Justice for Rex Bellotti Jnr an inch closer - new witness and calls for an inquiry.

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 01/09/2011 - 5:13pm

During the last couple of weeks Indymedia Australia and The National Indigenous Times in its most recent edition highlighted the plight of a West Australian Nyungar family whose young son, the eldest of their six children, was hit by a police four wheel drive. There is no question that the police vehicle hit him however the acceptance of responsibility has not occurred – and within this journey various acts and stressors upon the family, are clear acts of various racisms and discriminations and some of these with their origin-of-thinking from within the many inter-generational stereotypes and other premises.Much has unfolded within the fortnight since Indymedia Australia featured on its site and The National Indigenous Times featured on its cover, and as its four-page centerpiece article within The Big Read the plight of the Bellotti family and their seeking of some justice, some remedy and closure.
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Another witness has come forward and has corroborated some of the various third-party witness statements which are contrary to the statements of the involved police officers. The revelations from this new witness, who does fear going public, however understands the need to rise to the occasion, has ensured that the Bellotti Support Group will submit her testimony to West Australia’s Corruption and Crimes Commission in pursuit of the CCC re-opening their investigation. During October of 2009, the CCC found that the police mishandled their investigation and there were some very damning insights by the CCC about the police investigation however the CCC concluded that it had inadequate evidence before it in order to proceed with substantive conclusions of whether there was any criminality and whether there was any racism on behalf of the police officers who grievously injured Rex Bellotti Jnr. Officers of the WA Police recently said through the various news media that the CCC cleared them in 2009 however this is not the case – quite the contrary – the CCC was never cleared and it is beyond mischievous for any officer of the WA Police to be misleading the Australian public. The CCC will have to consider the worthiness of the new evidence - that is the testimony of an independent witness, far removed from the family, of the events of that particular evening. Personally, I believe there is adequate evidence for the CCC to initiate an independent external investigation of the police incident in which they hit Rex Bellotti Jnr. Furthermore, there should be a full inquiry into some of the horrific counter claims that the involved police officers have insulted the family with and which I will argue ring loud in racist and racial connotations and other underwriting.

It was reported in last week’s The National Indigenous Times that an Aboriginal youth, Rex Bellotti Jnr, aged 15 was run over by a police four-wheel-drive Holden Rodeo and more than two years have passed without any compensation, without any closure. When it comes to Aboriginal victims this is nothing new.

Rex Jnr’s parents are Nyungar-Yamatji Maaman Rex Bellotti Sr and Nyungar Yorga Liz Bellotti, 42 and 40 years old, and they have spent their lives working very hard to ensure the likelihood of the personal advancement of their children, in the belief that Aboriginal advancement should be achieved by Aboriginal peoples. They had never asked for help and had worked to ensure that their six children now aged 6 to 17, have had every reasonable opportunity. They have given every little bit of what they have to provide for their children the experience and hopes of a private school education. Rex Sr and Liz go without many things in order to educate their children. Rex Sr has often described that Aboriginal peoples have for far too long been oppressed by the inter-generational attitudes, premises and prejudices of non-Aboriginal Australians and that Aboriginal peoples cannot depend upon non-Aboriginal Australians to help Aboriginal peoples - however that Aboriginal peoples, even in the weighty blight of the voluminous adversities and disparities faced by them, must scrap for everything they can to bring about the reduction of the disparity between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians.

Rally on August 26th

On March 6, 2009, the Bellotti family's eldest son, Rex Jnr., aged 15, was involved in a police-related-incident. It was not of his making, he was an Aboriginal person at a place that police were converging upon. Since March 6, 2009 the Bellotti family has endured the severest forms of unrelenting grief and for the most part has been abandoned in their grief - without any form of adequate support, in a bleak vacuum of inhumanity. Since this police-related-incident Rex Sr, Liz and Rex Jnr and his five siblings have not only had to deal with the trauma of grievous injuries sustained by Rex Jnr they have also had to cope with the culture of brutal silence surrounding the Albany and Western Australian Police and with the contemptible minimalist fodder that we have all long learned to expect from various government authorities, ministerial portfolio holders and from the agencies which argue various demarcation and claim to be independent auditors and investigators.

