Speaker 1: Just before nine o'clock last night, the jury returned guilty
Speaker 1: verdicts against all three defendants. It was absolutely shambles, to
Speaker 1: tell you the truth.
Speaker 2: Just actually really.
Speaker 1: Padan blood on his clothing the day after the alleged attap.
Speaker 2: On a shallow mud bank and it fits through a river.
Speaker 1: Basically, I think most of the people are used to
Speaker 1: me are good people.
Speaker 2: I think a really important question we need to ask
Speaker 2: is how many Indigenous prisoners in Australia are innocent.
Speaker 1: This is Curtain, a podcast where we pull back the
Speaker 1: blinds to shine a light on the darkest parts of
Speaker 1: our justice system and ask who are the victims. I'm
Speaker 1: Amy Maguire and.
Speaker 2: I'm Martin Hodgson, a senior advocate for the Foreign Prisoner
Speaker 2: Support Service. And a warning, this series contains the names
Speaker 2: of deceased peoples and has distressing content that might upset
Speaker 2: some listeners.
Speaker 3: This special episode of Curtain is dedicated with our love
Speaker 3: to Elijah and his family.
Speaker 4: First and foremost, I just want to pay my respects
Speaker 4: to the traditional owners and the land we were gathering
Speaker 4: here today, the elder's past and present. My name is
Speaker 4: Main White. I'm a one of than man. I'm from Calgarley.
Speaker 4: Elijah Dohity is my blood. He's my family. My father
Speaker 4: in two thousand and one proclaimed Calgary the most racist
Speaker 4: town in Australia. He had lived there since nineteen seventy three.
Speaker 4: In nineteen seventy three, my father took a bus from
Speaker 4: Laverden which is now as Drive, from Calguley and took
Speaker 4: Indigenous people from the Skull Rock Skull Rock Royal Commission.
Speaker 4: He took Indigenous people from Kowguley all the way from
Speaker 4: labor and all the way to Calgouley. When he got there,
Speaker 4: six policemen beat him brutally. One of those policemen became
Speaker 4: the Commissioner of Police in Western Australia. For all the
Speaker 4: years my father had lived there, my father passed away
Speaker 4: two years ago. From all the years that my father
Speaker 4: has lived there, he said, nothing has changed all the
Speaker 4: way up from then to night to two thousand and one.
Speaker 4: Elijah Doughty is my family, my blood. I'm from Calgary.
Speaker 4: I lived in Calgary. I lived there. I lived up
Speaker 4: until I was seventeen. I lived I know that life.
Speaker 4: I've been chased. I've been chased by people in cars,
Speaker 4: white people in cars. I know what it's like. I
Speaker 4: lived there, I lived that life. But this kid was fourteen,
Speaker 4: he was a child. He was murdered. Let's not get
Speaker 4: the facts. Let's not get the stuff that's twisted.
Speaker 3: He was murdered.
Speaker 4: It was a manslaughter and reckless driving. Three years three years.
Speaker 1: Now. In this episode of Curtain, we'll be looking in
Speaker 1: more depth into the case of Elijah Dadi. At one
Speaker 1: of the protests in Sydney, Kevin's friend David tex Chapman,
Speaker 1: who's been on this podcast before, got up with a
Speaker 1: poster in support of Kevin, and he made the point
Speaker 1: that this man convicted of dangerous driving occasioning death over
Speaker 1: the death of Elijah Dowdy would most likely be out
Speaker 1: in February when he's.
Speaker 5: Eligible for parole. He compared that to Kevin Henry. Kevin
Speaker 5: Henry is serving time for a crime he did not commit.
Speaker 5: He's been locked up for twenty six years, and as
Speaker 5: we've explained on this podcast numerous times, his parole has
Speaker 5: been knocked back on several occasions, and we've explained a
Speaker 5: lot of the detail and the reasons behind that. But
Speaker 5: text made a very good point about the differences in
Speaker 5: the way the justice system treats white perpetrators and the
Speaker 5: way it treats black victims.
