Death of John Pat

John Peter Pat (31 October 1966 – 28 September 1983) was an Australian Aboriginal boy who, at the age of 16 years and 11 months, was killed in a fight with officers of the Western Australia Police. The officers, attached to the Wickham and Roebourne police stations in the Pilbara region of Western Australia, claimed to be acting in self-defence and were acquitted of manslaughter charges in May 1984. A Royal Commissioner in 1991 acknowledged that "The death of John Pat became for Aboriginal people nation wide a symbol of injustice and oppression. Suspicion and a continuing sense of injustice in the Aboriginal communities throughout Australia saw the anniversary of John Pat's death marked by demonstrations calling for justice."

His mother was Mavis Pat (aged 16 years at marriage) and his father was Len Walley (about 36 at marriage), who were married under traditional Aboriginal law. The eldest of three children, he lived with his family at the Mount Florence pastoral station until the age of nine. He attended the local high school for two years and left into a life of unemployment, drunkenness, disorderly conduct and conflict with police. He received five minor convictions and was a regular inmate of the Roebourne Lockup, on drunk charges.

On 28 September 1983, Pat and other young Aborigines engaged in a fight with an Aboriginal police aide and four off-duty police officers outside the Roebourne Hotel. Pat was reportedly injured in the fight, striking his head on the road and being kicked in the head and face. He was arrested and taken to the lockup, where he died soon after of "closed head injuries" in the juvenile police cell. Subsequent medical evidence indicated that "the fatal injury is likely to have been caused by the contre coup of the back of the head hitting a flat surface..." The separate impacts of punches and kicks were later also discounted by Royal Commissioner Elliott Johnston, QC.

A coronial inquest was conducted on 30 October 1983 at which five police officers declined to give evidence. The coroner, Mr McCann, committed the five officers for trial in the Supreme Court on a charge of unlawful killing.

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Wikipedia