Rally on August 26th

The Bellotti Support Group are approaching an increasing number of parliamentarians, and it is fair to note that there would now be few parliamentarians in Australia who during the last couple of months, and most certainly during the last fortnight have not heard of Rex Bellotti Jnr. For far too long, since March 6, 2009 till the middle of this year the Bellotti family had struggled for its voice, for its right to be heard, for others, especially from the legal fraternity and the various community social justice groups to rise to the occasion and to enrich their right to voice, to provide the assistance that they so desperately and rightly deserve. They came to me, and we organised a series of snap rallies on the steps of WA’s State Parliament, three in fact and these within a week of each other, and each one with a growing attendance, and whenever we saw a parliamentarian we stopped them and offered them an education of what occurred to Rex Bellotti Jnr. After the third rally some of the protestors came together and formed the Bellotti Support Group which has met every Wednesday since, without fail. They brought on a rally in the heart of Albany, the town where the Bellottis once lived, where Albany police hit Rex Jnr, and where he nearly died. People came to the rally from right throughout the southwest of WA and from Perth.

The Bellotti Support Group on August 11 coordinated a Public Hearing in Perth and as a result a resilience to testify among witnesses who are Aboriginal is growing – for far too long far too many Aboriginal folk have been intimidated by perceived concerns about giving evidence against police, and far too many Aboriginal folk believe that evidence from themselves is not considered as authentic and/or of the equivalent weight had it come from a non-Aboriginal person. These are the many and various layers of racism we live with in this country. Significant numbers of our Aboriginal brothers and sisters, and tragically so especially after the legislative events relating to Aboriginal rights issues, electoral rights and the various referendum pursuits still feel they are considered second class citizens, sub-human, stereotyped, and feel that their very identity, cultural, historical and racial, is a liability.

On March 6, within the last hour prior to midnight Rex Jnr was leaving a Wake when he was struck by a police vehicle, a four-wheel-drive, with a roo-bar, which according to witnesses was driving on the wrong side of the road. It has been alleged that Rex Jnr was hit by the vehicle on the opposite side of the road, on the wrong side of the road, however the police officers in question deny this and conversely claim that they were driving on the correct side of the road, and that it was not on the opposite side of the road that Rex Jnr was struck by their vehicle. However, what beggars belief for many non-Aboriginal Australians is the keystone, almost circus-like police investigation that for a significant period of time struggled to take effect, and for a crucial period of time had very little form and content. There was no bona fide investigation during the immediacy of the event; for Aboriginal peoples these insults and this sort of behavior is common place and matter-of-fact.

Rally on August 26th

After the recent Albany rally where the Bellotti Support Group protested in Mokare Park, in the heart of Albany, and educated many passers-by as to what occurred to Rex Jnr at nearby Lower King Road, they marched in numbers to Albany Police Station where they were refused the right to make a complaint against the police handling of the investigation and where they were treated with minimalist fodder from the Duty Officer. However, days later, on July 26, the local newspaper, the Albany Advertiser, published a page three article titled: Police offended by racial allegation in Bellotti case.

Reporter Elle Farcic wrote the following, “Great Southern police district Supt Dene Leekong says he is offended by claims police were negligent during an investigation into an accident involving a young indigenous boy because of his race.

In 2009, Rex Bellotti Jnr, then 15, was hit by a police vehicle in Lower King.The Bellotti Support Group claims the police were driving on the wrong side of the road and failed to stop and provide assistance to Rex after they hit him.

On Saturday, the support group held a rally at Alison Hartman Gardens (also known as Mokare Park), calling for an independent inquiry into the incident. One protester used a megaphone to recount the support group’s version of events on the night. He then launched into an attack of the police’s handling of the investigation.

‘Could you imagine that happening to you or anyone you knew if they were white? I ask you that,’ he said.

Supt Leekong said that the police had done everything they could.

The investigation had been reviewed by a senior executive officer and the Corruption and the Crime Commission.

‘The outcome had not changed on all of those investigations,’ Supt Leekong said.

‘The police were not at fault.’

‘The CCC also found there were allegations of racism put against police, which I find personally offensive. I find it personally offensive that we get accused of racism when my surname is Leekong and I am a Chinese descendant. It is pleasing the CCC supported our position that it was not racist at all.’”

Speakers at August 26th Rally

I refute what Superintendant Leekong misled the Albany Advertiser and hence its readership with. His statements do not correlate with the comments of other police spokespeople nor with the findings and conclusions of the Corruption and Crimes and Commission. The CCC did not clear the involved Albany police officers nor did the CCC or other police spokespersons consider that everything possible that could have been done in terms of the police investigation was done - on the contrary.

What disturbs me the most is the fact that one of the investigative officers who was supposed to have been demarcated and independent from the involved officers was Superintendent Dene Leekong, of the Great Southern Police. Reading these statements by him I can only conclude bias and ignorance.

