Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Katie Woolf spoke with NT Police Commander Matt Hollamby

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Katie Woolf spoke with NT Police Commander Matt Hollamby · 360 with Katie Woolf

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  Speaker 1: Mix one O four point nine dot com dot a
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  Speaker 1: U for all the latest news and information now three
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  Speaker 1: sixty with Katie Wolf. Everyone is listening Mix one oh
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  Speaker 1: four point nine one hundred percent NT.
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  Speaker 2: It is just after nine thirty. If you're keen to
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  Speaker 2: messages this morning, zero four one eight nine five seven
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  Speaker 2: three sixty nine, you can also give us a call
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  Speaker 2: eight nine four one one oh four nine. And joining
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  Speaker 2: us in the studio right now is Northern Territory Police
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  Speaker 2: Commander of Darwin and Road Policing, Matt Holland B.
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  Speaker 3: Good morning, Good morning Katie, and good morning to your listeners.
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  Speaker 2: Now, Commander Firstley, there was a break in overnight two
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  Speaker 2: thirty this morning. I believe Caledonus restaurant in the city
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  Speaker 2: was broken into. Can you give us a bit of
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  Speaker 2: an update on that situation.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, look, obvious it spend reported to us. We've reviewed
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  Speaker 3: CCTV and there's some some youth that were detected inside.
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  Speaker 3: Strikeforce Trident's got that and they're all over it, so
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  Speaker 3: hopefully we'll get a good result for the owners, bearing
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  Speaker 3: in mind that nobody should be a victim of a crime.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, how any any suspects at this point in time.
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  Speaker 3: I looked a bit early to say, but you know,
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  Speaker 3: we're working on it and we'll throw everything at it.
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  Speaker 2: Do we know if they got away with much or
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  Speaker 2: was it alcohol related?
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  Speaker 3: I think it was just alcohol that was stolen, So
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  Speaker 3: you know, it's the value of the alcohol is minimal
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  Speaker 3: compared to the damage and the inconvenience that it caused
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  Speaker 3: to the victims. So you know, sometimes it's it's you know,
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  Speaker 3: it's just sad that those the proprietors of that business
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  Speaker 3: are now going to have to fix things and make
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  Speaker 3: their business serviceable again.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly right. And we see that so often.
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  Speaker 2: You know, what they're actually taking is not a huge amount,
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  Speaker 2: but the damage that's caused is very often quite substantial,
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  Speaker 2: and it means that it makes it really hard to
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  Speaker 2: trade as well.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely, And you know, nobody should be a victim of
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  Speaker 3: a crime, and I wish them well in restoring their
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  Speaker 3: business and you know, encourage people to help them out.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, let's take a look at these crime statistics. I
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  Speaker 2: know that assaults seem to be on the rise, domestic
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  Speaker 2: and alcohol fuel violence are on the rise in Palmerston.
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  Speaker 2: Some of those statistics look quite astronomical alcohol related violence
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  Speaker 2: up eighty six percent. What's the cause of this?
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  Speaker 3: Look, Katie, that this is a twelve month period ending
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  Speaker 3: April twenty twenty one, so it starts in May twenty
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  Speaker 3: twenty and as we all know, that was the peak
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  Speaker 3: of the COVID period. There was more money around, people
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  Speaker 3: were more at home, so you know, there were sadly
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  Speaker 3: some people that assaulted family members. And you know, it's disgraceful. Really,
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  Speaker 3: there's no other way of putting it. I mean, to
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  Speaker 3: assault a family member, whether it's a sibling or a partner,
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  Speaker 3: or a child or a grandparent, it's just disgraceful.
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  Speaker 2: And is this something you know, I guess to give
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  Speaker 2: listeners perspective. Is this something that your officers are called
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  Speaker 2: out to quite often, domestic violence incidents.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, Look, it's one of our bread and butter things.
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  Speaker 3: And again it's about protecting victims. And you know, we
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  Speaker 3: have a very pro prosecution policy in relation to domestic violence.
