Police Training and Use of Firearms against mentally ill

	Extract from Hansard Legislative Council 20 October 1999

Ian Gilfillan Australian Democrats Member of the Legislative Council		Parliament Index 1999 Spring Session Index Browse by Subject About the SA Parliament Hansard on line

The Hon. IAN GILFILLAN: I want to discuss briefly a matter which profoundly concerns me, and that is the killing by police officers in the past few months of two young men in South Australia and some of the relevant circumstances surrounding those incidents. I refer, first, to Luke Donaghey, who was killed just recently. It is relevant from the wide reportage to quote from an article that appeared in the Advertiser of 2 October, as follows:

Luke's doctor at the Adelaide Clinic, who did not want to be named, describes Luke's illness as `not terribly severe'. `But he was a bloke who would react if he felt threatened,' he says. The doctor says people like Luke should be given space and reassured about their safety and security. `Luke was a nice bloke, he was intelligent and held his views pretty strongly,'

The second victim, Grant MacLeod, was shot and killed by a police bullet in the Marion Hotel car park this month after behaving strangely and brandishing a knife. A newspaper article describes how much he was loved by his family and states that there appeared to be no reason why he was behaving in that manner other than a temporary mental derangement. While dwelling on that, I think it is essential that we sheet home the fact that the AMA is very concerned that the resources are inadequate for dealing with mentally deranged people. A recent Messenger press article states:

. . . some AMA members have had difficulty admitting patients chronically ill with mental health problems to acute care.

The stark and dramatic fact is that, in this case, two young men suffered a death penalty for committing nothing more than a minor public disturbance as a result of some mild mental disturbance. I do not believe that, as a society, we can tolerate that.

I was opposed to the carrying of exposed hand guns by police officers when it was introduced. Police now are seen carrying the massive Smith and Wesson .357 revolver, which emphasises the firearm aspect of our policing. I was most impressed to hear Fred Broughton, the President of the UK Federation of Police Officers, saying clearly on Philip Satchell's program this morning that police in the UK are not armed, they do not intend to be armed and they do not want to be armed, and they believe that their policing is much better.

Not only have we inflicted capital punishment on two innocent men in the past 12 months but, as a result, the police officers involved have been exposed to trauma. Peter Alexander, the President of the South Australia Police Association, told me that 90 per cent of police officers involved in these incidents do not return to active service. We are paying an enormous penalty, not only in terms of the tragedy of the loss of human life but in the human tragedy of police officers suffering trauma. Police officers are not properly prepared. I said earlier in this chamber that lieutenant colonel, now Professor, David Grossman in a book called Killology pointed out that the human needs artificial conditioning to be prepared to kill, to point a firearm and deliberately wound one of his or her own kith and kin.

These police officers are being dramatically and abruptly exposed to situations which, it is scientifically realised, will cause them enormous trauma and they have virtually no preparation for it. There are other means. We have capsicum spray. There are other ways in which people in these circumstances should be treated. After the first death my colleague the Hon. Sandra Kanck asked (29 July) why the Assessment and Crisis Intervention Service was not involved. That organisation has been shown to be very effective in talking down these dangerous incidents as they occur.

I feel that, similar to previous times when we have needed a trigger to prompt revision in the way we do things in our community, the time has come to revise the arming of our police officers with these massive hand guns and with the expectation that, under certain circumstances, they will be used. If we do not do that we will continue to see a death penalty imposed on non-offenders-people who have not offended-and we will have serving police officers who are no longer fit and able to do their job.