Once again, simply, this follow up article can be summed up with the assertion that Police should not investigate Police - this should be 'a given'.

Having read every available police and third-party witness statement under the Police Freedom of Information Act relating to the incident of police hitting Rex Jnr, and other evidence, and the CCC report, and in listening to what various police spokespersons have said, I responded with the following letter to the Albany Advertiser.

“I am appalled by the nonsensical and misleading comments of Great Southern Police District Dene Leekong to the Albany Advertiser (26.7.2011) in relation to a page 3 article by reporter Elle Farcic about the public rally in Albany the preceding Saturday for Rex Bellotti Jnr who was hit by a police four wheel drive on the night of March 6, 2009 when he was aged 15.

I do not believe that we will ever have recorded the contextual truth of the incident and this is something that all parties have to live with, the WA Police and the Bellotti family. However what remains 100% indisputable is that a police vehicle, whether by sheer accident, carelessness or recklessness definitely hit Rex Bellotti Jnr. It is indisputable that 100% of Rex Jnr's injuries, mental and physical, and they are grievous, were directly and indirectly caused by the impact of the police vehicle upon him. His injuries were shocking and he is still healing. Therefore the WA Police, if nothing else, should expedite compensation and other paid for support - there should be no further delay as this family has been impoverished by this 'accident.'

I am a PhD Law researcher in Australian deaths in custody, and because of a number of factors, historical and contemporary, Australia has one of the world's most disturbing deaths in custody records, prison and police custodial related. Police and prison officers are victims of zero tolerance practices and of the fact that there are no demarcated Inspectorates to investigate complaints. In the most serious of matters police should not be investigating police.

Supt Dene Leekong in the Albany Advertiser article claims he is offended by claims that police were negligent during the investigation. The fact is according to both Police and CCC investigators there was negligence, clearly, however it has been limited to mishandling of the police investigation rather than to any assertions of favour dispensation or criminal negligence and other vicarious liability.

Police statements from third party witnesses were not collected till after a significant Sunday Times article. Statements had been limited to the involved police officers. The incident occurred on March 6 however statements from third party witnesses were collected April 5 to May 16. I have read the statements under the Police Freedom of Information Act and some of these statements do not corroborate other versions.

How dare Supt Leekong state to reporter Elle Farcic that 'the police had done everything they could'? In November of 2009 investigating police officers admitted to The Corruption and Crimes Commission that there had been 'oversights' during the police investigations, and there had been assertions this was because of 'inexperience'. The CCC responded, "Given the injuries suffered by Rex Jnr., it would be hard to accept that the lack of obtaining statements is merely an oversight." In fact the CCC found that the police investigation had been mishandled. In fact as recently as July 23, 2011, the day of the Albany rally The West Australian reporter, Kate Bastians interviewed WA Police Spokesperson, Bill Munnee who said the Corruption and Crime Commission investigation led to the re-education of police in regards to giving witnesses information about available counselling services. He said the "original investigating officer conducted an inadequate investigation" and was therefore subject to a managerial action plan. Officer Munnee said, "The investigation into the traffic crash and subsequent reviews have concluded that there is no evidence that the driver of the police vehicle was at fault."

How dare Supt Leekong consider it 'personally' offensive that the police can be "...accused of racism when my surname is Leekong and I am a Chinese descendant." I am of Greek descent, so what? The CCC stated that it had inadequate evidence to substantiate any assertion that racism was a factor. This may be the truth however without CCTV the CCC would never have upheld some of the findings against police and prison officers in the incidents relating to Kevin Spratt. On that occasion police fabricated charge sheets!

Involved police officers assert that Rex Jnr intentionally jumped in front of the police vehicle. I do not believe this. Other evidence states he was trying to cross the road. However if in the event an accident did occur, or maybe the police vehicle was driving with its lights off in the heart of the darkness, in order not to be conspicuous, converging upon a Wake, where Nyungar folk had coalesced to pay their respects, and maybe neither saw each other in time, I find it questionable that in the heart of the darkness police officers could make an assessment in a couple of seconds that someone was trying to kill themself. I have long wondered whether they would dare to make this assertion if he were not Aboriginal. In this boy's case his family is a hard working family, with six children and all of them in private school education. I find it an insult to the parents that an aspersion was cast upon their son (and them) just as police officers may likewise argue they find such aspersons cast upon themselves. Several days after the incident The Albany Advertiser reported the police officers' accusation that he tried to kill himself. This was a horrific public statement. If this is untrue then this accusation is one of the worst forms of sheer racism and hence we are yet to unveil our racist layers in this country.

