Kerryn Williams, Sydney
On September 24, Redfern police Aboriginal liaison officer Paul Wilkinson told the NSW parliamentary inquiry into Redfern that the young Aboriginal man who died after he was impaled on a fence in Waterloo on February 14, had been "rammed" by police. The police continue to claim that they were not near the 17-year-old when he died.
On February 15, grief and anger at the young man's death erupted within the Aboriginal community into a "riot", when mostly young residents of the Redfern Block fought with police for several hours. Contrary to an internal police report claiming that insufficient warning had been given, Derek Wilson, also an Aboriginal liaison officer, claimed to the inquiry that he had told a police inspector 24 hours before the riot that "trouble was brewing".
According to Ray Jackson, president of the Indigenous Social Justice Association, "Wilson and Wilkinson also claimed that the authors of the Coburn report, which looked into the causes of the riot at the Block, never, at any time interviewed either of them, which indicates to [the ISJA] that there was never any intention to get at the truth." Jackson is also a Socialist Alliance Senate candidate in NSW.
Wilkinson's house was burnt down and he told the inquiry that he has been under extreme pressure from police not to testify. AAP reported on September 24 that Wilkinson said: "I got death threats stating to stay away from this inquiry. And you may ask who from? The police."
The claims by the liaison officers "show up the police lies and the cobbled-together Coburn report to be what they really are — lies to keep the truth of what really happened to Hickey from the public and protect some police from justice", Jackson said.
The ISJA has called for the coronial inquest into the young man's death, which found that police were not responsible, to be re-opened and for the NSW government to fund an independent legal team for the young man's family, of their choosing.
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, September 29, 2004.
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