How the ICAC’s investigation into senior NT Police officers’ misconduct was rigged from the start

The investigation, called Operation Beaufort, was ordered back in March, following revelations by Zach Rolfe at the coronial inquest into the death of Kumanjayi Walker that the NT Police’s elite Territory Response Group had engaged in overtly racist conduct on a regular basis, including annual racist award certificates being handed out by TRG members at their annual dinner, known as the ‘Noogadah awards’ – also called the “coon of the year” awards – with the winner given a “caveman club” with nails in it that was later revealed to be a makeshift weapon seized during riots in Wadeye.

That sparked the five senior officers to write statutory declarations to the court claiming the ‘Noogudah’ award had no racist connotation.

But the next day at the inquest, certificates were tendered that backed up Rolfe’s assertions, including a certificate from 2013 with a backdrop of an Aboriginal flag. This was followed by others, including one award for the “most coon-like BBQ ever”, images of people in blackface, and one Noogadah award given to a drunk officer for displaying the “utmost level of Aboriginality while being an elite member of the TR[G]”.

We were all assured at the time that the matter was being taken seriously and would be investigated “thoroughly”. But there is now evidence that Police Commissioner Michael Murphy lied twice the day he announced the investigation, first when he claimed he had no knowledge of the awards at all and then that they would be investigated thoroughly.

It was all a bit dubious to begin with, given the NT Police were investigating their own with the help of the ICAC – an organisation that has done less than nothing since Riches took over in 2021.

But we had to suspend our disbelief and give them time to investigate these very serious allegations that go to the heart of the NT Police’s integrity and trust in the community. We expect in return that an investigation into misconduct is clean and independent. We kept our end of the bargain, the powers that be did not.

Those racist awards we all saw were shocking on their own, but to think five officers now in senior roles in the police force lied to the courts in a failed effort to save their own skin and avoid personal accountability for their actions is extremely serious. In fact, it’s criminal.

What we learned this week from the investigation report was just how rigged this supposed investigation was from the start.

It’s hard to even say who is more to blame, Riches or Murphy, but neither one should ever subject us to the spectacle of having to watch them espouse the virtues of integrity ever again.

The investigation had two main elements: whether TRG members issued the racist awards over the last 12 years and whether the five officers who filed stat decs claiming they weren’t racist lied to the court, “constituting potential criminal conduct and/or improper conduct”.

The report shows Riches wrote to Murphy the day after the investigation was launched – before any evidence had been collected – to tell the Police Commissioner he “did not see any utility in pursuing an investigation with a view to making adverse findings…”.

So, the man leading the investigation into the creation of the racist awards and establishing if the TRG officers committed a crime by misleading the court, started the investigation by specifically stating nobody was going to be held accountable for their individual actions.

Riches said attempting to hold someone accountable would cause “adversarial positions” and delay his efforts “in addressing the important issues”. As we have said before, the main function of his job as the anti-corruption commissioner is to investigate corruption, as adversarially as necessary.

He pulled the same bullshit with the Territory Labor travel rorts investigation and appears to have got away with it because he does not have to explain his decisions to anyone, even when he decides not to do his job and lets corruption go unchecked.

But Riches’ personal comments to the Police Commissioner explain a lot, including why Murphy never suspended James Grey Spence, Meacham King, Craig Garland, Shaun Gil or Mark Clemmons, some of whom are now in high-ranking, senior roles within the NT Police.

Why suspend them if you already know there will be no adverse findings against them?

Nobody has explained why Riches was tasked with investigating the criminal element of the alleged perjury when everybody knows the ICAC’s investigations cannot lead to a criminal prosecution. It is still unclear what role the police’s Professional Standards Command had in the investigation, other than banal claims they investigated “thoroughly”.

Riches collected evidence that he made ‘inadmissible’, threw down the memory hole

After quietly establishing that he intended not to find anybody accountable, Riches then went about collecting evidence – hard evidence from other current and former police officers, personal computers and jump drives that showed these cops lied to the Coroner under oath – but collected it in a way that made it inadmissible in court by offering “protections” to everybody who gave evidence to him about the matter. There were others he simply chose not to speak with.

This is astounding, even for the NT, and possibly borders on corruption itself. Riches was given evidence of criminal conduct and was the person who ensured it could never be used in court.

But Riches’ little game started to unravel when he got into trouble himself.

Riches took sudden leave in June after domestic violence allegations made by his wife surfaced in the media, with that leave turning into an indefinite suspension later in the month, when an internal investigation into the domestic violence allegations unearthed a number of other serious allegations of inappropriate behaviour towards female staffers.

