Living in a racist, redneck wonderland

November 2nd, 2008

Well I’ve been thinking about what to say about this, and phrases like “travesty of justice” and “racist, redneck state” spring to mind. This week indigenous man Lex Wotton will be sentenced for his alleged part in the 2004 riot and subsequent arson of the Palm Island police station and court house after the death of Mulrindji Doomagee at police hands. Wotton faces up to 25 years for an incident in which no one was injured.

So where is Senior Sargeant Chris Hurley, the policeman charged with splitting Mulrinji’s liver in two before he died? Hurley was in 2007 acquitted by a jury of his peers. No jury of his peers for Wotton, his jury was white as snow.

Was Hurley punished, demoted or otherwise suffer for the murder of Mulrinji? Today Hurley has a cushy job, a promotion compared to his Palm island posting. In 2007 he received $100,000 compensation.

On Monday he and 21 other officers involved in the riot received bravery awards. Mayor of Palm Island, Alf Lacey, says this sets back indigenous-police relations a decade. He says the timing of the awards is offensive.

“It seems quite clear that they’re trying to send a message to Palm Island and to Aboriginal people in general in Queensland that we’re it and we’re the winners and things like that,” he told the ABC.

Queensland State Parliament Speaker Mike Reynolds, the Member for Townsville, called for the awards to be postponed, saying Police Commissioner Bob Atkinson was being purposely provocative. Reynolds was one of the few political supporters of the rioters. On October 25 Reynolds accused the QLD police union of a vendetta against him.

During the trial, Wotton was hospitalised for shock. Police were accussed of lying under oath. Wotton’s lawyer Clive Steirn said that evidence would show several police witnesses have lied under oath about his client’s alleged part in the riot, in particular Detective Sergeant Darryn Robinson. Robinson had previously admitted to lying during the Hurley investigation. Steirn says Robinson wanted Wotton to pay for what happened to his friend Hurley.

In March demands were made for the trial judge, Milton Griffin, to disqualify himself over comments he made about Wotton during the trial of four other men charged with rioting on Palm Is.

On Saturday, November 1, hundreds of people turned out in a solidarity march for Wotton in Brisbane. More protests continue this week with a mass rally called for Friday, the day of Wotton’s sentencing, outside Brisbane Police Headquarters.

kim kaos