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  Speaker 3: If you choose to assault a family member, you know,
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  Speaker 3: we've got no qualms about prosecuting you for it. And
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  Speaker 3: you know, if you are a domestic violence offender who
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  Speaker 3: hasn't been caught yet, you might want to consider getting
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  Speaker 3: some help because it's not normal. We can't know. There's
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  Speaker 3: nothing that we could say or do that would normalize
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  Speaker 3: domestic violence. You've got a problem and you need help.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, go and see someone before you end up doing
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  Speaker 2: something that you really really regret because it's totally unacceptable.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely, Hey, I mean I think that also when we
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  Speaker 2: take a look at some of these alcohol related assaults,
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  Speaker 2: they're certainly on the rise in DA when it looks
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  Speaker 2: like thirty four point four percent in Palmerston, as I
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  Speaker 2: say that was up even further, I mean, have we've
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  Speaker 2: got to real issue at the moment with alcohol.
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  Speaker 3: Look, I think alcohol is a causal factor towards domestic violence,
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  Speaker 3: and you know, some of our alcohol policies we can
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  Speaker 3: have a look at, but and the way we police
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  Speaker 3: them we may have to have a look at. But again,
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  Speaker 3: it's a causal factor. It's down to individual choices. And
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  Speaker 3: if you're a thug or a coward who chooses to
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  Speaker 3: assaulted family member, you're a despicable person and we're quite
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  Speaker 3: happy to prosecute you for it.
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  Speaker 2: I know that there's been you know, over the last
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  Speaker 2: few months, we've certainly talked a lot about some of
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  Speaker 2: the you know, the alcohol misuse that we've seen in
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  Speaker 2: quite public places. I know that at one point there
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  Speaker 2: was an actual alcohol unit that was sort of managing
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  Speaker 2: some of this stuff. Is that still the case.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, Look, we had a social audio unit and they've
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  Speaker 3: largely been committed to COVID related active But it is
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  Speaker 3: called policing business for every police officer targeting social order
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  Speaker 3: issues and from our perspective, we look for crime series,
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  Speaker 3: we look for hot spots, and we look for RECIDIVIS defenders,
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  Speaker 3: And in terms of alcohol related issues, hotspots is probably
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  Speaker 3: is the main one. And you're obviously aware of the
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  Speaker 3: operation we did at Middle Beach some months ago that
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  Speaker 3: got way out of control and we threw a lot
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  Speaker 3: of time and effort into that and quick with our
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  Speaker 3: partners being the City of Darwin and Larakia, Nash and
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  Speaker 3: we were able to quickly stop that issue.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, one of the other things that's been raised, and
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  Speaker 2: I know that's not part of the of the crime stats,
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  Speaker 2: but speaking of that sort of alcohol issues and also
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  Speaker 2: substance abuse, I know that anecdotally we have heard more
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  Speaker 2: reports of people chroming. Is that something that your officers
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  Speaker 2: are seeing evidence of?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, we are, and it's it's young people, some of
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  Speaker 3: them are from communities. But you know, sniffing aerosols, particularly
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  Speaker 3: deodorants has been has been an issue in really really
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  Speaker 3: severe cases. We sadly we see people sniffing fly spray
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  Speaker 3: and cockroach bombs and it's you know, the damage that
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  Speaker 3: it does to people's brains is it's horrific and it's
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  Speaker 3: a sad thing that you know, these kids are doing it,
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  Speaker 3: their parents aren't stopping them.
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  Speaker 2: So it is a real worry and yeah, a real
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  Speaker 2: worry that I guess it's becoming sort of more evident
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  Speaker 2: to everybody that it's going on. I don't really know
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  Speaker 2: how you stop something like this from happening.
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  Speaker 3: Look at it's primarily a health issue, but it then
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  Speaker 3: becomes a crime issue. So we try to treat it
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  Speaker 3: as a health issue to initially, but you know, it
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  Speaker 3: when it degenerates into a crime issue, that's, you know,
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  Speaker 3: we become heavily involved in it. Yeah, but you know,
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  Speaker 3: it's you know, we just ask people to care for
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  Speaker 3: their kids. Give you kids a hug, and it's pretty
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  Speaker 3: sad when it gets to that.
