Posts tagged police
Legal advocates fear Victoria Police’s public complaints process is biased, with court documents revealing a police investigator directed witnesses on how to write their statements about an officer accused of assaulting a man.
The ABC has uncovered details of a secret Victoria Police operation targeting young African-Australians in Melbourne’s inner north.
Operation Molto was conducted by the Flemington Police Station in 2006.
According to the police force’s operation order document, Molto was established to find criminality in young African-Australians living in or visiting the Flemington public housing estate.
“to find criminality”
Interview with Reem from IMARA Advocacy on Different Like Us on 3CR community radio Melbourne, Australia. The Racial Discrimination Case begins on the 18th of February at the Federal Magistrates Court. Donate to their legal fund here.
“stability”, timofey radya. materials: riot shields, empty golden throne. context.
(via chris dite.)
In February 2013, six brave young men are taking their claims of racial discrimination by Victoria Police to the Federal Court.
…This is our biggest and most time consuming case. As a small community legal centre we will need your help to get through this enormous commitment and to support the six young men who will be required to attend every day of the case, leaving work, study and family each day.
This could be one of the most important police cases in modern Victoria’s history. Please add your support.The impact of this case goes beyond addressing the trauma and injustice of enduring regular racist harassment when you consider the number of deaths associated with police custody.
A petition launched in November is asking for charges to be laid against the officers responsible for the death of Anmatjere man Kwementyaye Briscoe, 27, in “protective custody” earlier this year. The coroner reported that Briscoe’s death was preventable and criticised the police for failing to implement recommendations made three years ago. It’s now 25 years since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody commenced in September 1987 but look at all the recent news stories, rising figures and police cover-ups.
In Victoria, a young Ethiopian man (Michael Atakelt, 22) was found dead in July 2011 after being released from police custody. Friends said he’d been called in by police countless times, for reasons unknown. An inquest is scheduled to begin 11 February 2013.
At least three people died in 2010 in or after being in custody of negligent Victoria Police. One was a 53-year-old Chinese man arrested for drunkenness, whose interpreter witnessed him crawling out of his cell bleeding after being held for five hours despite repeatedly calling for an ambulance. Another was a 23-year-old mentally ill man whose parents called Emergency Services for an ambulance. Instead he was taken to a police station and sedated. When he was finally placed in an ambulance he died en route to the hospital.
(via str-crssd)
In one case, protective services officers fined a teenager with a severe intellectual disability 13 times in two months for riding his bike on a platform, failing to wear a helmet, failing to have a bike light and obstructing a pathway by sitting on steps. Some of the fines were issued 20 minutes apart.
Community legal centres say the officers issue infringement notices so often because they are bored.
In February 2013, six brave young men are taking their claims of racial discrimination by Victoria Police to the Federal Court.
…This is our biggest and most time consuming case. As a small community legal centre we will need your help to get through this enormous commitment and to support the six young men who will be required to attend every day of the case, leaving work, study and family each day.
This could be one of the most important police cases in modern Victoria’s history. Please add your support.
“Left alone, there is not a shred of evidence that he would have caused any harm other than to himself,” she said. “[The officers] seem to have thrown themselves into a melee with an ungoverned pack mentality, like the schoolboys in Lord of the Flies, with no idea what the problem was, or what threat or crime was supposedly to be averted.”
She referred the incident to the Police Integrity Commission, urging an immediate review of training and operating procedures for Tasers, capsicum spray, handcuffs, restraint and positional asphyxia.
I felt I should share this on Tumblr as well as Facebook, seeing as I have different school affiliates on this site.
As some of you may not know, my mother is of Noongar heritage (indigenous people of the Perth and lower Western Australia area) I’m from the Balardong region as shown here…
I’ve been confronted countless times by people in school telling me to get over the Stolen Generation, saying things like “Why does it even bother you?” “You wern’t taken away from your mother so get over it.” I’ll tell you now, it’s not an easy thing to get over.
It’s true I may not have been taken from my mother, but my mother was badly affected by the attempt at “Whitening” Aboriginal kids. She tells me she remembers significant moments, like when her older brother was taken straight from her fathers side and chucked into the back of a cop paddy wagon and taken to a white family, or when she was out with her mother and two of her sisters one night, they were caught out after 6:00pm and were also chucked into the back of a cop paddy wagon and driven home. This all took place during the 60’s and 70’s, not all that long ago really. The wounds are still fresh. I could tell you heart breaking stories of other Aboriginal families and their struggles, like a close friend of my mothers, she was removed from her parents at a young age, and when she was let go went searching for her parents… she later found out they had both been killed by cops for trying to steal a chicken.
Because my Nan and Pops familys were pulled appart, they were not given the knowledge previously known by their ancestors, meaning they had nothing to pass on to their children and now, my own mother knows next to nothing to pass on to me. I was essentially drained of my culture.
All through my childhood, since I was born up to about a year ago, my mum went through depression and was on medication to “help” her with the problems, all they did were immobilize her. She wasn’t able to leave her bed or even the house. She didn’t get to see me grow up. She missed all the little things like awards at school or even play-days with friends. Dad was essentially a single parent.
I am lucky I grew up the way I did, I am lucky enough for an education, I am lucky enough for running water and fresh food, I’m so thankful everyday for it. I will embrace both sides of my blood, Noongar and Northern Irish, I am a unique mixture and blessed for it!
I simply wish to tell the people of the Perth area, and the rest of Australia for that matter, to watch what you say. Think about what you’re going to express before you open your mouth. I over hear racist “jokes” everyday targeted at my culture, a strong example happened not to long ago in a health lesson in school, we were all sitting listening to our teacher when she directed our attention to the next subject, alcohol, a student on the far left of the class said quite loudly, in an “accent” we hear quite commonly around Perth from people trying to “act” like a drunken/homeless Aboriginal, “I can drink as much alcohol as a f*ckin’ want I don’t get drunk! I’m Flabba Jabba Wabba Noonaghh!”My teacher being the person she is immediately turned around and reprimanded the kid straight away, she had no Idea of my heritage until I spoke up. I expressed my feelings to the class in that I’m hurt everyday by the heartless jabs at my culture, half the time I’m sitting in the same room as the racist gits and they don’t even realise they’ve done something wrong until I speak up or leave the room crying… which is what exactly happened in that situation, I told everybody how I felt and broke down crying, I had to leave the classroom because I couldn’t hold it in. An example of the ridiculous “accent” I was talking about can be found here for anybody who doens’t know what I’m talkign about.. Warning there is some vile language in the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkjPbu8A3Dk
In a whole I’m quite disgusted with my peers and in fact the majority of my country. Racism is treated as a joke and not handled seriously. I’m all for a laugh now an then at certain things, but there are limits. I wish people would just stop being so ignorant and open their minds to others perspectives. So please, to any Aussie out there who stereotypes my culture and thinks it’s people are all drug addicts and drunkards, come and have a conversation with me, see how you feel after you’ve actually met on of us. I am affected by the Stolen Generation, it has battered my family and it’s heritage, there’s no way I can ever get over it, I can try, but it won’t ever change the fact that I’ve holes in my culture that’ll never be filled.
Thanks for taking the time to read this if you have, it means a great deal
- A 14 year old Proud Ballardong Noongar YORGA!
(via aboriginalpressnews)
