Three days before a Northern Territory policeman shot Aboriginal teenager Kumanjayi Walker during a failed arrest attempt, he ran at an officer with an axe.

February 9, 2022

Three days before Aboriginal teenager Kumanjayi Walker was fatally shot during a failed outback arrest, he ran at two Northern Territory policemen with an axe.

But the officers did not draw their guns like Constable Zachary Rolfe, who is on trial for murder in Darwin after he shot the troubled 19-year-old.

Instead, they let Mr Walker run from his Yuendumu home into the bush, saying they wanted to de-escalate the situation.

“I would not call him dangerous,” Senior Constable Christopher Hand told the Supreme Court on Wednesday when asked about Mr Walker.

“We get trained … if you draw your firearm you never want the muzzle to cover or point at anything you are not willing to destroy.

“Also, it escalates the issue.”

Mr Walker was not holding an axe on November 9, 2019 when Rolfe, 30, and another officer also tried to arrest him.

This time he had a pair of surgical scissors, which he stabbed Rolfe with in the seconds before the officer pulled his pistol and shot the teenager three times.

Rolfe has pleaded not guilty to murdering Mr Walker. He says he was defending himself and his partner against a dangerous criminal while they performed their police duties.

Constable Hand did not view Mr Walker in the same way, saying after the incident that the teen did not want “to chop us up” and “just wanted to escape”.

“He had plenty of opportunity to assault us and he did not, and ran out of the house,” he said.

“He was not injured, we were not injured and no one in the house was injured.

“There were a lot of young kids in there and we knew where Kumanjayi lived and allowing him to run out of the house, we could formulate a plan later on to effect an arrest.”

His partner on the day, Senior Constable Lanyon Smith, agreed saying Mr Walker’s threats with the axe were to impress his family.

“I did not feel he as if he was going to hurt me. It was more intimidation to get out of room,” he said.

“Kumanjayi being Warlpiri man, it was more of a show for his partner in the room and his family.”

Constable Smith said Warlpiri people often used physically threatening actions to impress their community and show they are strong.

Rolfe’s first shot – which hit Mr Walker in the back while he was standing and struggling against another officer attempting to handcuff him – is not the subject of the murder charge.

It relates to Rolfe’s second and third shots, which the prosecution says were not legally justified.

They were fired when Mr Walker was laying on the ground with Rolfe’s partner on top of him “effectively restraining” the teen.

He died about two hours later inside the Yuendumu police station as the officers attempted first aid.

Constable Hand agreed with Rolfe’s lawyer David Edwardson QC that the axe incident was a violent and serious escalation of Mr Walker’s behaviour.

However, the officer disagreed that he had been trained to pull his gun in all circumstances when confronted by an offender armed with an edged weapon, as Mr Edwardson had asserted on Tuesday.

Constable Hand also said policing in the outback needed to be approached with care.

“It is a different way of policing in Indigenous communities. We always like to be as non-violent as we can with arrests because we have to live in those communities and we try to build partnerships with the people,” he said.

“Obviously, if force needs to be used, we will use it.”

The trial continues.