Speaker 1: So we're going to talk a little bit more about
Speaker 1: Elijah Dowdy's case and what it says about Kevin Henry.
Speaker 5: So Martin, I mean, dealt with.
Speaker 1: A lot of cases, and you've spoken and become close
Speaker 1: to a lot of victims, particularly do I think custody
Speaker 1: of victims, but also victims who have been wrongfully convicted.
Speaker 1: When you heard about a Elijah Dowdy's case in the
Speaker 1: recent decision in the Supreme Court of Western Austraia, what
Speaker 1: was your reaction maybe your personal reaction.
Speaker 3: For me, my personal reaction was immediately anger. That was
Speaker 3: because I understand previous cases where the same charges have
Speaker 3: been brought in wa where much harsher sentences have been
Speaker 3: handed out, and they were the sort of sentences you
Speaker 3: would hope and we were hoping to hear would come down.
Speaker 3: But to see once again the justice system fail an
Speaker 3: Aboriginal family, and in particular a young Aboriginal boy who'd
Speaker 3: done nothing wrong. You can't kill someone because they're riding
Speaker 3: a bike you believe is yours to then no one
Speaker 3: finds out this man would be eligible for parole just
Speaker 3: early next year, just rub salt into the wound, and
Speaker 3: you can only imagine how Elijah's family is feeling. And
Speaker 3: also why there is so much grief and anger in
Speaker 3: the Aboriginal community right across the country. Too many times
Speaker 3: people who have murdered Aboriginal people and in this case
Speaker 3: a child, have gotten away with it. Too many times
Speaker 3: when Aboriginal people have been murdered, no one's ever even
Speaker 3: been charged. So what other response to people expect than grief, anger,
Speaker 3: and frustration. And I think one thing that angers me
Speaker 3: in particular is not only the justice system we know
Speaker 3: it's failed time and again, but some of the media
Speaker 3: reporting and particularly referencing rioting, fighting behavior when such an
Speaker 3: injustice takes place. We live in a democracy where the
Speaker 3: right to protest is vital to that democracy's existence. And
Speaker 3: if you can't protest and be angry and call for
Speaker 3: justice when a child is hunted down and killed by
Speaker 3: a man in a large four wheel drive, when else
Speaker 3: can you be angry? And I think that was just
Speaker 3: part of the feeling that many people had this week.
Speaker 3: It just says you can do everything right, play by
Speaker 3: the rules, and even when they kill your children, you
Speaker 3: can't get justice, and I think that's an awful message
Speaker 3: the justice system is sent this week, and it's a
Speaker 3: disgrace what's happened.
Speaker 1: In wa One of the things that angered me quite
Speaker 1: a lot in this case and also just waiting for
Speaker 1: it to go to trial, is the fact that Aboriginal
Speaker 1: people have to justify the humanity of Elijah Dowdy. They
Speaker 1: have to actually go to extra lengths to show that,
Speaker 1: you know, the actions that man took that day in
Speaker 1: running over this young boy was simply not justified, and
Speaker 1: yet across social media, even in the media, it was
Speaker 1: almost as if people were trying to justify his actions,
Speaker 1: to try and claim that he was right, that somehow
Speaker 1: his completely disproportionate response was right in taking after that
Speaker 1: young boy. And a lot of it's focused on whether
Speaker 1: or not he stole a motorbike, and we know that
Speaker 1: there's no evidence that Elijah actually stole that bike. There's
Speaker 1: no real evidence that it was that man's bike in question.
