Riots erupt in Sidney over Aboriginal boy's death

[fantassin]

Riots erupt over Aboriginal boy's death

FINANCIAL TIMES

By Virginia Marsh in Sydney
Published: February 16 2004 2:37 | Last Updated: February 16 2004 2:37


Racial violence erupted in Sydney on Sunday night after Aboriginals angered by the death of a 17-year-old Aboriginal boy clashed with police in the city's worst riot in years.


More than 50 officers were injured in a nine-hour riot after members of the Aboriginal community in Redfern, an inner city suburb of Sydney, rose up in anger against alleged police brutality. The Aboriginals set fire to a local railway station and threw rocks, bricks and bottles at police who used water hoses to bring the crowd under control. Eight officers were hospitalised.

The violence was triggered by the death of Thomas Hickey who impaled his neck on a fence after falling off his bicycle. Mr Hickey's mother said she had eyewitnesses who said the accident occurred while he was being chased by police. However on Monday morning, police denied reports the boy died while being pursued by officers.

With an election due later this year, the incident is set to reignite the debate over Australia's reconciliation with its Aboriginal population. Australia, unlike other former colonial societies such as Canada and New Zealand, has yet to apologise to its indigenous population for past injustices.


The conservative government of John Howard - who is personally opposed to a formal apology - has in recent years successfully buried the issue, one of the few key differences between his centre-right government and the opposition Labor party.

Even though the issue has been unfashionable domestically, Mark Latham, Labor’s new leader, highlighted his determination to achieve reconciliation in his keynote speech to the party conference last month.

Although historically avoided by many because of its reputation for crime, Redfern, like London’s Brixton, has become popular in recent years with young professionals because of its proximity to the city centre and local house prices have risen sharply.

Aboriginals, the sole human inhabitants of the Australian continent until just over 200 years ago, now make up only 2 per cent of the population. They are by far the country’s most disadvantaged ethnic group with male life expectancy, for example, 20 years below that of other Australians.

[fantassin]

Forty hurt in inner-Sydney riot
By Scott Jenkins, Paul Colgan and wires
February 15, 2004

A DAY of racial tension spilled over into an evening of violence on the streets of Redfern in inner Sydney last night.


Officers tend to an injured colleague as violence erupts in Redfern overnight.


Eight police officers remain in hospital after a total of 40 - revised down from 50 - were injured trying to subdue a riot near Redfern railway station into the early hours of this morning.

The bridge at the station resembled a military zone as at least 60 officers defended one side of Lawson St, facing about 50 angry local residents.

Armed with bricks, rocks, broken bottles and molotov cocktails, the group threw missiles at police, passing trains, vehicles and businesses.


Four people were in custody this morning, but police said they had identified several others involved in the violence and expected to make more arrests in coming days.

Assistant Commissioner Bob Waites said the violence was sparked by the belief that police had pursued 17-year-old local Thomas Hickey to his death.

"One officer was knocked out by a brick that was thrown through the air and a number of others have got broken limbs, legs," he said.


He also said the rioters appeared to have an endless supply of ammunition.

"They had a number of wheelie bins lined up with paving stones in them - in fact there were eight of those. There were a number of large tubs with beer bottles in them," he said.

The railway station reopened this morning after being shut down last night.

The confrontation escalated at 2am when the angry mob began hurling fireworks and firebombs and spearing burning garbage bins into police lines.

Fire brigade officers attempting to extinguish the fires were pelted with bottles and bricks.

Tragic death

Thomas was impaled on a metal fence on Saturday afternoon in what police said was a tragic but freak accident. But his mother said witnesses saw the teenager being chased by police just before he came off his bicycle and was impaled on the rods of the fence in inner-city Waterloo.

He died in Sydney Children's Hospital early yesterday of chest, neck and internal injuries.

Police held a press conference yesterday to deny officers were pursuing Thomas at the time of the accident but posters began to appear around the suburb, calling them "murderers".

His mother Gail Hickey speaking early today said she planned to go to a lawyer today with a witness claiming to have seen police chasing her son.

The stand-off began shortly after 9pm and for several hours police tried to negotiate with the group, who were shouting "child killers" and "murderers".

Redfern railway station had to be closed to the public after projectiles were thrown at trains. The station was being guarded by riot squad officers last night.

Police officers sent out a "signal one" priority call at 9.04pm after being pelted with bottles, rocks and bricks in Lawson St.