Supt Leekong owes the Bellotti family a public apology on page 3 of The Albany Advertiser. I do feel sorry for police, and there are police officers in my family, as the majority of police officers are victims of practices and zero tolerance protocols and other ignorance. Imputations and aspersions can be eliminated by demarcated Police Inspectorates that do not report to the Police and rather to another body or to the Office of the Attorney-General or a Parliamentary Inspector.”

The Coordinator of the Bellotti Support Group, Shilo Harrison wrote to the Albany Advertiser the following response.

“As a member of the public and a human being, I am disgusted and angered by Superintendant Leekong’s deliberately misleading comments and completely fabricated statements. Superintendant Leekong is well aware what the CCC report contains, and so am I. Superintendent Leekong inaccurately states that the WA Police did ‘everything they could.’ LIE. The CCC report remarks that the investigating Sergeant L ‘relied largely on Mr Bellotti and Mr C. to bring witnesses to him, rather than proactively seeking them out himself.’ Is that how an investigating Sergeant or the WA police department do ‘everything they can’, asking the parent of the victim (Rex Sr), who was not present when his son Rex Jr was run down by two members of the WA Police in their 4WD, to bring witnesses to them?

Again from the CCC report (2009), ‘the Commission is of the view that it is not appropriate, nor sufficient, to wait for witnesses to seek out such assistance. It is clear that in this instance Sergeant L. did not adhere to Police policy on this issue, failing…’ Superintendent Leekong, as a member of the WA Police, surely would not lie or release false information to the media, so perhaps I should re-read the CCC report. Are phrases such as ‘insufficient checks and balances’ and the fact that the WA Police has ‘instigated changes in the way investigations are now dealt with at the District level’ endorsing the efforts of those officers involved in the Bellotti case to any degree?

Superintendant Leekong, thank you for exposing the reality of many of those involved with the WA Police, through your deceit and arrogance, you have provided an additional platform for us to speak the truth. I hope that the people of Albany now know that their Superintendent has no qualms telling outright lies and feigning offense, when he and his department are the most vile and offensive abusers of social justice and human rights. Justice for Rex Bellotti Jr will be afforded to him and his family. One of the Police memos regarding the Bellotti case, attained under FOI, states ‘hopefully we can get rid of this’ and to that the Bellotti Support Group would like to inform those WA Police officers that we are never going away.”

The Corruption and Crime Commission Report damningly finds, “Given the injuries suffered by Rex Jr, it would be hard to accept that the lack of obtaining statements is merely ‘an oversight’.”

In the previous The National Indigenous Times article about the incident that left Rex Jnr fighting for his life and with the ever present risk that his leg may be amputated I wrote that Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal folk believe that the involved police officers could be guilty of a 'hit and run'. The police reports are not clear however they do describe the involved police officers as having remained at the scene for a period of time and that in fact other police officers did arrive. Witnesses have described that Rex Jnr was hit on the opposite side of the road. Witnesses, who were at the Wake, or who were Passers-By, describe that the involved police did not remain at the scene and according to them in fact they left the scene of the accident, and that in fact at no time while they may have been there did any police officers offer to assist Rex Jnr., and that they did not assist Rex Jnr. However the police reports describe the presence of the involved police officers and of another Albany Police Officer having been called to the scene. Rex Jnr., lay encumbered by his injuries pale, hardly a murmur, bleeding profusely, and many would have been questioning whether there was a whisper of life left in Rex’s body, and yet the police officers did not assist. The police reports do describe that the involved police officers called for an ambulance. The victim was left in the care of bereft and horrified relatives and friends and shocked Passers-By. Fortunately, one of the Passers-By was an off-duty medic who in the immediacy provided assistance.

The police officer who drove the police four wheel drive that hit Rex Jnr returned to the Albany Police Station that night and sought legal advice and this may not be an unreasonable course however police usually encourage witnesses to provide testimony as soon as they can. The police officer was advised by his lawyer to say nothing till he had an opportunity to speak to him which was days later. I find this disturbing that a police officer, and with another police officer in his company as a bona fide witness, both while in the line of duty, commissioned by the State and the public and with various inherent indemnity, would believe he needed the guidance and advice of a lawyer before speaking his truth.

