Gail Hickey received by minister of Aboriginal affairs

By Raul Bassi
What happened on Saturday morning in Kings Cross has jumped to the front of our activities and organising the rally on Tuesday the 24th took priority, and stopped us to report some things that have been happening around the TJ Hickey-Death in Custody campaign in Sydney.
1) On Tuesday the 17th something happened that the people involved in the Justice for TJ campaign never believed would happen: Gail Hickey was received by a minister of the NSW government. After eight years, a minister of Aboriginal affairs (probably the fourth or fifth since the death of TJ), saw and talked to Gail. Still nothing concrete came from the meeting besides a show of commiseration and a promise to refer everything to the Attorney General. We didn’t expect much more but for Gail it was important to tell someone in the government about her pain, her anger and her decision to keep up the campaign for Justice. We’ll see what happens next.
2) Also on Thursday the 19th, the monthly meeting of the group took place. We took some decisions, particularly the organisation of a forum about the Tasers and the need of ban them, organize an action on 12th in agreement with the National Campaign of Death in Custody, but what happened later has changed some of the priorities.
3) So, what we were doing about the latest shootings, those of Roberto Laudiscio Curti and other deaths, changed to a straight campaign for three points: stop police brutality, stop the police investigating police and for an independent investigation first, about what happened in the Cross on the morning of the 24th, and after that, we will call to do the same about the death of Roberto, some of the late shootings like that of Parramatta Westfield, the North Coast and particularly a new independent inquiry about the death of TJ.
4) We intend to keep up the pressure and ask everyone that came to parliament house last Tuesday, talk to their and be ready for our next action that will be in the afternoon of 12th of May, the day of the National Action of the Death in Custody.
5) In relation to 24th, we have received lots emails of support, photos even u-tubes about the rally. But the most clear sign that we touched a raw nerve was the reaction of the press. The shock jocks, some of the papers and TV stations went berserk justifying anything that the police did and putting all the blame on the kids and their parents. The unprincipled and unconditional support for the police didn’t recognise any limits and they lost all credibility in their subservient defence of unjustifiable police actions. The state government wasn’t much behind, particularly insisting that they had all the confidence in the capacity to investigate themselves.
So, we have a big fight in front of us until justice can be done.