Latest / The Slippery Slope / NSW Police: The Villian and The Hero. One Taser's an Old Lady the other Saved Lives.
Transcript
- 0:11Hi, I'm Jay Fallon. Thank you for listening to The
- 0:14Slippery Slope. So there's a couple of stories
- 0:16that came out this week or the last seven days relating to
- 0:22police in specifically in NSW. Obviously we had the outcome for
- 0:28police officer Christian White, the champion who decided, hey,
- 0:33let's go on Taser, a great grandmother, a 95 year old woman
- 0:36and and then surprised when things didn't turn out that
- 0:40well, had a bit of a brain malfunction.
- 0:43I'm, I'm assuming at 3:00 AM in the morning and just said bugger
- 0:49it, bang, pulls the Taser out. She falls back, cracks her head,
- 0:55not to make light of the situation, but yeah, falls back,
- 0:57cracks the head, gets a, a bleed on the brain apparently and
- 1:02passes away from these injuries all 'cause because he just had
- 1:09an absolute brain malfunction. I'm assuming I, I don't know how
- 1:14else to explain it because there is nothing in police protocol
- 1:18which would suggest that you should be doing what he's what
- 1:22he has done absolutely nothing. So I just want to go through
- 1:25this quickly. And then there's another story
- 1:27that came out again in NSW And now maybe I'm just a little
- 1:32cynical. I have been called cynical at
- 1:35times. But I read this other story.
- 1:37I thought, oh, I wonder whether this is just NSW governments and
- 1:41NSW police trying to put out a bit of a feel good story.
- 1:46So how you look, look at this, we have a hero cop.
- 1:50So we might have some absolute numbskulls getting around, you
- 1:55know, nitwits, but we've got a hero cop Remember this follow.
- 1:59Anyway, we'll talk about this story later.
- 2:00I'm going to bring up, First off, just go through the stuff
- 2:03that's happened with Omar, NSW Police officer Christian White.
- 2:11The court has found Claire Nellen died as a result of the
- 2:15actions of a police officer. This should never have happened.
- 2:21The officer's employment is currently under review and that
- 2:25process is underway. His employment, in terms of his
- 2:33ongoing employment is also subject to a legal process and
- 2:38that will follow and I expect to consider that matter next week.
- 2:43OK, there we have police commissioner, NSW Police
- 2:48Commissioner, I think her name is web, isn't it?
- 2:52She's, she's a weak and feckless leader.
- 2:56Just my opinion, OK, Don't just I don't think she's a great
- 3:00leader at all. She, she is underperformed
- 3:04consistently. Anyway, that's what happened.
- 3:06So in the meantime, so basically you know what happened?
- 3:09The Australian police officer was found guilty of killing the
- 3:1295 year old woman. So he's been sacked.
- 3:15Christian White So he had been suspended from the force without
- 3:19pay until he was found guilty of manslaughter last week.
- 3:24And then what's happened? So NSW Police Commissioner Karen
- 3:29Webb confirmed on Tuesday that Monaro Police District officer
- 3:33Christian James Samuel White had been sacked by the state force.
- 3:40I've determined that I do not have confidence in the officer's
- 3:42suitability to continue as a police officer, she said in a
- 3:46statement. I've spoken with the family of
- 3:48the 95 year old victim involved in this matter and advised them
- 3:52of my decision. So the decision by NSW Police
- 3:58Police's most senior commander comes five days after a jury
- 4:01found that a White was guilty of manslaughter after 20 hours of
- 4:07deliberation. And then it goes on.
- 4:09The story continues on with all the other stuff that happened.
- 4:14Obviously we know, you know, she had the Walker, she could barely
- 4:18move. She stood up.
- 4:20She had a steak knife in the hand as well, moving around with
- 4:23the Walker. Basically he stood there talking
- 4:26to her for a couple of minutes. There was another office, a
- 4:29senior officer who was in the room who attempt apparently she
- 4:33attempted to grab the knife, made a bit of a meal out of it,
- 4:37just completely stuffed the whole operation up.
- 4:41And then White felt the need to Taser her.
- 4:46Absolutely no idea why you would do that.
- 4:48Like I said, a bit of a brain malfunction, maybe something to
- 4:50do with being called out at two 3:00 AM in the morning.
- 4:54I mean just being tired and thinking, well, stuff this.
- 4:56I want to get and go home anyway.