Operation Beaufort then had to be completed by interstate retired judge Patricia Kelly. Why she was involved instead of acting ICAC Naomi Loudon is unclear, but it’s probably safe to assume Loudon had some conflict of interest that prevented her again from carrying out her duties as the acting ICAC.

What the Kelly report showed this week is how badly Riches rigged this investigation from the beginning, which we may never have been privy to if Riches hadn’t been suspended indefinitely.

At some point after taking over the investigation, most likely in August, Kelly appears to have done the right thing and written to the Solicitor General’s Office seeking advice on whether the declarations and other evidence that Riches collected that contradicted the officers’ sworn statements could be included in a brief of evidence to the DPP for criminal charges.

She states that she was provided advice that led her to determine that “it would be inappropriate to disclose any of those declarations”, which it turns out is “a consequence of the assurances given by Commissioner Riches”.

There is evidence the Office of the ICAC is sitting on right now that contradicts those five TRG officers’ claims about the Noogudah awards – the report stated that as a fact – but it cannot be used and cannot be referred to the police or the DPP because of Riches’s own stupidity or cowardice, or worse.

Riches essentially gathered all the evidence in the case and threw it down the memory hole never to be seen again.

Again, this appears to be bordering on corruption, if not outright perverting the course of justice, despite his explanation that it wasn’t important.

Kelly wrote that the racist awards were clearly racist and that it is “difficult to conclude how any person of reasonable intelligence could conclude otherwise”. She clearly hasn’t met our two Michaels.

But astonishingly she made no conclusions as to what should be done with the five officers who lied to the court about the awards not being racist, instead bizarrely adopting Riches’ approach that the most important element of the investigation isn’t the crime committed by the five officers, but rather that everybody has learned their lesson about producing racist awards and won’t do it again.

The real focus of investigation should have been on the criminal conduct

Kelly concluded that there was “no admissible evidence of misconduct” on the part of the lying officers and therefore no further investigation could be carried out and no charges laid. She then inexplicably waxes on about how the NT Police is dealing with its racism issues and that no racist conduct or material has been produced since 2015, so you know, no problem now.

Except that’s not true. The TRG continued handing out the Noogudah awards until 2022, when they changed the name to the “Voldemort” awards, which shows the racist ceremonies were still taking place until two years ago – a fact Murphy himself said was “concerning” earlier this year while under oath, but completely forgot about this week.

(There is also some conjecture about why these tough TRG bros renamed the racist awards the “Voldemort” awards. Voldemort is the villain in the Harry Potter books, known as “he who shall not be named”. Some have suggested the new name for the awards is an inside joke within the TRG to insult Aboriginal culture yet again, in reference to Aboriginal cultural traditions of not directly naming the deceased. Or maybe these guys just really, really love children’s literature.)

As much as Murphy thinks this is a full exoneration of the five officers’ clear misconduct, it in fact raises more issues with his leadership.

How can a Police Commissioner in good conscience know that there is evidence that exists and claim the matter is concluded?

But this is the same Commissioner who admitted lying to the public about when he first became aware of the racist awards and then covering them up by taking no action until it was all revealed at the coronial inquest.

What happens when any of the five perjurers give evidence in court in an effort to secure a conviction against a serious criminal?

Any two-bit lawyer will get their evidence stricken from the record, by pointing out that they’re one of those officers who lied to the courts under oath about the racist TRG awards in 2024.

We asked Murphy about this dilemma yesterday and he came back with weasel words about the inquest continuing and the ICAC’s “conclusions”.

What happens when Coroner Elisabeth Armitage releases her final findings, whenever that might actually be? Will she hold the five lying officers to account for clearly misleading her court?

Murphy said in his statement this week concerning the ICAC report that the NT Police force “remain fully committed to maintaining public trust and ensuring that any concerns raised are thoroughly investigated and appropriately addressed”.

Neither of those things happened in this matter. He also said the internal investigation has concluded, so he won’t bring internal disciplinary action against the officers who everybody knows lied to the courts.

This is the most blatant rigged investigation in the history of the Northern Territory. And they might have gotten away with it all, if it wasn’t for Riches mucking it up for them.

But perhaps just as disturbing as all of this is Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro’s statement on the matter. Instead of calling for a public inquiry into the shonky, corrupt investigation to restore public confidence in its police and its anti-corruption body, she also declared it concluded because her party never believed there was systemic racism in the police force, except of course for that time Murphy admitted there was.

“The report makes no adverse findings and the investigation is now closed,” she said in the statement on Thursday afternoon.

“The CLP has never supported the view that there is systemic racism within the Northern Territory Police force.

“This report puts those claims to bed.”

It does anything but. She did not mention the real focus of the investigation: the officers who breached the public’s trust and openly lied to the court. Her personal feelings aside, the public still need answers.