Speaker 1: It seems to be a lot of conjecture at the moment,
Speaker 1: and there definitely wasn't any evidence that if it was stolen,
Speaker 1: Olijah actually knew it was stolen. And yet it seems
Speaker 1: to be there's this emotional burden on Aboriginal people all
Speaker 1: across Australia, but most particularly on Elijah's family to try
Speaker 1: and to justify his right to be free and writing
Speaker 1: around Calgouli. And it's just I don't think any other
Speaker 1: Australian family would have to do that. When we see
Speaker 1: other cases of murdered children, they are never acquired to
Speaker 1: do that. In fact, they automatically had the support and
Speaker 1: the sympathy of wider Australia. They end up on sixty minutes,
Speaker 1: they end up on the front page of newspapers. We
Speaker 1: saw with Daniel Walcombe that obviously, you know, I remember
Speaker 1: at one point the Premier and members of the Queensland government,
Speaker 1: we're out walking with his family. You know, everyone supports
Speaker 1: his family. And yet and yet, for some reason, when
Speaker 1: it comes to Aboriginal families, when they moren their their children,
Speaker 1: they have to go through so many greater lengths in
Speaker 1: order to just in order just to get what should
Speaker 1: be you know, basic human decency. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: that's what really angered me as well, is the aftermath
Speaker 1: and just the racism, the pure racism that's continually shown
Speaker 1: by a non Indigenous Australia, even when it's something that
Speaker 1: should be so black and white as to be about
Speaker 1: the case of a murdered child, a complete innocent child.
Speaker 3: I totally agree, and I think that's where a huge
Speaker 3: amount of frustration has come. And everything you say is
Speaker 3: absolutely spot on, and anecdotes never make great evidence. But
Speaker 3: I want to give an anecdote that touched me the
Speaker 3: most this week, and that is that I've been fortunate enough,
Speaker 3: through the organization I work with, Foreign Prisoner Support Service
Speaker 3: to have worked with the Morchambe family and what amazing
Speaker 3: people they are and how the community rallied around them,
Speaker 3: and justifiably so, nobody who kills a child should be
Speaker 3: on the street. If anyone belongs in prison, it's them.
Speaker 3: But then at a protest in Perth this week, a
Speaker 3: friend of mine took along her little boy. He's an
Speaker 3: Aboriginal boy of just four years old, and he protested
Speaker 3: holding up a sign. He's a four year old Aboriginal boy. Four,
Speaker 3: he's not even old enough for school, and he's having
Speaker 3: to justify his right to live, that he doesn't want
Speaker 3: to be the next victim, that his humanity and that
Speaker 3: of Elijah's has to be honored by the Australian community,
Speaker 3: and it's not. What does it say about our society,
Speaker 3: let alone the justice system and our politicians and our police.
Speaker 3: When a four year old boy in Australia has to
Speaker 3: protest because he's scared if he is killed or his
Speaker 3: two year old sister is killed, there will be no justice.
Speaker 3: Children should not have to know such things. Elijah should
Speaker 3: not have had to know what he experienced, and nor
Speaker 3: should his family ever have had to deal with what
Speaker 3: happened to him, let alone their appalling treatment ever since
Speaker 3: their child was murdered. It might be an anecdote, but
Speaker 3: it's two groups of people who I've come to know,
Speaker 3: one white family, one Aboriginal family, and the difference in
Speaker 3: their treatment says everything about how Australian society treats Aboriginal people.
Speaker 3: In twenty seventeen, Martin, coming back.
Speaker 1: To the details of Elijah's case, and this is what's
Speaker 1: been reported in the media, is that there seemed to
Speaker 1: be a focus on the last I think it is
Speaker 1: twenty seconds of Elijah's life, and because obviously Elijah wasn't
Speaker 1: there to tell us his side of the story, a
Speaker 1: lot of it rested on the man's version of events,
Speaker 1: and what he claims is that while while he was
Speaker 1: chasing Elijah down, Elijah veered into the direction of his car,
Speaker 1: and the man claims that he didn't mean to do it.
Speaker 1: And yet when police actually got there that day, they
Speaker 1: drove over the tire marks, and they, i think from
Speaker 1: whatever in the media, they drove over them quite a
Speaker 1: couple of times. And so there's no way of being
Speaker 1: able to piece together what really happens. So a lot
Speaker 1: of it rested on that man's testimony. What do you
Speaker 1: think of the police investigation in that sense that it
Speaker 1: literally come down to the man's version of events, because
Speaker 1: the police seem to have contaminated a great deal of
Speaker 1: the crime scene.
