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Speaker 1: Now joining me in the studio is the Northern Territories

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Speaker 1: Assistant Police Commissioner, Travis Worst. Good morning to you, Travis,

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Speaker 1: Morning Katie.

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Speaker 2: How are you very well?

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Speaker 1: Now? It has been a pretty big week, you'd have

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Speaker 1: to say for our Northern Territory Police. We know that

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Speaker 1: there's been quite a lot going on. Well, I guess

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Speaker 1: they're always the issue. Guys are always busy, but that

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Speaker 1: unrest in the community of what Air unfortunately continues. Yesterday

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Speaker 1: issuing a statement that since the first of May, police

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Speaker 1: have responded to a number of community disturbances, resulting in

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Speaker 1: a total of thirteen arrests, six notices to appear being issued,

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Speaker 1: in three youths being diverted. How serious is this issue

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Speaker 1: out in what Air at the moment?

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Speaker 2: Look, it's extremely serious because the harm it's been caused

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Speaker 2: to that community. And it's not just about the harm

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Speaker 2: that we are hearing reported in the news, but it's

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Speaker 2: more about the displacement it's causing for those that aren't

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Speaker 2: involved in the in the unrest, the women and the children,

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Speaker 2: the elderly, those that aren't involved at all, that have

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Speaker 2: safety against for living in their own community, and a

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Speaker 2: lot of those people I'm aware of being displaced from

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Speaker 2: within what Air and have actually moved out to our stations.

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Speaker 2: Some have actually chosen to move out of the community altogether,

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Speaker 2: whether they've moved to Plump or Peppy or even into Darwin.

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Speaker 2: We are seeing, obviously people that have come into Darwen

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Speaker 2: who are living either in accommodation that family have already

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Speaker 2: got or living rough and we're seeing some of that

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Speaker 2: displacement occurred. We were aware that what Air may spill

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Speaker 2: over into Dahm. We have seen a bit of that

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Speaker 2: obviously over the last week or so. But obviously we're

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Speaker 2: very very mindful of making sure we've got a good

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Speaker 2: connection between what's happening and what Air from an information

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Speaker 2: and an intelligence point of view, so that we're sharing

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Speaker 2: that with our teams, not just police but the whole

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Speaker 2: NGO and government team that are working in this antisocial

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Speaker 2: behavior space in Darwin, so that we can be in

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Speaker 2: front of whatever's occurring.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, some of it's been pretty crazy. I mean that

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Speaker 1: vision obviously over the course of the weekend from outside

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Speaker 1: the hotel in Jinglely, we know that three people have

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Speaker 1: since been arrested, but somebody appearing to be hit by

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Speaker 1: a vehicle then jumping up running away. We've also then

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Speaker 1: seen photos emerge on social media of people with what

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Speaker 1: appeared to be arrows in their various body parts. And

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Speaker 1: then yesterday morning we caught up with one of the

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Speaker 1: managers from Mitchell's out in Berrima who'd said that they'd

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Speaker 1: actually had some of their crossbows and things like that stolen.

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Speaker 1: So are there any links, I guess firstly to that

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Speaker 1: breaking entry that we'd seen at Mitchell's and those crossbows

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Speaker 1: being stolen. Do we believe that they could have ended

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Speaker 1: up in the community.

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Speaker 2: Of whatever, so it's more than likely that those involved

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Speaker 2: have links to potentially What what I can say is

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Speaker 2: we recovered some of the packaging from that unloaful entry

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Speaker 2: in the Adelaide River area, and we have recovered most

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Speaker 2: of those items within the water community already that was stolen.

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Speaker 1: OK, So those crossbows and that kind of stuff.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, So to suggest there's a link between what

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Speaker 2: that's quite obvious given that we've located in that location.

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Speaker 2: There are some minor items still outstanding, so it wasn't

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Speaker 2: just crossbos. There were some knives and other items that

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Speaker 2: were taken at that same time which haven't yet been recovered.

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Speaker 2: Investigations on going between both our Trient team here and

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Speaker 2: darn and the WA Air Police to continue the identification

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Speaker 2: process and bring those involved into custody.

