The Australian Greens have today called for a federal investigation into missing First Nations men and children in Western Australia, after years of inertia by police and government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a letter to the Australian Federal Police Commissioner and the Minister for Indigenous Australians, Greens Senators Dorinda Cox and David Shoebridge said the WA Police Force had had enough time to act, and that it was time for a larger, federal investigation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In recent years seven First Nations WA men \u2013 Zane Stevens, Jeremiah “Jayo” Rivers, Wylie Oscar, Clinton Lockyer, Wesley Lockyer, Brenton Shar, Jimmy Taylor \u2013 have gone missing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Greens say their families have been in a holding pattern ever since, and deserve better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While the WA Police Force seems to continue operating as though its business as usual, the government has yet to formally respond to the Missing and Murdered First Nations Women and Childrens report which was tabled over a month ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A rally will be held in Perth today for missing First Nations people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Australian Greens First Nations spokesperson, Senator Dorinda Cox:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe police and the government are failing the families of these missing men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThese are humans, people whose families are sitting in a holding pattern waiting for any news.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cInstead the police seem to be operating as though its business as usual, and the government won\u2019t even respond to the Missing and Murdered First Nations Women and Childrens report which was tabled over a month ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFamilies shouldn\u2019t need to go to public meetings, rally, or fund private investigations to get answers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe haven\u2019t even seen rewards being offered for information relating to these cases, yet we have for property offences in Western Australia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFirst Nations people are going missing and have been disappeared by systems at an alarming rate \u2013 we are demanding truth-telling and action.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Australian Greens justice spokesperson, Senator David Shoebridge:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n “Families of missing people shouldn’t have to fight the justice system to get answers about what happened to their loved ones but they do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We know that police responses to First Nations families can retraumatise those seeking help and that substandard investigations by police mean missed opportunities to locate missing First Nations men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The racist justice system has failed these men and their communities for too long and a comprehensive investigation is urgently needed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Australian Greens have today called for a federal investigation into missing First Nations men and children in Western Australia, after years of inertia by police and government. In a letter to the Australian Federal Police Commissioner and the Minister for Indigenous Australians, Greens Senators Dorinda Cox and David Shoebridge said the WA Police Force … Continue reading “Greens call for federal probe into missing First Nations men and children in WA”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29132"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29133,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29132\/revisions\/29133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}