Speaker 3: I think there's a number of things there. I think
Speaker 3: we have to start with the fact that the police
Speaker 3: had already told this gentleman where to go and look
Speaker 3: for his bike. Now, again, we don't even know if
Speaker 3: the bike that was involved belonged to this gentleman, and
Speaker 3: we certainly don't know, and it's highly doubtful in my opinion,
Speaker 3: that even if the bike was his, that Elijah was
Speaker 3: the one who stole it. What we do know, though,
Speaker 3: as you point out, is that the police arrived on
Speaker 3: the scene having been called, knowing that this was a
Speaker 3: serious event that had taken place, in fact so serious
Speaker 3: a child had lost their life. It doesn't get any
Speaker 3: worse than that in what at that time they were
Speaker 3: treating as a traffic incident. And remember a traffic incident
Speaker 3: can result in a murder or manslaughter charge. Vehicular manslaughter
Speaker 3: is not an uncommon thing in Australia. So the way
Speaker 3: they secure the crime scene so that the police crash
Speaker 3: investigators could do their job and get to the bottom
Speaker 3: of it is absolutely crucial. But as you point out,
Speaker 3: once they'd driven all over the scene, driven through the
Speaker 3: oil patch that was left behind by the man's four
Speaker 3: wheel drive, driven multiple times over the tire tracks of
Speaker 3: his four wheel drive, it made the expert police's job
Speaker 3: almost impossible. So those police who responded very early on,
Speaker 3: and maybe these are the same police who tipped this
Speaker 3: man off as to where to go looking for his bike,
Speaker 3: the bike he claims was stolen, are the same ones
Speaker 3: that destroyed any evidence that would give Elijah his final
Speaker 3: voice as to what actually happened. There's no way we
Speaker 3: can ever know if Elijah did in fact swerve in
Speaker 3: front of the man. If Elijah swerved, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 3: The man should never have been behind him in the
Speaker 3: first place. And I think some of the key facts
Speaker 3: we need to break down are very important because there's
Speaker 3: a lot we don't know, and we don't know because
Speaker 3: we're relying on this man's word, and we can't know
Speaker 3: because the police drove over the crime scene. But here's
Speaker 3: what we do know. This man, believing his bike had
Speaker 3: been stolen, took the day off work, so quite clearly
Speaker 3: he had an intent very early on to suggest. I think,
Speaker 3: as the media has and those who were defending this
Speaker 3: gentleman have said, is that it all revolves around that
Speaker 3: last twenty seconds is a total lie. This man had
Speaker 3: made the conscious decision to take a day off work.
Speaker 3: Then he made a conscious decision to get in his
Speaker 3: full wheel drive and lay in wait. He then pursued
Speaker 3: Elijah at speed and very close to the motorcycle Elijah
Speaker 3: was riding. All of these things go to the intent
Speaker 3: of this man far beyond that final twenty seconds that
Speaker 3: he claims to be an accident. This has nothing to do,
Speaker 3: in my opinion, whether Elijah swerved or didn't swerve. This
Speaker 3: is about vigilante justice in Western Australia that a man
Speaker 3: is told by police where his motorcycle that was allegedly
Speaker 3: stolen could be. If the police had gone and looked
Speaker 3: for that motorcycle in the first place, we wouldn't be
Speaker 3: here right now. If the police had done their job
Speaker 3: the day before Elijah died, none of this would have
Speaker 3: ever happened. But because the police didn't do their job,
Speaker 3: and because they interfered knowingly or unknowingly with the crime scene,
Speaker 3: we see a man take a two ton vehicle and
Speaker 3: chase after a fourteen year old boy. So while we
Speaker 3: might never know exactly what happened, I think we have
Speaker 3: to all agree that placing it on that last twenty
Speaker 3: seconds of Elijah's life does no justice in getting to
Speaker 3: the truth.
Speaker 5: And you raise a really good point.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think we even have to go further
Speaker 1: back than before that day because it was something that
Speaker 1: never came up in the trial. There was a.
Speaker 5: Group on Facebook where.
