WE ARE HORRIFIED BY THE EVENTS UNFOLDING IN THE UNITED STATES, BUT IS AUSTRALIA ANY BETTER?

We are the family of David Dungay Jr, a proud Dunghutti warrior who tragically died in custody on 29 December 2015. David was 26 years old. He was a diabetic. He needed health care. He was a sportsman and a poet and an uncle. He was meant to be coming home soon.

On the day he was overpowered by prison guards, he was alone in his cell, eating rice crackers he had purchased at the prison shop. Some of the nurses were concerned about David’s high blood sugar.

Instead of allowing the clinical care he needed unhindered, prison guards took control of David’s situation. They created a security crisis that the Coroner found was totally unnecessary. One guard called the Immediate Action Team (IAT). The IAT is like SWAT for prisoners. Over a packet of biscuits.

The images of what happened next to David have been viewed all over the world: our young man was held down by prison guards while being sedated. David cried “I can’t breathe” over a dozen times in the space of his last nine minutes. The guards ignored his cries for help. Sound familiar?

THE U.S. IS IN FLAMES BECAUSE OF WHAT HAPPENED TO GEORGE FLOYD.

WE WATCH IN HORROR, YET THE EXACT SAME THING HAPPENED TO DAVID DUNGAY.

WHERE IS AUSTRALIA’S OUTRAGE?

No one has been held accountable for David Jr’s death and he is not the only one.

There have been 432 Black deaths in custody since the 1991 Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. This number will continue to rise as the perpetrators evade accountability.

We need to act now and hold them to account.

We call on the NSW Attorney General to refer the matter to the NSW Director of Public Prosecutions and SafeWork NSW to investigate criminal charges under the laws of New South Wales.  

We call for accountability from police, prisons, medical officers and governments for ALL Black deaths in custody in Australia.

We call for the implementation of all 339 recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.

Many of us look abroad in horror but racism is alive and well in our own backyard.

Institutions of power - the police, the courts, the media and the government - discriminate against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People at every opportunity.

We call on Australia to help us dismantle this institutional racism.

We call on Australians to act.

“They don’t care, well that’s how it seems
And they take away our hopes and dreams
And until the day we’re out and free
This is how our life’s to be”
-David Dungay Jnr-

 

‘This petition is administered by the National Justice Project on behalf of the Dungay family, authorised by Leetona Dungay.’