In 2024, twelve Aboriginal people have died in custody across New South Wales, Lindsay McCabe writes, this underscores a troubling rise in deaths and the ongoing failure to prevent them, despite decades of calls for change.

Nathan Booth was reported missing in July 2019, and after months of inaction from the police, his body was found in December that year, in the Murrumbidgee. After five years of waiting, the inquest into Nathan’s death is continuing this week. Yesterday Nathan’s family made a statement, which we have published with their permission.

In NSW the Coroner is crucial in determining cause of death whenever there is a sudden, unexpected or unnatural death in the community, including when the police are involved. A recent inquiry into this system has revealed an unwillingness on behalf of government to implement changes that could save countless Aboriginal families needless grief and suffering, Lindsay McCabe explains.

This is not a numbers game. These are people, Aboriginal people, whose lives have been snuffed out in the ongoing machinery of colonisation and the carceral State.

On the 22nd September Victorian State Coroner Judge John Cain released a practice note outlining changes in the conduct of coronial investigations into Aboriginal deaths in custody in Victoria.

Research indicates that as Aboriginal peoples, we are overrepresented in almost every category of reportable death, including violent or suspicious deaths, deaths in State custody, and deaths as a result of police operations.