Speaker 1: A lot of non indigenous residents in cal Gurley were
Speaker 1: actually congregating to talk about what they say were a
Speaker 1: spade of stolen bikes and vehicles, and some of the
Speaker 1: comments made on those social media pages were just completely outrageous.
Speaker 1: They're talking about hunting them down. I mean, they were
Speaker 1: the very examples of the vigilante justice you were just
Speaker 1: talking about, and yet that was never raised in court
Speaker 1: from my understanding, so it's even I guess the wider
Speaker 1: context of what's actually happening in cal Gurley, which is
Speaker 1: obviously such a place of such extreme racism.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think you'd call it one of the.
Speaker 1: Most racist towns in Australia. So from that backdrop, I
Speaker 1: mean you could even bring that into play, couldn't you.
Speaker 1: I mean, what's the reasoning behind not being able to
Speaker 1: include those social media pages in court?
Speaker 3: Well, I think it goes to the fact that Aboriginal
Speaker 3: lives are just not given any worth. I think to
Speaker 3: link what you've just raised, which is a very valid
Speaker 3: point with what I was speaking about earlier. In light
Speaker 3: of there being this Facebook group calling for horrific vigilante
Speaker 3: justice to be dished out against Aboriginal children, why on
Speaker 3: earth would a police officer suggest that this man go
Speaker 3: and look for his own stolen property. Surely the police
Speaker 3: a should have been taking action to close this Facebook
Speaker 3: page down, should have been taking action against those calling
Speaker 3: for vigilante justice against young Aboriginal children, especially given the
Speaker 3: graphic and violent nature of what people were calling for.
Speaker 3: And then to know about this, and it's no secret
Speaker 3: that this group and other Facebook groups around Australia exist
Speaker 3: that target young Aboriginal people. For the police then to
Speaker 3: encourage this man to go and look for his bike himself,
Speaker 3: was always going to end in tragic consequences. And this
Speaker 3: comes back to a point we've discussed on this podcast before.
Speaker 3: Aboriginal people are automatically criminalized. If there was a Facebook
Speaker 3: group calling for the murder of white children, would we
Speaker 3: see that Facebook stay up? And if such a group
Speaker 3: existed in a small town and an Aboriginal person called
Speaker 3: the police and said they were looking for something of
Speaker 3: theirs they thought was stolen by a white child, would
Speaker 3: they instruct this Aboriginal man to go looking to where
Speaker 3: these white children are known to hang out. There's not
Speaker 3: a chance in hell that would happen, And that would
Speaker 3: not happen because the police police would be setting up
Speaker 3: for a situation. Justice has unfolded. So I think, as
Speaker 3: you suggest, the racism of Calgooli is central to what
Speaker 3: took place, and the police have to take full responsibility here.
Speaker 3: If Aboriginal lives are worth those of everyone else's and
Speaker 3: the police are there to protect and serve, what were
Speaker 3: they doing to protect the children who are being targeted
Speaker 3: by this Facebook group? And on the back of this
Speaker 3: Facebook group existing comes to death and I would say
Speaker 3: murder of young Elijah. And yet we're seeing no calls
Speaker 3: for the people involved in administering in administering this group
Speaker 3: to face any consequences for their action. We're seeing no
Speaker 3: calls for reforms of police's action in what they did
Speaker 3: that led to these events. All we're seeing is Elijah's
Speaker 3: family in the end Aboriginal community have to justify his humanity.
Speaker 3: Why a man who killed their child will walk free
Speaker 3: before the next summer is even over. I don't see
Speaker 3: how that can be acceptable to anyone. And again, this
Speaker 3: is clearly an issue of race, and until people accept that,
Speaker 3: we're not going to get to the bottom of what happened.
Speaker 3: And this is not a one off thing for Western
Speaker 3: Australia so much.
Speaker 1: I think even now there's quite a lot of confusion
Speaker 1: about why sentence was so short and short compared to
Speaker 1: cases of dangerous writing that you hear about every so often.
