AAP
Readers are advised that this article contains the name and image of an Indigenous person who has died.
The police officer who killed 19-year-old Indigenous man Kumanjayi Walker was racist and benefitted from a “racist” system, the Northern Territory coroner has found.
Coroner Elizabeth Armitage found former police officer Zachary Rolfe was racist, working in a system that was “also racist”, and could “not exclude” that drove Rolfe’s actions when he shot and killed Walker in 2019.
“I found that Mr Rolfe was racist and benefitted from working in a system that was…also racist,” said Armitage.
“This was not a case of one bad apple,” she said.
Rolfe shot Walker three times at close range during an attempted arrest at a home in the community of Yuendumu, about 290km northwest of Alice Springs.
Armitage said is was not possible to determine with certainty whether Rolfe’s racism was what led his actions, but “I cannot exclude that possibility”.
“Mr Rolfe was racist and benefitted from working in a system that was…also racist” – Coroner Elizabeth Armitage
She has delivered her findings in Yuendumu today.
Armitage said Walker’s death was “avoidable”.
“This was a case of officer-induced jeopardy – where officers needlessly put themselves in danger making themselves and others vulnerable and creating a situation that justifies the use of deadly force,” she said.
“While it was not possible for me to say with certainty that Mr Rolfe’s racist attitudes were operative in his decisions on November 9, or were a contributing cause of Kumanjayi’s death, I cannot exclude that possibility”.
In March 2022 a jury in the NT Supreme Court found Rolfe, then 30, not guilty of murder.
“This was not a case of one bad apple” – Coroner Elizabeth Armitage
Kumanjayi Walker was shot three times at close range by racist police officer Zachary Rolfe. Source: Supplied
Armitage is not permitted to make findings that contradict the findings of the jury.
Rolfe, carrying a pair of scissors, was resisting being handcuffed by Northern Territory Police officers when Rolfe repeatedly shot him.
Armitage in November closed Australia’s longest-running inquest to consider more than 5000 pages of transcripts and 1990 pages of written submissions.
She had been due to deliver her findings on June 10 in the remote desert community of Yuendumu.
But that was postponed until July 7 following the death of another young Yuendumu man in police custody in Alice Springs.
Kumanjayi White, 24, died on May 27 shortly after being forcibly restrained by two plain-clothes police officers at a supermarket where he allegedly assaulted a security officer who accused him of shoplifting.
His death prompted the Yuendumu community to seek a delay of the Kumanjayi Walker findings as they went through another time of “sorry business”.
Armitage’s inquest heard damning evidence against Mr Rolfe.
Zach Rolfe leaving the inquest into the death of Kumanjayi Walker at Alice Springs Local Court in November 2022. Source: AAP/Aaron Bunch
This included counsel assisting Peggy Dwyer arguing that his character should be considered as a direct cause of death.
“Mr Rolfe was a man whose ego was wrapped up in his use of force and who took pride in and derived a sense of worth from expressing his dominance over others,” Dwyer said.
“They were generally Aboriginal men and he expressed that dominance with the use of force.”
Counsel for NT Police Ian Freckelton KC told the inquest “it is absolutely undeniable that Mr Rolfe is a racist” based on his derogatory text messages about Indigenous people.
“People who talk about ‘loser locals, coons, Neanderthals’ … on the basis of their Aboriginality, are racists and it’s important to call it as it is.”
Text messages between Mr Rolfe and other officers revealed a string of racist slurs and the normalisation of using excessive force against Aboriginal people.
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