NT: Aboriginal boy couldn t understand why he was in jail

AAP General News (Australia)
02-11-2000
NT: Aboriginal boy couldn t understand why he was in jail

By Catharine Munro

DARWIN, Feb 11 AAP - When 15-year-old Wurramarrba broke into a council building last
November and stole textas and liquid paper, he had no idea he could be sent to jail, where
he ultimately died yesterday.

Wurramarrba understood English when he appeared in court in January, unlike many Aboriginal
people who are sent to jail under the Northern Territory's tough laws against property
crime.

However, his lawyer Selwyn Hausman said he simply couldn't grasp the concept that he
would be imprisoned for what he had done.

Wurramarrba, identified only by his surname according to his family's wishes, was jailed
under the NT's mandatory sentencing laws, which demand prison sentences of 28 days for
juveniles aged 15 and 16 on their second property offence.

"The concept that he would go to jail was beyond him," Mr Hausman said.

"He kept saying he wanted to do community service."

The Aboriginal boy from Groote Eylandt, 800 kilometres from Darwin, was found at the
Don Dale Detention Centre unconscious, with a bed sheet around his neck. He died in hospital
yesterday.

He had been sent to his room as 15 minute's punishment on Wednesday night for not washing
up after a meal and was only left alone for five minutes with the door unlocked.

Correctional services spokespeople said Wurramarrba was not suicidal, but it emerged
today that he had lost a number of family members recently.

"He has had a number of deaths in the family over which he was terribly distressed,"

Mr Hausman said.

Three years ago, his father was killed in a car accident in Darwin and only a few weeks
ago his aunt died while receiving renal dialysis.

When Mr Hausman visited him last week he was anxious to be released.

He had been sentenced to 28 days detention on January 18 at the Alyangula Youth Court
for his antics two months earlier, when he and a bunch of kids broke into the Angurugu
Council and stole textas and liquid paper worth no more than $40.

In December they climbed into the local school and stole some paint, breaking glass
louvres, damage worth $90.

Under the NT's tough laws he had to either go to jail or attend a diversionary program
because it was a second offence.

Tragically, he was due for release on Monday.

NT chief minister Denis Burke defended the laws, introduced when he was Attorney General
in 1997, saying diversionary programs had been available to Wurramarrba.

Mr Hausman said he had written to the chief minister to find out where the programs
were, as he knew there were none for remote communities in the north east of the NT.

In Darwin today, members of Wurramarrba's extended family gathered outside Darwin Magistrate's
Court with about 300 others for one minute's silence to remember the boy.

They asked that he not be referred to as an orphan because in Aboriginal culture, the
extended family has the same role as parents.

They also asked that his first name not be published.

Gayayangwa Lalara, a relative from Groote Eylandt, was in Darwin studying theology
at a local college when she heard of the death and attended the memorial.

She said she was concerned about copy-cat suicides.

"Maybe one of our young men will do the same, you know," she said at the memorial service.

"We want the laws changed because it's killing our young men."

AAP cm/ej/de

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