Speaker 1: I mean putting it into the context of other cases
Speaker 1: like this. Was this a lenient sentence?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it was an exceptionally lenient sentence. And
Speaker 3: we've heard this week in the media legal experts talk
Speaker 3: about this being a harsh sentence. Well, that was another
Speaker 3: thing that infuriated me this week because in just a
Speaker 3: matter of seconds, a quick search of the records in
Speaker 3: Western Australia showed sentences far, far longer and more substantial
Speaker 3: that had been handed down for exactly the same thing,
Speaker 3: dangerous driving causing death. But I also want to go
Speaker 3: to the issue of manslaughter, and this was something that
Speaker 3: Chief Justice Martin had to re explain to the jury.
Speaker 3: And one thing Justice Martin did was use a word
Speaker 3: that would help make it easier to understand what the
Speaker 3: jury were having to come to terms with, because often
Speaker 3: juries are not aware of the legal terms and their complexities.
Speaker 3: And it's quite easy again with a quick search of
Speaker 3: WA's records to see that this same word has been
Speaker 3: used by many judges across the state to help juries
Speaker 3: in their deliberation. And that word is not just did
Speaker 3: this individual drive in a manner that was criminally negligent,
Speaker 3: but was it grossly negligent, and if so, that would
Speaker 3: constitute the man slaughter charge and would have seen the
Speaker 3: man face more like ten years in prison. And I
Speaker 3: just want to go to that word grossly negligent, and
Speaker 3: this is how it's defined. A very obvious and unacceptable
Speaker 3: manner is chasing a fourteen year old child at high
Speaker 3: speed in a two ton four wheel drive a child
Speaker 3: on a small motorbike that may not be yours, and
Speaker 3: gaining on that child at a rate of five point
Speaker 3: six meters a second into rough dirt road where you
Speaker 3: have no control of your vehicle.
Speaker 4: Is that.
Speaker 3: Is that obviously flagrant and dangerous. All the jury had
Speaker 3: to decide was that that was the case based on
Speaker 3: the facts and the facts alone, And once again, as
Speaker 3: we've spoken about on this podcast, I would suggest that
Speaker 3: if the people listening don't go off the facts of
Speaker 3: what we said, it's been reported very clearly as to
Speaker 3: what was presented in the courtroom, and that alone should
Speaker 3: have been enough for a jury to find that this
Speaker 3: was grossly negligent. And yet they didn't come to that determination.
Speaker 3: And all I can assume is that that was because
Speaker 3: of the race of the child. And how can I
Speaker 3: prove that, well, what do we know about Western Australia's
Speaker 3: criminal justice system? Just recently, an Aboriginal man, Gene Gibson,
Speaker 3: was released after five and a half years behind bars.
Speaker 3: He was found guilty of manslaughter and an unlawful killing
Speaker 3: and sentenced to seven and a half years, of which
Speaker 3: he served five years behind bars. But here's the thing.
Speaker 3: Gene didn't commit the crime. Gene has a cognitive impairment.
Speaker 3: Gene was forced to confess to something he didn't do,
Speaker 3: and because of that he's been released despite losing five
Speaker 3: years of his life. This man has been found guilty
Speaker 3: of a charge, admittedly a lesser charge, and will be
Speaker 3: out halfway through the next summer. But had he been
Speaker 3: found guilty of the same charge that Jene was found
Speaker 3: guilty of when there was no evidence at all, no
Speaker 3: forensic evidence, no witness testimony, and a forced confession alone,
Speaker 3: Whereas here we have forensic evidence even if it had
Speaker 3: been to disturbed. We have CCTV footage, we know the
Speaker 3: man took the day off, we know he lay in waiting,
Speaker 3: and yet a Western Australian jury could not find this
Speaker 3: man guilty of manslaughter as they could find Gene Gibson
Speaker 3: guilty despite there being no evidence. What more do we
Speaker 3: need to know? And here's another thing to suggest that
Speaker 3: this was a harsh sentence if we look it back
Speaker 3: to Western Australia twenty fourteen, a very similar incident where
Speaker 3: neither party was Aboriginal. The offender in an almost identical situation,
Speaker 3: but where the person who died was not a child
Speaker 3: received eight years. Eight years That person who committed that
Speaker 3: crime will not be free to enjoy this Western Australian summer.