- 4:58Who knows why he did it, but it all went pear shaped.
- 5:02The worst outcome possible for obviously Claire Nolan and her
- 5:06family. Claire, Nell and Nolan, how you
- 5:09pronounce the name Anyway, so he was found guilty.
- 5:12Unfortunately for him, he is going to end up having to, he's
- 5:19going to end up having to spend some time in the big house.
- 5:23So let's see how that goes for him.
- 5:25But found guilty and I don't think there's any way around him
- 5:29being found guilty. There's nothing else you could
- 5:30do. You look at all the facts, You
- 5:32know, the, the case that he was trying, him and his defence team
- 5:36were trying to put forward, it just seemed weak.
- 5:40There's there was nothing to, I don't know how you could defend,
- 5:44you know, with a serious face, how you could really defend his
- 5:48actions. And then the things that he was
- 5:50putting out there in his defence really made no sense, absolutely
- 5:55no sense. Anyway, so we had that story
- 5:58come out and I was thinking, oh, OK, yeah, a bit of a bad news.
- 6:01And then this next story came out.
- 6:03I was reading this and I thought, well, isn't it funny?
- 6:06Isn't it funny? NSW Police have had a lot of bad
- 6:10stories just in the last couple of months.
- 6:13Obviously they had this fan, this fellow tasering the old
- 6:16lady. They had another story coming
- 6:18out about some about supposed racial racist issues within the
- 6:25force house apparently rife within NSW police force racism,
- 6:29I think sexism as well. There are a couple of the
- 6:31articles going on about that. But then we have this story come
- 6:36out about the Lint siege hero cop.
- 6:41If you remember the Lint siege happened or was it almost 10
- 6:45years ago? Anyway, I'll bring up the story.
- 6:48We can we can read it together and I but I just thought I'm a
- 6:52little bit cynical as I said, but so well, I wonder what the
- 6:55reason is why also this story is coming out so unmasked.
- 7:01Lint Siege hero cop wins battle to reveal his identity came out
- 7:07in the Korean male. So the hero of the Lint Cafe
- 7:09Siege who shot dead man Manas has finally been unmasked after
- 7:15a frustrating and emotionally devastating 9 year battle to
- 7:18have his identity restored. So Ben Bezant told the Sunday
- 7:23The Saturday Telegraph Can I read, can I read?
- 7:26I don't know. The Saturday Telegraph after his
- 7:29monumental NSW Supreme Court battle victory on Friday
- 7:34afternoon, that finally today was a good day.
- 7:37I have not only been given my name back, but my dignity and my
- 7:41high purpose in life, the former NSW Police Tactical Operations
- 7:47Unit officer said. This is a victory not just for
- 7:50me but for our first responders and military personnel.
- 7:53It means we can have a real discussion about PTSD and what
- 7:58has to be done to keep first responders well and in work.
- 8:02There he is here. The police officer in question?
- 8:05Ben Bezant. OK, so Mr Bazan's legal fight,
- 8:10backed by the Seven Network Spotlight programme, came to an
- 8:13end on Friday afternoon when the NSW Coroner lifted the
- 8:16suspension order which had prevented him from ever telling
- 8:19his story without the pseudonym Officer A.
- 8:23The order was made at the time to protect him but over the
- 8:28years became a shackle, further exacerbating the PTSD that cost
- 8:34him his career, his marriage and his home.
- 8:37In 2022, Mr Bazant gave heartbreaking detail of the
- 8:42memories that haunted him, including the visions of Sydney
- 8:45barrister Katrina Dawson dying in his arms.
- 8:49She was looking into his eyes. Her eyes were blue, just like
- 8:53his children's. She was killed by police bullet
- 8:56fragments after officers stormed the building.
- 8:59Monas, who also killed who was also killed when Mr Bazant and
- 9:04the Alpha team broke through the front entrance of the cafe at
- 9:082:13 AM on December 16, 2014 after Monas, armed with a pump
- 9:15action shotgun in the threat of a backpack bomb, shot dead cafe
- 9:19manager Tori Johnson. Bazant told The Sydney Telegraph
- 9:26earlier this year that he wanted to tell his whole story, the 17
- 9:30hours of horror, what happened to him in the years following
- 9:33and what still haunts him to this day.