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Speaker 1: And you mentioned that you know some of that violence

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Speaker 1: is obviously there has spilled into Darwin. As we saw

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Speaker 1: throughout that vision. How many people are displaced and potentially

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Speaker 1: in Darwin from the community of What.

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Speaker 2: It's really hard to put a number on how many

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Speaker 2: people from what are here. So the last time that

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Speaker 2: you and I spoke, we were talking about the any

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Speaker 2: social behavior problem that was rather exasperating for members of

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Speaker 2: the community. At that time we had over three thousand people.

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Speaker 2: So now our advice is that that number is certainly

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Speaker 2: below fifteen hundred. People would be as low as a thousand,

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Speaker 2: But we do know there are pockets of people from

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Speaker 2: what a who. We've always got people from What are

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Speaker 2: living rough in Darwen, almost on a semi permanent basis.

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Speaker 2: We've seen some of those numbers increase, particularly along the

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Speaker 2: McMillan's road area between the airport and the water gardens

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Speaker 2: is one location where we know what Air people live.

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Speaker 2: We've also got a group of what Air people living

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Speaker 2: out at the back of Tallagi Road in the Garaonga area.

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Speaker 1: Look, I think the hard part about it is as well,

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Speaker 1: you see some of those photos you know that we've

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Speaker 1: seen on social media. You see some of those images,

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Speaker 1: but then you also think about women and children living

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Speaker 1: out in that community and how dangerous it must be

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Speaker 1: for some of them and bloody frightening, to be honest.

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Speaker 2: They're absolutely scared and they're terrified for what it means

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Speaker 2: for their community. What it's doing is it's not just

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Speaker 2: having that short term impact, but it's impacting on kids

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Speaker 2: going to school, it's impacting on people getting access to

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Speaker 2: health services. There's a whole task force that's multi agent

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Speaker 2: that's been delivered in relation to what air, and that

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Speaker 2: task force is very much focused on that community safety

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Speaker 2: and how that collectively we can work through this so

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Speaker 2: that that safety aspect can be brought back in and

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Speaker 2: whether that means that those community members who are displaced

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Speaker 2: can live semi permanently in that displaced location, whether it's

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Speaker 2: a homeland, whether it's another community. All that works on going.

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Speaker 2: It's a significant challenge that's multi dimensional. Certainly has is

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Speaker 2: extremely complex and it requires lots of agencies, lots of effort,

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Speaker 2: lots of community engagement and buying, lots of leavers to

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Speaker 2: be pulled to make sure that we can actually get

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Speaker 2: a try understanding what's going on behind the scenes in

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Speaker 2: relation to the cultural aspect of why this is occurring.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, look, we are fast running out of time, but

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Speaker 1: I want to ask you about some of those concerns

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Speaker 1: we have seen around the place when it comes to

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Speaker 1: public drunkenness. You did say that those numbers have dropped

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Speaker 1: significantly in terms of people being in town from other communities.

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Speaker 1: How have you got I know that those patrols have

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Speaker 1: restarted as well, where some of that alcohol's being tipped out,

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Speaker 1: people are being apprehended if they are behaving in a

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Speaker 1: way or you know, in criminal engaging in criminal behavior.

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Speaker 1: How have some of those patrols been going when it

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Speaker 1: comes to public drunkenness.

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Speaker 2: So what we've done is we've actually pulled all the

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Speaker 2: entities together that are involved in this space, both frontline

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Speaker 2: services that are doing that enforcement and engagement type work,

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Speaker 2: but then behind that having the outreach services coming following

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Speaker 2: in close behind to be able to work out what

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Speaker 2: the situation that individuals are in and how we can

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Speaker 2: work with them to get them into a different scenario,

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Speaker 2: which is why for example, this month, for the month

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Speaker 2: of May return to country was four hundred and twenty

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Speaker 2: two people and this month already so noting that we're

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Speaker 2: only halfway through June, two hundred and ninety four people

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Speaker 2: have returned to country as well. Okay, so the increased

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Speaker 2: level of coordination we're using the Nightclif Police station is

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Speaker 2: our central point to be able to talk to agencies

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Speaker 2: every day to make sure we know where the issues

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Speaker 2: are so that our resources are been maximized. It's clearly

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Speaker 2: making a difference. We still have challenges around access to

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Speaker 2: alcohol and alcohol and drunken behavior criminality as a consequence,

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Speaker 2: but we are seeing the numbers living rough reducing the

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Speaker 2: any social behavior impact reducing. But will continue to work

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Speaker 2: because at the moment, town's pack that's heaving. We've just

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Speaker 2: had a vas which went really well. We need to

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Speaker 2: make sure that the amenity of our community is save

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Speaker 2: as it can be and make sure it's safe for

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Speaker 2: all the new visitors we've got to town, which is great.

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Speaker 1: One of the terrible things that we have seen as

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Speaker 1: well in recent days is a terrible fatality on our

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Speaker 1: road out in the rural area out there near Nunamar.

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Speaker 1: I know that certainly a tributes flowing through that life

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Speaker 1: for that man whose life was lost. But there is

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Speaker 1: no doubt that road safety, particularly it seems as though

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Speaker 1: we see we're having more incidents out in the rural

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Speaker 1: area at the moment.

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Speaker 2: For some reason, we did ask you before we started

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Speaker 2: this interview today about your listenership in the rural area.

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Speaker 1: We've got a lot of people that listen in the

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Speaker 1: rural area.

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Speaker 2: I want them to open their ears because clearly some

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Speaker 2: of them are not listening. So this is a case

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Speaker 2: of one of the fatal five being in play. This

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Speaker 2: person was obviously impaired because of well the media release

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Speaker 2: quite clearly indicated that he'd been taken into custody to

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Speaker 2: deal with presentation of cannabis and pulled in front of

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Speaker 2: a vehicle, sorry a writer that caused his death. Only

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Speaker 2: two weeks ago, we had another fatal in that area,

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Speaker 2: and within hours of that fatal occurring, we've been in

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Speaker 2: the same location arresting people for drink driving on that

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Speaker 2: same road. Yet this same person drunk drove, crashed and died,

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Speaker 2: And it's happening far too often. The impact here is

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Speaker 2: the individual, the community, the family, but also obviously the

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Speaker 2: police as well. And I'm not selfishly talking about the police,

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Speaker 2: but every time this occurs, we've got to attend to

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Speaker 2: the crash and then to the family and that takes

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Speaker 2: as absolute toll. I asked, I urged the rural road users.

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Speaker 2: Please slow down, stop if you're impaired, Please don't drive distraction.

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Speaker 2: We've had a near fatal hit and run during the

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Speaker 2: week that was a person driving admitted he was looking

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Speaker 2: at his mobile phone and struck a pedestrian. As a consequence.

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Speaker 2: In that rural area, we've had two pedestrian strikes that

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Speaker 2: led to fatalities. One was well publicized, the other not

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Speaker 2: so much, but still two is too many. Please just

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Speaker 2: take care on the roads, and particularly that rural area,

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Speaker 2: because we've seen a significant increase in fatalities in that

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Speaker 2: rural area for this year, where way above last year's

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Speaker 2: fatality rate. We're running unfortunately, we've had twenty six fatalities

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Speaker 2: this year already thirteen so double what we had last year,

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Speaker 2: and I'd suggest a lot of those have occurred in

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Speaker 2: our rural area outside of Darwin.

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Speaker 1: It is terrible stuff. It is something that we need

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Speaker 1: to see some change in that space. We have run

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Speaker 1: out of time, but just very very quickly. We did

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Speaker 1: receive some information from one of our listeners out at

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Speaker 1: Marlow's Lagoon that apparently a little forklift or a little

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Speaker 1: excavator had potentially been broken out of a fenced off

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Speaker 1: area there at the dog park and caused some damage.

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Speaker 1: Is any report, No report at this stage to you guys,

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Speaker 1: and we'll see.

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Speaker 2: What we can find out.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely well, we'll see what we can find out. We

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Speaker 1: better leave it there. Travis Worst, Assistant Commissioner with the

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Speaker 1: Northern Territory Police. Thanks so much for your time.

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Speaker 2: Thank you,