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  Speaker 2: Property offenses are down by the look of things, According
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  Speaker 2: to the latest crime stats is that because you know,
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  Speaker 2: the period of time that we're talking about was right
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  Speaker 2: in the midst of that COVID lockdown. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Look, Katie, this time last year there was very little
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  Speaker 3: to no crime because of the lockdowns and because people
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  Speaker 3: were at home and people were working from home, so
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  Speaker 3: it presented challenges to actually break into our house. So
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  Speaker 3: that was that was a really positive thing. But you know,
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  Speaker 3: those months are starting to slide into what happened last year,
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  Speaker 3: what happened you know, the period that we're comparing to.
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  Speaker 3: So you know, unfortunately, we think it's going to go up,
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  Speaker 3: mainly because we're hearing in the future will be compared
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  Speaker 3: to that ultra low period whether it was very little crime. Yeah, right,
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  Speaker 3: you know, there are some learnings out of that, and
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  Speaker 3: that includes, you know, when you're home, it's a deterrent
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  Speaker 3: from crime. If you know you're lockerhouse, it's again it's
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  Speaker 3: a deterrent. And the opportunistic offenses probably didn't happen during
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  Speaker 3: that period because you know, there was a natural deterrent.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and people were there a lot in a lot
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  Speaker 2: of cases, weren't they.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, And you know, I think there's a message
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  Speaker 3: that you know, it's not about being paranoid, it's about
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  Speaker 3: being security conscious and lock your doors at night.
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  Speaker 2: That's yeah, hey, commander, we know that the supercars obviously
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  Speaker 2: were on on the weekend. Did everybody behave relatively well?
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  Speaker 2: I know the police were going to be keeping it
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  Speaker 2: close on the roads and plenty of other things.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, Katie that the event itself very little dramas. I
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  Speaker 3: think we might have had one person arrested for a
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  Speaker 3: fairly minor offense, but yeah, very little drama within the event.
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  Speaker 3: We actually had a very heavy road policing presence outside
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  Speaker 3: of the event. I think we tested about fifteen hundred
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  Speaker 3: people for random breath and random drug testing and out
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  Speaker 3: of that fifteen hundred, only two were positive. There was
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  Speaker 3: one idiot that we encountered who he was clopped doing
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  Speaker 3: two hundred and forty two k's an hour on his
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  Speaker 3: motorbike down the Stewart Highway. My god, and that was
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  Speaker 3: you know, it's just a death waiting to happen.
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  Speaker 2: Basically, did that happen?
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  Speaker 3: That was on Saturday and it was going outbound on
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  Speaker 3: the Stuart Highway. So if anyone know who knows who
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  Speaker 3: that idiot is, please ring the police.
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  Speaker 2: So still on the hunt for that person.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, and look, it's one of those things that he
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  Speaker 3: was clocked doing that speed on a radar and disappeared
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  Speaker 3: fairly quickly. Now that speed, you know, it's just too
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  Speaker 3: dangerous for our people to chose that person.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely, Hey, just very quickly. Territory Day is fast approaching.
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  Speaker 2: Is there much sort of that the Northern Territory Police
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  Speaker 2: are planning on doing, just to try to keep everybody
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  Speaker 2: behaving the best should be, I suppose.
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  Speaker 3: Look, Territory Day is one of those days where it's
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  Speaker 3: supposed to be a good day, and sadly it usually
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  Speaker 3: is a good day, but sadly there's a couple of
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  Speaker 3: idiots that don't play by the rules. So the rules
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  Speaker 3: are that you need to let your fireworks off between
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  Speaker 3: the a lot of times. It's actually illegal to possess
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  Speaker 3: them outside of those times well after that time, and yeah,
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  Speaker 3: just be sensible and be careful. So it is a
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  Speaker 3: busy day for us. We get a lot of phone
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  Speaker 3: calls because sadly, some people continue to let fireworks off
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  Speaker 3: after midnight and then the next night and the night
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  Speaker 3: after that, and our phones light up, and yeah, just
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  Speaker 3: be sensible.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, good advice well Northern Territory Police Commander of Darwin
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  Speaker 2: and Road Policing Matt Hollandby good to catch up with
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  Speaker 2: you this morning. Thanks so much for your time, always
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  Speaker 2: a pleasure, Katie. Thank you