- 9:36Most importantly, he wanted to be able to look other first
- 9:40responders crippled with PTSD right in the eye and let them
- 9:44hear and see for themselves that there is a way forward here
- 9:49here. I think I completely agree with
- 9:51the whole PTSD. There's not enough spoken about
- 9:54it with first responders. And you know, I remember when,
- 9:58back when at extreme early parts, when I was in the Academy
- 10:02and they, they talked about, they, they taught us about
- 10:05compartmentalization, which now I realise is the biggest load of
- 10:09crap ever. You cannot compartmentalise
- 10:12these things. I remember our Sergeant telling
- 10:14us, Yep, this is what you do. You go to all these things, all
- 10:17these jobs, you see all this extremely confronting situations
- 10:23and how do you not let that bleed into your personal life
- 10:26while you compartmentalise it? You know, you treat your mind
- 10:29like it's different compartments, different little
- 10:32files, and you just file it away in this area and you, you know,
- 10:35compartmentalise this. And then when you're home with
- 10:37your family, that's this part of your brain and it doesn't work.
- 10:41I know it doesn't work because I suffered from BDSD.
- 10:44Not anyway. And it doesn't work.
- 10:47What happens? You, you, you're asleep at night
- 10:50and you, you wonder why. You wonder why you have the same
- 10:54reoccurring dream about dead bodies or dead, whatever
- 10:59situation, whatever horror, horrific situation you're trying
- 11:02to suppress. Compartmentalization doesn't
- 11:05work. But they still teach it in the
- 11:07military, I believe. I think they still don't.
- 11:09I don't know if they still teach it in at QPS.
- 11:13It's to me, stupid. So yeah, good on him.
- 11:16I'm great that I'm grateful. I think it's a good thing that
- 11:18he can stand up, that he wants to stand up there and talk about
- 11:22PTSD and how it's affected him and he is a hero police officer
- 11:27I think. But am I just being a little
- 11:29cynical where I wonder who was behind the scenes from NSW
- 11:35government, from NSW Police Force, maybe having a little
- 11:40chat to the coroner saying hey, NSW government, NSW Police, we
- 11:47need a feel good story. We need to remind the public of
- 11:51the good that NSW Police do because we've had way too many
- 11:56stories showing how useless some of the officers are or how bad,
- 12:02how just absolutely bad. You know, we want to, we want to
- 12:05deflect from the racism accusations that are going on.
- 12:09We want to we want to deflect from Adrian White.
- 12:13Adrian White and he's, you know, I'll just bugger it tasering
- 12:18killing a 95 year old. We want to we want to deflect
- 12:21from all that. We need a feel good story.
- 12:23We need to remind, we need to remind the public that you know,
- 12:27when the siege went on almost 10 years ago, that our hero police
- 12:32went in and saved the day. So how about we put this follow
- 12:36back in the news. He all follows been fighting for
- 12:38this for years and now he gets to tell his story properly.
- 12:43So good on him for what he's trying to do.
- 12:45I just I'm a little cynical. I just wonder whether there's
- 12:48someone in the government, NSW government behind the scenes
- 12:53pulling the strings, saying hey, we need to feel good story.
- 12:56We need to remind people of how good the police are, how good
- 13:00they can be, how we do actually need them.
- 13:03And we we need to put them back in the spotlight in a good
- 13:07spotlight for once. I don't know, am I just being a
- 13:12little cynical or, you know, Hi, that's just my opinion.
- 13:20OK. Let me know what you think about
- 13:25the, the manslaughter charge with, with the great grandmother
- 13:30tasering. What amount of time do you think
- 13:35is reasonable for this officer to spend in gaol?
- 13:40I'm a little torn, a little torn about how long he should be
- 13:44spending in gaol. Obviously he can't spend any
- 13:46time in general population. He'll just be killed by other
- 13:50cell or by other inmates. But let me know how long you
- 13:55think what would be a reasonable amount of time to serve or his,
- 14:01you know, absolutely stupid reaction, his stupid actions
- 14:09that's resulted in the ending of this 95 year old's life.
- 14:14And let me know what you think about the the lint siege hero
- 14:17cop story about the sudden unmasking.
- 14:22I think it's a good thing. I am just very cynical and I
- 14:25think there's people behind the scenes who push this story
- 14:28because they want a good news story to come out.
- 14:32Anyway, that's just my opinion. Let me know what you think.
- 14:34I'm Jay Fallon. Thanks for listening to the
- 14:36slippery Slippery slope. If you desire, they will take