An inquest for an Indigenous teen shot dead by an NT policeman has heard the officer’s supervisor apologised to Aboriginal friends over his racist language.

October 26, 2022

A non-Indigenous Northern Territory police officer apologised to his Aboriginal friends after his “shameful” racist conversation was made public during an inquest into an Indigenous teenager’s shooting death.

Kumanjayi Walker, 19, died after Constable Zachary Rolfe shot him three times during a botched arrest in Yuendumu, northwest of Alice Springs on November 9, 2019.

The Alice Springs inquest into his death on Tuesday was told Sergeant Paul Kirby and Const Rolfe, who is his subordinate and friend, exchanged texts messages containing racist remarks about five months before the shooting.

In them, Sgt Kirby writes: “Hope you’ve got your body-worn on. Ha ha … On the whole time … Who was the silly bitch?”

Const Rolfe replies: “F*** no. Some white bitch who thinks she’s Aboriginal”.

Sgt Kirby then said on June 22: “Lying in the dirt, pissed, doing a f***ing good impression.”

Counsel assisting Peggy Dwyer asked Sgt Kirby if he thought the texts were racist.

“I’m going to say yes. I’m not even going to try and defend it, sorry,” he replied.

“When it came out (in public) I wondered whose it was and then it was mine,” he said in reference to the text messages being read into evidence at the inquest before he was called as a witness.

Sgt Kirby said it prompted him to admit to his Aboriginal friends that it was his text messages in the media and apologise to them.

Asked if he felt a sense of shame over the texts, Sgt Kirby said: “Yes”.

But he declined to accept that racist language is dehumanising.

“To be honest I don’t really know what that means,” he said to Dr Dwyer when she posed the question.

However, Sgt Kirby did agree that using racist language could lead to Aboriginal people being mistreated.

The inquest continues on Wednesday.