At 9.10pm, police asked RailCorp to prevent trains from stopping at the station because of fears for passenger safety.

At 9.46pm, an ambulance was called to treat five police officers injured by flying projectiles. Two officers were taken to hospital.

At 10pm, fire brigade officers began setting up behind protective police lines while coming under fire from projectiles. At 10.08pm, rioters torched a car.

Late last night, the fire brigade focused a high-beam light into Lawson St to confuse the rioters and hamper their vision.

Extra police were called to control a crowd of observers, some of whom had become unruly.

All duty officers within the metropolitan area were called to the scene to help local officers.

At 12.30pm, riot police charged the group after a barrage of bottles and bricks were thrown.

At 2am when rioters threw fireworks and firebombs into police lines

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[steel bonnet]

Well if it`s true the POLICE were chasing him,why are they blamed for a criminal no being very good on a Bike & Impaling himself.

The Mother even says she has witnesses who saw him fall fleeing the Police. Therefore NOT THE POLICE fault. Just a criminal getting what`s deserved. After all Prisions are a Great Failure the world over (for Civilized countries at least).

Not a nice way to go,though TOUGH!! Coppers wouldn`t have chased him if he`d Done NOTHING wrong.
Ja
Steel Bonnet

[scoone]

Aboriginal Leader Warns of More Violence
Tue February 17, 2004 02:01 AM ET
By Belinda Goldsmith
CANBERRA (*******) - Simmering tension in Australia's black communities could spark more of the violence witnessed this week when Aborigines clashed with police in Sydney, the country's biggest city, a key black leader warned Tuesday.

Aden Ridgeway, the sole Aboriginal member of the national parliament, said anger over the lack of progress in narrowing the social divide between black and white Australians over the past decade was growing, creating potential hotbeds of violence.

This flared up Sunday night when about 100 Aborigines, angry over the death of 17-year-old Aboriginal Thomas Hickey, pelted 200 riot police with Molotov cocktails, stones and bottles, in the worst civil unrest in Sydney in over a decade.

Hickey was impaled on a metal fence after falling from his bicycle Saturday. He died in hospital Sunday with his family blaming the police for harassing the teen-ager.

"There's been simmering tension building up in communities...and Thomas Hickey's death became the trigger point for this stress and anxiety to be expressed in such an extreme way," Ridgeway told ******* in an interview.

"This isn't being harnessed by any particular political movement but instead you have young people feeling a sense of hopelessness and despair about life's opportunities."

Australia's 400,000 Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, who make up two percent of the continent's 20 million population, remain the nation's most disadvantaged group despite government funding of more than A$1 billion ($787 million) a year.

Many Aborigines live below the poverty line, dying 20 years younger than other Australians and with far higher rates of imprisonment, unemployment, welfare dependency and alcoholism.

"STOLEN GENERATION"

In addition, victims of the so-called "Stolen Generation" still suffer mental scars from the seizure of up to 100,000 Aboriginal children, including Ridgeway's father. They were taken from their parents between 1910 and 1970 to be assimilated into white culture.

Ridgeway said anger was growing over the lack of commitment to address social problems and a refusal by the government to apologize for past injustices inflicted on the nation's original inhabitants in the 216 years since British colonization.
Instead the conservative government has adopted a pragmatic approach to racial reconciliation, using the army to build housing for outback Aboriginal communities.
Ridgeway said this feeling of alienation had been exacerbated by a dramatic shift in the profile of the indigenous population, with about 70 percent of Australia's blacks now aged under 25.

Young Aborigines led the nine-hour riot in the inner Sydney suburb of Redfern Sunday night and into Monday morning.

"They feel the government hasn't done enough to alleviate the poverty they find themselves in," said Ridgeway, a member of the Gumbayyngirr people who was elected to parliament's upper house Senate five years ago.

He said it was critical the authorities handled the aftermath of the Sydney riot correctly, and called for an independent, far-reaching inquiry to look at the social needs of Aborigines and not just the circumstances of Hickey's death.

Ridgeway urged the government to adopt a longer-term approach to the indigenous problems.

"If the inquest comes up with a report that doesn't satisfy demands about getting answers, it is more than likely you will end up with another outbreak of violence."
http://www.*******.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=4370142&pageNumber=1

[marktigger]

interesting the Sydney police comissioner said in interview that the boy was not being chased and that he bolted when a police patrol went past and that the police patrol went on.