Speaker 3: This gentleman will be and Elijah will never come back.
Speaker 3: So to mount the argument that this is based on
Speaker 3: race is quite simple as far as I'm concern, and
Speaker 3: the facts on it are clear. So I don't want
Speaker 3: to hear any more about Aboriginal people rioting or misbehaving.
Speaker 3: This is the state that killed mister Ward. This is
Speaker 3: the state that killed Miss dw This is the state
Speaker 3: that set up Gene Gibson and falsely imprisoned him and
Speaker 3: deprived him of his liberty for five years. Stop blaming
Speaker 3: Aboriginal people. Aboriginal people did not kill Elijah. A non
Speaker 3: Indigenous person did. And it's your fault that it's this way,
Speaker 3: and it's your fault that Aboriginal people are angry, and
Speaker 3: it's your fault that this injustice exists. Stop asking Aboriginal
Speaker 3: people for the solution, Stop asking Aboriginal people to justice.
Speaker 3: Fire the humanity of their children, of themselves, of their families,
Speaker 3: of their communities, Politicians, the justice system, broader society, and finally,
Speaker 3: the police, the ones who are supposed to protect all
Speaker 3: of our community, have to take that responsibility. It's not
Speaker 3: for Aboriginal people to do. It's for everyone else to
Speaker 3: do and take responsibility for why this occurred. And all
Speaker 3: that racism, all those deaths in Western Australia and around
Speaker 3: this country is why Elijah is dead. A non Indigenous
Speaker 3: man will walk three this summer and Aboriginal Australia is
Speaker 3: grief stricken and angry, and it's your fault that that's
Speaker 3: the case.
Speaker 1: Mightn't taking that all in? Is there anything that people
Speaker 1: can do?
Speaker 3: What I would call on the public to do. Aboriginal
Speaker 3: people and non Aboriginal people to join me in calling
Speaker 3: on the Western Australian Department of Public Prosecution to appeal
Speaker 3: this decision and ensure that Elijah's family receives justice, that
Speaker 3: receives justice people can write to the Attorney General of
Speaker 3: Western Australia, will put the information on our website and
Speaker 3: all people need to do is call for justice to
Speaker 3: be done. This sentence is grossly unfair, it's not just,
Speaker 3: it's not right, and it has to be appealed. The
Speaker 3: DPP in a number of states have appealed such decisions
Speaker 3: and done so successfully. What we're asking for is no
Speaker 3: more and no less than what non Indigenous people get
Speaker 3: from the justice system every day of the week in Australia.
Speaker 3: So if the Western Australian government wants to prove there
Speaker 3: is no racism in their justice system, if Australian people
Speaker 3: want to prove there's no racism in Australia, and quite frankly,
Speaker 3: that can't be done just by this, but this is
Speaker 3: a start. Right to the Western Australian Attorney General and
Speaker 3: demand the DPP appeal this lean and unjust conviction that
Speaker 3: was handed down to the killer of Elijah. And we
Speaker 3: won't rest until we've done everything we can to bring
Speaker 3: justice for Elijah and his family. Behind the scenes, our
Speaker 3: work has already begun. It started just moments after the
Speaker 3: decision was handed down, and we won't stop until we've
Speaker 3: literally done all we can. All we're asking is that
Speaker 3: you write that one email. And that's what this podcast,
Speaker 3: Curtin is all about. It started with Kevin Henry and
Speaker 3: the fact that he's still in prison for a crime
Speaker 3: he didn't commit. But throughout the last year, as you've
Speaker 3: gone on this journey with us, we've been contacted by
Speaker 3: endless Indigenous Australians and their communities who have faced injustices
Speaker 3: all over the country and so we're here to pull
Speaker 3: back that curtain and bring justice. That's our fight and
Speaker 3: all we ask is that you support us in doing that.
Speaker 1: That thess of current