Northern Territory policeman Zachary Rolfe intended to kill or cause Aboriginal teen Kumanjayi Walker serious harm when he shot him, a jury has been told.

March 9, 2022

Northern Territory policeman Zachary Rolfe intended to kill or seriously harm Aboriginal teenager Kumanjayi Walker when he shot him three times during a failed arrest, a murder trial has been told.

Constable Rolfe, 30, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Mr Walker as the 19-year-old resisted arrest in Yuendumu, 290km northwest of Alice Springs on November 9, 2019.

But prosecutor Philip Strickland SC told the Supreme Court in Darwin the policeman’s “sole mission” was to track down the teen.

He said he had become “preoccupied” with him after viewing a video of Mr Walker violently threatening other officers with an axe three days earlier.

He reminded the jury Rolfe had given evidence that he knew shooting Mr Walker in the body from point-blank range was “likely to cause death or serious harm”.

“You can conclude that that was his intention. To kill or cause serious harm,” Mr Strickland said in his closing address.

“He knew that what he calls the centre of seen mass included his lungs and his heart.”

Mr Strickland also reminded the jury of the evidence during the four-week trial, including that he believed Rolfe had lied under oath about seeing Mr Walker stab his partner Sergeant Adam Eberl, then a constable, and that he feared for his life when he fired shots two and three.

“The Crown case is that the evidence that the accused gave in court, that he did have those beliefs, was a lie, and the accused lied to justify the unjustifiable – namely the fatal shooting of Kumanjayi Walker,” he said.

“The accused did not believe that Eberl was at risk of death or serious injury.”

The jury has heard that Rolfe pulled the trigger after the teen had lied about his identity and stabbed the constable in the shoulder with a pair of scissors.

The Crown concedes the first shot, fired while Mr Walker was standing and wrestling with Sgt Eberl, was justified.

But it says the second and third shots into the teen’s torso, which are the subject of the murder charge, as he struggled against Sgt Eberl on the ground went “too far”.

The closing address continues on Wednesday.