [10cm] concrete step and broke four ribs in a neat line, crushing and severing his liver," Foster says.

"Not the slightest effort was made to provide counselling for Mulrunjie's family after he was found dead. Nobody attempted in the normal humane way to give them comfort. The only response of this Government was to fly in an extra 18 police from Townsville so they could strut around this community, looking intimidating.

"And on November 26, a week after Mulrunjie died, when sections of the first autopsy report were read out to our people at a public meeting, they burned the police station down. And what did the 18 police do - 18 armed and trained police? They cut and ran. No effort was made to address the mob - and they were sober because the canteen had been closed for the preceding week - no effort made to pacify and placate them."

A doctor experienced in dealing with trauma patients tells The Australian that an injury so severe that the liver is crushed and severed is most commonly seen in serious road accidents. The initial autopsy report read to the Palm Islanders said Doomadgee died at about 11.20am on November 19, an hour after being picked up by police, and that his death was the result of "an intra-abdominal haemorrhage caused by a ruptured liver and portal vein".

"It is the type of injury we encounter in a major road trauma - the driver in a head-on accident having his chest crushed with the steering wheel," the doctor says. "By way of example, you can go through an entire football season throughout Australia where huge, fit men hit each other with brutish tackles, but never hear of anybody's liver being crushed and severed by broken ribs."

Since November 26, the people of Palm Island, which lies off the north Queensland coast, have heard public expressions of support for Hurley, as well as statements to the effect that Doomadgee's injuries were consistent with a fall on a step.

Police commissioner Bob Atkinson said the week after the death in custody: "It's my understanding that it [the cause of death] is entirely consistent with the circumstances which police allege occurred - that what happened was that when the person who died was removed from the prison van, there was a scuffle initiated by the person who died, who allegedly punched the police officer in the head.

"There was a scuffle and the police officer and the person who died then fell to the ground on some concrete steps. "It's important that people realise that the person who has died tragically sustained injuries, that people should not draw conclusions from that
alone."

Inflammatory statements have also been made by Queensland Police Minister Judy Spence, who recently told an international policing conference on the Gold Coast that Palm Island was dysfunctional and the police were making efforts to redress that. She also said that two of the police in charge during the riot should be given bravery medals.

What Spence did not mention was that from June 1998 to February 2004 she was Queensland's minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander policy -- a position that vested in her the responsibility for redressing the problems of "dysfunctional" Aboriginal communities.

Last month the official coronial inquest into Doomadgee's cause of death began, but it was stopped after hearing evidence for only one day because counsel for various parties objected to the state coroner Michael Barnes officiating.

He stepped down after hearing submissions that he could have a "perceived bias" because, a decade earlier, when he was head of the complaints section of the Criminal Justice Commission, he had dealt with complaints against Hurley.

Barnes had not personally investigated the complaints but, as section head, had signed off on them; it was found at the time that there was no case for Hurley to answer.

Christine Clements will now officiate at the inquest that opens in Queensland today. Evidence from witnesses will follow three days of directions hearings.

As a result of the riot and arson that followed the announcement of the findings of the first autopsy, 30 Palm Islanders were arrested and charged with a variety of offences. All of them were eventually granted bail, but the bail conditions for more than 20 of them included the stipulation that they could not return to the island until the charges had been dealt with.

Police contended in court that their presence on the island could incite further violence, so ever since -- including during the Christmas period -- families have been separated, in most cases with the male provider being forced to live away from Palm Island.

Foster says that, despite this, life on the island is gradually returning to normality, but there is fierce resentment over the handling of events surrounding Doomadgee's death.

He says people should walk a mile in the shoes of locals to understand their frustration.

"I ask a simple question: Just consider if a policeman and an [Aborigine] -- or your son or father, for that matter -- were involved in a scuffle at the entrance to the watch-house and they fell to the ground, and the Aboriginal man got up and walked away, leaving the policeman dead.

"How long do you think it would be before that [Aborigine] was charged? Do you believe he would have been immediately spirited away and protected from the media, given counselling and a safe-house on the mainland, and then transferred to a pleasant job on the Gold Coast, constantly comforted by media statements by the Police Minister and the police commissioner? Of course not.

"And that is what Palm Islanders want answered. Why wasn't Hurley suspended? Why did he arrest Mulrunjie for being drunk in the back streets of Palm Island that morning anyway? Why wasn't the brother [Doomadgee] given medical assistance? The claim is that Mulrunjie punched Hurley, yet there is no suggestion he was charged with assault. Why not, if that was true at the time?

"And, most important, why were his ribs broken and his liver torn in two?"

Source: The Australian

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