For myself the worst act of unbelievable racism was the Albany police officers several days later in the local newspaper, the Albany Advertiser, claiming that Rex Bellotti Jnr intentionally jumped in front of the police four wheel drive vehicle and that he tried to commit suicide. How dare they? Would they have pulled that conclusion out of the bag if he was not an Aboriginal youth? I believe to save their skins from the various limited liability and culpability they dug deep into the various stereotypes that are shoved down the throats of non-Aboriginal Australians, and that are underwritten by the high incarceration and mortality rates of young Aboriginal Australians, and by the endemic induced poverty that underwrites Aboriginal Australians who languish in such suffering and torment. They made a huge judgment call however garnered the judgment call on well known stereotypes and the statistics that are pummeled out by various agencies through their media spokespeople. They did not bank on the fact that this is a family that works very hard to beat the odds heaped upon impoverished Aboriginal peoples and that their children are private school educated.

In the heart of darkness, near midnight, with the likelihood of the police vehicle’s headlights turned off, with minimal lighting on Lower King Road, in a matter of a few critical seconds, with an inability to find the seconds to stop the vehicle, these police officers claim that they made the incredible assessment that Rex Jnr was trying to kill himself – this is impossible. I know how dark it is at that time in places such as Lower King Road, and you may be able to see form however the content and its detail is difficult to see, if at all. He did not try to commit suicide and on that point I will stand by Rex Jnr and the family as if I was there on the night, as if I was a witness to the events, as I feel the reports and the testimonies guarantee me adequately this propriety. How dare these officers insult the family, the parents that they did not know their son’s mental health, his state of mind, how dare they?

If this was an accident, as I believe, because I do not believe as some others do, that they hit him intentionally, then they should have owned up, and can still do so. For the record, I believe what happened on that night was that the police were converging on the Wake - what they would deem as a coalescing of Aboriginal folk, and I believe that they did turn off their headlights so as to remain inconspicuous. I am not sure on what side of the road they were on, however I would not be surprised if they were on the wrong side of the road. I believe they didn’t see Rex Jnr trying to cross the road, and when they did see him they may have quickly turned on the headlights, and this fits in with Rex Jnr’s testimony, and that of others, and they may have tried to swerve to miss him. Rex Jnr instinctively tried to get out of the way. The police claimed at no time were they speeding or travelling beyond 41 kilometres per hour and I am in part inclined to believe this however they must have seen him very late in the piece, allowing only for a couple of seconds prior to impact as they finished many metres down the road which indicates either the driver hit the brakes seconds before impact or that they must have been travelling a little faster, maybe at sixty, however I do not believe that Rex Jnr was hit at anything less than the forty kilometers per hour, as his injuries are horrendous and would require a substantive impact. Witnesses claim he was dragged under the police vehicle however police refute this. A proper forensic investigation of the crash scene and the vehicle could have ensured some of the truth.

There is no question the police hit him therefore the WA Police should hurry up with all his entitlements in terms of compensation, and various support, and stop the disgraceful delays that are impoverishing this family. How disgusting that the WA Police are yet to pay out in compensation and in accepting the fact they need to err on the side of remedy and entitle this family to its full suite of rights.

If the facts are as I’ve described then the police should have admitted their mistakes, and that they hit this young boy, and accepted the various culpabilities and vicarious liability, done the penance and where required accepted the consequences of being charged with unlawful and reckless driving and in having committed grievous bodily harm. If they are guilty of the above, and where they have not admitted to this there are no excuses and the rest is racism and discrimination.

There is a new witness with damning testimony. There are witnesses who defy the statements of the involved police officers, who claim Rex Jnr tried to cross the road, and who claim they themselves were almost hit as the police vehicle swerved, and there is a claim by two witnesses that is so damning I cannot yet publish it and will leave the allegations for the CCC to consider. Even in the police reports Rex Jnr after the impact lay in the middle of the road and not on the side of the road the police claim they were driving on - more to come.

Rex Bellotti Jnr was a near death in custody – there have been two and a half thousand deaths in custody since 1980, and there has never been a successful prosecution against anyone, police or prison officers in the deaths of those where many of us know an unnatural hand has played its part. There have been thousands of near deaths in custody, such as that of Rex Jnr, and from a prosecutorial outcome we have a similar predicament. The case of Rex Jnr is important, as there appears to be liability and responsibility that has not been owned, and the Bellotti Support Group, and the various social justice groups now supporting them, will try to change practices and conduct by continuing to highlight what occurred to Rex Jnr, and that he should not go the way of so many others, like John Pat, like Mulrunji Doomadjee, like Mr Ward, and the hundreds of others. Let us remind ourselves that in the case of Rex Jnr he had not been arrested, he had not done anything to disturb the peace, he had not been disorderly, he was just walking home and when it appeared to be safe to do so, he just tried to cross the street.