[ShotOver]

Yeah, the kid was riding on his bike, a copper car drove past him, he bolted and tried to jump a fence, with no luck. Died the next day.

Then, the Aboriginal's and other people from the lowerclass are of Redfurn, its full of unemployed, bikies.. etc, went mental.

Cops didnt kill the boy, its a stupid situation.

:roll:

I guess you yank's don't know much about the Aboriginal population then, aye.. haha, lucky you.

The so called "Stolen Generation" should be named the "We tried to help them, but they gave up a fight, so we thought bugger them"

We took their babies, because they were being brought up badly, and their parents wernt going to let them have a chance, so we thought we would help them along, and teach them the way of "the white man" so they could have a life, in the new Australia. But, they didnt want it, so we gave up on them. And now they are, the lowest of the low around the areas and cities. Passed out in parks, sniffing glue and paint from coke bottles, stealing, robbing, charming bunch they are.

[Tommy Gunn]

Well if it`s true the POLICE were chasing him,why are they blamed for a criminal no being very good on a Bike & Impaling himself.

The Mother even says she has witnesses who saw him fall fleeing the Police. Therefore NOT THE POLICE fault. Just a criminal getting what`s deserved. After all Prisions are a Great Failure the world over (for Civilized countries at least).

Not a nice way to go,though TOUGH!! Coppers wouldn`t have chased him if he`d Done NOTHING wrong.
Ja
Steel Bonnet

Agreed

[Tengu]

we aren't strangers to this kind of thing, fantassin. We know if tomorrow someone (doesn't matter if it's a mental patient, a cop or a shopkeep) shoots a turkisch or North-African (as they like to call it), we would have riots. And the assholes will have their own version or excuse to destroy property.

[mocking_loudly_died]

I am personally sick of these drug-fueled communities thinking they have the right to disobey the law due to events that happened a few generations ago.
Having been a mugging victim by these lovely gentlemen of Redfern I feel nothing for their self induced plight.

At some stage in your life you sink or swim – they burn their own communities, furthering their own squalor then have the audacity to blame the evil “white man”.

Now being the fairly liberal minded person that you know me to be - you know things are bad when I like empathy.

[marktigger]

the Former head of Sydney police was interviewes last night on UK C4 and his theory is the riot had more to do with the Hot weather and large amounts of alcohol.

[Ballistic]

Reconciliation ? My ass, Im not saying sorry for something that happened decades and decades ago which was meant to better their living standards. It's not my fault they can't or are perhaps UNWILLING to get over it. Aboriginals are perhaps the most laziest breed of people I've ever meet, from personal experience (I live in a city with a fairly large black community, but they are still in the minority by a long way, thank God), they seek trouble, like causing trouble, and then get out of it because of their skin colour. Police are afraid to arrest them or handle them due to just this sort of thing. They get away with murder (figuratively speaking). Ofcourse not all are like that, the traditional Aboriginies (pure bloods) who still live on the land, are good people, hard workers and arent afraid to dish out abuse on their own kind...tribal law of sorts.

I dont hate them because of their skin colour, I dislike them because of their attitudes, which are for lack of a better explanation, racist toward white people. We give them millions a year in funds, and they still have the audacity to think we arent doing anything for them. Perhaps if the Government just said "stuff them, they can work their lives out for themselves", cut their welfare paychecks and make them actually WORK FOR THEIR OWN WELLBEING and stop living off of hardworking taxpayers, they might get a little bit of respect and figure out how to live in the 21st century.


At some stage in your life you sink or swim – they burn their own communities, furthering their own squalor then have the audacity to blame the evil “white man”.

So true. I heard some Army Engineers went out and built a village or something for them, weeks later the places were gutted and destroyed and they were living like they had been previously, in a shanty town, they dont have a clue as to how to live decently, do they need to be schooled how to live in a house ?!?

Hmmm, anyway, bad way to go, but if he wasnt guilty of anything, why did he run ?

[ShotOver]

:hug:

Awesome points mate. I agree fully. They have shocking attitudes.
They have infected the town i go to school in "Fremantle" i was aproached by 4 of them, wanting my school bag. Lucky they wernt my size or height, so i bashed two of them, and the other two ran.

Told the cops, but they won't do anything. Prision is just a warm bed, hot chow and good company to Aboriginals. They don't care.

[ShotOver]

Oh, and it's "Sydney" :roll: