Sydney police officer under investigation after slamming Indigenous boy face-first on to pavement
"FactCheck Q&A: are Indigenous Australians the most incarcerated people on Earth?"
Constable placed on restricted duties after footage emerged on Facebook showing him tripping up 16-year-old during arrest in NSW, Australia
Matilda Boseley and Michael McGowan
Tue 2 Jun 2020 18.31 AEST First published on Tue 2 Jun 2020 14.42 AEST
VIDEO - 9:45 Australian police officer slams Indigenous teen to pavement during arrest in Sydney
A New South Wales police officer has been placed on “restricted duties” and professional standards command is investigating after a video posted to social media showed the officer tripping an Indigenous teenager while arresting him, slamming the boy face-first on to bricks.
The arrest occurred about 5.30pm on Monday in the inner Sydney suburb of Surry Hills.
A family member said the 16-year-old had to be taken by ambulance to hospital to receive X-rays after the arrest.
One of the boy’s relatives posted in the video caption that the boy was with friends in a park less than 100 metres from his home when the police arrested him for what she said was “no reason at all”.
The police can be heard in the video talking to the group before the teenager was arrested.
The police officer said “open up your ears”, to which someone off-camera replied: “I don’t need to open my ears, I’ll crack you across the jaw, bro.”
The officer then began arresting the boy, using his leg to pull the teenager’s feet from under him while his arms were held behind his back, causing the teenager to slam face-first into the bricks and garden bed.
The boy could be heard groaning and whining in pain.
“He is in pain, bro, I’ve never heard that,” said one of the group in the video.
Another person off-camera shouted: “You just slammed him on the face!”
The relative said the boy had then been taken to the police station holding cells before being taken to St Vincent’s hospital.
The boy had sustained a bruised shoulder, cuts to his knee, face and elbow, and chipped teeth, she said.
The relative told Guardian Australia X-rays revealed no broken bones, but the bruising was serious enough that he had to return to the doctor on Tuesday morning.
NSW Police confirmed the professional standards command was investigating the incident and said the constable involved had been placed on restricted duties.
“About 5pm [Monday], officers were patrolling Ward Park, Surry Hills, when they spoke with a group of teenagers. It’s alleged a 17-year-old boy from the group threatened an officer, before being arrested and taken to Surry Hills Police Station,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
“He was subsequently taken to St Vincent’s Hospital for observation before being released into the custody of family pending further inquiries … Senior officers have met with the community and local elders and will keep them appraised throughout the process.”
At a press conference on Tuesday assistant commissioner Mick Willing refused to say whether he believed the level of force used by the officer during the incident was appropriate, or to explain why the officer had not been formally stood down during the investigation.
Willing said he was “concerned” by the footage, but that he was “equally concerned about others who may use this footage to inflame it and turn it into something it’s not”.
“I’m concerned that people will use this video, this footage, to create it into something it’s not,” he said.
“We’re all well aware of what’s happening overseas but this is not the United States of America.
“We have very, very good relations with our local community and I’m concerned that people will pre-empt the outcome of this investigation and draw conclusions prior to that outcome.”
Asked why the group of boys had been stopped by officers, Willing said the officers had been “attending an unrelated job” when they had “come across” the group and “engaged them in conversation”.
Willing said he had watched the footage and was “absolutely” concerned by it, but refused to comment on whether he thought it was appropriate for the officer to use force against the teen.
“That’s what the investigation is about. It’s about trying to identify whether the use of force was necessary in the circumstances. Now obviously police officers can use force lawfully so this investigation has been initiated to look at the circumstances around that and get to the bottom of what’s happened,” he said.
Solicitors from Redfern Legal Centre called for the investigation to be overseen by police watchdog the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission.
“This type of policing is not only unacceptable but harmful and impacts community relationships and trust in the police,” said Samantha Lee, a solicitor focusing on police accountability at the centre.
“Redfern Legal Centre believes the young man should seek immediate legal advice and is offering to assist.”
Dave Sharma, the Liberal MP for Wentworth, which is the neighbouring electorate to Surry Hills where the boy was arrested, tweeted that he was “alarmed and sickened” by the video footage of the arrest. Acknowledging there was an internal police investigation underway, he added: “I await the outcome with interest.”
Dave Sharma @DaveSharma
Anyone who has seen this footage cannot be other than alarmed and sickened by it. I understand there is an internal @nswpolice investigation currently underway - I await the outcome with interest. @PatsKarvelas @abcnews Embedded video 5:46 PM - Jun 2, 2020
Scott Morrison compares Black Lives Matter protests to Anzac Day, urges Australians to show 'respect' and not attend
"FactCheck Q&A: are Indigenous Australians the most incarcerated people on Earth? 2015 - "A guide to Australia’s Stolen Generations""
No apology Mr. Morrison, and other politicians and health experts who are telling us not to go. NSW and Victoria police are both in court seeking injunctions to make the rallies illegal. Systemic racism is a blight worth attending. I hope to be there.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison during the press conference at Parliament House on Friday. Source: AAP
The Prime Minister has cautioned Australians not to attend protests against police brutality over the weekend amid coronavirus social distancing restrictions.
Updated Updated 4 hours ago
By Maani Truu
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has invoked the shutdown of Anzac Day memorials due to coronavirus as he urged Australians to show respect and not attend protests against police brutality this weekend.
While coronavirus social distancing restrictions remain in place, protests against Indigenous deaths in custody and in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States are planned in most Australian capital cities on Saturday.
More than 18,000 people have clicked 'attending' on the Melbourne Facebook event, and another 10,000 in Sydney, but Mr Morrison sent a clear message to those planning to attend during a media conference on Friday.
"For all of those Australians who couldn't attend the funeral of a family member, or couldn't see a loved one in a nursing home, or a veteran who couldn't remember their fallen colleagues by attending a war memorial service on Anzac Day, I think all Australians owe all those other Australians a great degree of responsibility," he said.
"I say to [protesters]: don't go."
David Pope @davpope
Big #BlackLivesMatter #AboriginalLivesMatter rally and march in Canberra today. Overwhelmingly young crowd. 11:45 AM - Jun 5, 2020 63 people are talking about this
As the Prime Minister addressed the nation from Parliament House, hundreds of Black Lives Matter protesters gathered in Canberra.
ACT police told SBS News no fines or infringements were issued for breaches of social distancing at the rally.
"The crowd was well behaved and followed the advice of police," the spokesperson said.
VIDEO - 04:08 Mr Morrison said people had the right to protest, but added that the public health risk of spreading COVID-19 was legitimate.
He pointed to people standing on their driveway to pay respect on Anzac Day this year, as opposed to attending memorial services and marches, as an example of Australians showing responsibility.
"We found a way to celebrate those who gave us our liberty. Let's not misuse that liberty. Let's respect it. Let's respect other Australians," he added.
She said approval for the event was granted on the understanding it would be a small gathering.
"The New South Wales Government would never ever give the green light to thousands of people flagrantly disregarding the health orders," she said.
Organisers of events in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and Canberra have urged attendees to maintain 1.5-metre social distancing, wear masks, and use hand sanitiser while at the rally.
VIDEO - 01:14 Melbourne has gone further and said attendees must wear masks, while the Sydney organisers said they relocated to a larger venue to allow for distancing.
Federal chief medical officer Brendan Murphy said even if attendees tried to practice social distancing, mass-gatherings are fundamentally unsafe.
"A mass gathering, even if people try to make it safe by trying to practise distancing and hand hygiene, is inherently dangerous because people can't really keep apart," Professor Murphy said.
"We have done so much, we have sacrificed so much as Australians, to get us in an enviable position of where we are now. It would be very foolish to sacrifice by exposing the population to a larger outbreak."
Heated protests have spread across the world following the death of black man George Floyd at the hands of police in Minneapolis on 25 May.
Facebook incorrectly removes picture of Aboriginal men in chains because of 'nudity'
FactCheck Q&A: are Indigenous Australians the most incarcerated people on Earth?
Seriously, Mr. Zuckerberg. Hire more humans.
Facebook also blocks users from sharing Guardian Australia’s story based on its use of the image
Josh Taylor @joshgnosis
Fri 12 Jun 2020 19.11 EDT First published on Fri 12 Jun 2020 16.00 EDT
Photo of Aboriginal prisoners in chains, removed by Facebook in error from post critical of PM’s comment. Photograph: State Library of Western Australia
Facebook .. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/facebook .. incorrectly removed a post critical of the prime minister’s comments regarding slavery in Australia that featured a photograph of Aboriginal men in neck chains from the late 1800s, claiming the photo featured nudity.
Following his comments on Thursday, debate on social media was rife with discussion of Australia’s history of slavery. One Australian user posted about the topic on his personal Facebook profile, including a photo of nine Aboriginal men chained together by their necks wearing loin cloths outside Roebourne Gaol in 1896.
“Kidnapped, ripped from the arms of their loved ones and forced into back-breaking labour: The brutal reality of life as a Kanaka worker - but Scott Morrison .. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/scott-morrison .. claims ‘there was no slavery in Australia’,” the post stated.”
The photo from the state library of Western Australia refers to the men as prisoners, and the photo had been shared in stories about Morrison’s comments in the Daily Mail.
The post was removed by Facebook, and the man had his account restricted, with Facebook claiming the photo contained nudity and was in breach of the social media site’s community standards.
The post was restored after Guardian Australia asked Facebook about whether the photo had been flagged in error. Facebook apologised to the user late on Friday and restored the post.
A spokeswoman for Facebook said the photo was removed by the automated system in error.
“We apologise for this mistake,” she said.
As of Saturday morning, Facebook was blocking users from sharing Guardian Australia’s story based on its use of the image.
According to Facebook’s latest community standards report .. https://transparency.facebook.com/community-standards-enforcement , between January and March this year, Facebook removed 39.5m pieces of content for adult nudity or sexual activity, and of that 99.2% was removed by Facebook automatically, without a user reporting it.
Through the appeals process Facebook has in place, there were 2.5m appeals made, and 613,000 pieces of content were restored.
Facebook also faced criticism in Australia in 2016 for blocking the account of Arrente writer Celeste Liddle four times after she shared a trailer for an Indigenous comedy show .. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/mar/23/facebook-censorship-topless-aboriginal-women .. that featured images of topless desert women. Trolls kept reporting the content as “indecent”, and Facebook kept removing the trailer and locking Liddle out of her account.
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