Yanner's bitter dilemma
11.12.2004
SINCE the death in police custody of his blood brother Cameron Doomadgee, Aboriginal firebrand Murrandoo Yanner has outraged white Australia with Malcolm X-style calls for ``racist cops'' to be bashed and police stations to be burned.
Doomadgee, 36, died on Queensland's Palm Island on November 19, an hour after what police have described as a ``scuffle'' with his arresting officer, Senior Sergeant Chris Hurley.
But therein lies the heart of a huge political and personal conundrum for Yanner, one he is struggling to deal with and one he fears will confuse the many Aboriginal people who look up to him.
The problem is that not too long ago the tall, powerfully built Hurley was a close mate, a regular visitor to the Yanner home and a man adored by Yanner's kids.
And, despite what Palm Islanders may think, Yanner insists Hurley is ``no racist''.
In fact, Yanner says Hurley is the only copper he's ever respected. He says Hurley is the only copper ever to walk through his door without carrying a warrant or a gun.
The Yanner-Hurley relationship -- established when Hurley was stationed for two years in Yanner's remote Gulf country home of Burketown and revealed here for the first time -- provides a compelling and strangely beautiful subtext to the hotbed of racial tension inflamed by Doomadgee's tragic death.
``I have a real pain in my heart,'' Yanner told The Weekend Australian this week. ``I am a proud Aboriginal man and I will never deviate from standing beside my people, no matter what the circumstances. But Hurley was the most decent copper I have ever known and he was definitely no racist.
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``And this is affecting my kids. They loved this guy when he was the Burketown copper.
``So I don't know how to handle this ... I am still trying to come to grips with it. I really liked him. He was the most decent and the most likeable bloke.''
Yanner says he wants to see Hurley face-to-face and ask him what went wrong that November 19 morning when a drunk and singing Doomadgee was picked up on a Palm Island backstreet and charged with creating a public nuisance.
The police version is that Doomadgee punched Hurley as he was being led from a police paddy-wagon to the cells. They then scuffled, with Doomadgee falling on a small concrete step.
In the police account, that fall allegedly broke four of Doomadgee's ribs, ruptured his liver and spleen and led to his painful death in the cells an hour later.
But two Aboriginal men in adjoining cells have given statements saying they saw and heard Hurley on top of Doomadgee, repeatedly punching him and yelling: ``Have you had enough now, Mr Doomadgee''.
Says Yanner: ``I would like to meet him (Hurley), look him in the eye and ask him what really happened with my brother.
``Hurley would not be able to lie to me. We know each other too well and have too much respect for each other for him to be able to look me in the eye and not tell me the truth.''
Yanner and Hurley -- who is in hiding and under police orders not to speak about Doomadgee's death while the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission investigation is continuing -- haven't seen each other since the policeman left Burketown two years ago.
Yanner says their relationship began at the work level but grew into a mateship that was sometimes frowned upon by people who didn't understand.
He says when Hurley arrived as the officer in charge at Burketown there was a lot of trouble with minor crime in the district, some of it involving Aborigines.
So Yanner had an ``arrangement'' whereby he would find out where the stolen goods were and have them returned on the basis that Hurley not ask for names.
``Everybody was happy and there were no problems'' Yanner said. ``When problems brewed with my mob he would come and see me. He was my friend and I thought a lot of him.
``We got drunk together dozens of times and he used to come to my place and eat meals with my family.
``He was the only copper who ever got into my house without a gun or a search warrant in his hand. I trusted him. He used to give his own time to take Murri kids from Burketown on camps to places like Lawn Hill Gorge. Once he took my oldest boy. I wouldn't usually let any copper touch my dog, but I trusted this bloke with my son.
``The CMC should look at their records -- the publican at Burketown once complained to them that Hurley was too close to the Yanner family.''
Yanner has vivid memories of a conversation with Hurley in which the policeman told of the day he recognised and decided to confront his own inherent racism.
At the time Hurley was stationed in the Torres Strait and was out searching at night for a fisherman who was lost.
``Hurley said he was swearing and cursing about the black so-and-so but after a while he looked at the stars and listened to himself and said, `I am a racist'.
``That was the turning point for him. It changed him. They eventually found the Islander lad who was lost and later Hurley's sister came to that same island where the bloke came from and they treated her like a princess.''
But Yanner also confesses to what many would see as a dark side of his relationship with Hurley, one born of their mutual propensity to be physical when threatened.
Yanner describes Hurley as like himself, ``a thug and a mug'', who responds with his fists when confronted or challenged.
``Had he not been a policeman, him and me would have been identical in many ways,'' Yanner says. ``Like him, I will take on the black or white who talks shit to me.''
Yanner says Hurley ``never hid behind a uniform or a badge'', preferring to face up to aggressors even if it meant a brawl.
``He was a thug and a mug. I am the same,'' Yanner said.
``He liked to give blokes a touch-up if they got out of line. Twice he got into fights with my brother Vernon and he got towelled up, but he copped it.
``He only had one fault -- he couldn't keep his hands to himself. But he was no racist.
``I teach culture at the Burketown school. He used to go to the school and was every bit as popular with the kids as I am.
``I want to meet up with him and ask him what happened. I think what happened is he went too far in giving Cameron a hiding.''
Yanner says he will continue urging Aboriginal people not to only stand up to violence against them but to hit back.
``Racism is a horrible thing and we get it all the time,'' he says.
``Just look at the cops here opposing bail to the Murris from the Palm riot, yet they didn't oppose bail to that (St George publican) rooster Clarke when he was charged with murdering a little Murri lad.
``There's one rule for us and one for whites -- and that's a racist legal system where the cops get their way.''
