Real action needed on Aboriginal deaths in custody Of the 516 recorded Indigenous people who died in custody since 1991, 335 were in prison, 177 were in police custody and four were in youth detention.
In total, there were 24 Indigenous deaths and 81 non-Indigenous deaths in custody and one death of a person whose Indigenous status was unknown. This report contains detailed information on these deaths and compares the findings with longer term trends.
The highest number of Indigenous deaths in prison custody in 2021/22 occurred in NSW, with five deaths. There were four Indigenous deaths in prison in Queensland, three in Western Australia, two in South Australia and one each in Victoria and the Northern Territory.
In an analysis by Guardian Australia based on the data, Aboriginal deaths were estimated to be 27 to 33 times higher than coloniser deaths. Between 11,000 and 14,000 Aboriginal people died, compared with only 399 to 440 colonisers.
Final report. The Commission's final report was published in April 1991, and concluded that the 99 deaths investigated were not due to police violence: "... the immediate causes of the deaths do not include foul play, in the sense of unlawful, deliberate killing of Aboriginal prisoners by police and prison officers.
The research project, currently in its eighth year and led by University of Newcastle historian Emeritus Professor Lyndall Ryan, now estimates more than 10,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander lives were lost in more than 400 massacres, up from a previous estimate of 8,400 in 302 massacres.
The Bringing Them Home report (produced by the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families in 1987), says that "at least 100,000" children were removed from their parents.
The Coniston massacre, which took place in the region around the Coniston cattle station in the then Territory of Central Australia (now the Northern Territory) from 14 August to 18 October 1928, was the last known officially sanctioned massacre of Indigenous Australians and one of the last events of the Australian ...
Based on age-standardised rates, circulatory diseases accounted for the largest gap in mortality rates between Indigenous and non‑Indigenous Australians (gap of 78 deaths per 100,000 population).
Natural causes and suicide were the most common causes of death among Indigenous people who died in prison custody, while most non-Indigenous deaths were due to natural causes.
The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander imprisonment rate decreased by 3% from 2,412 to 2,330 prisoners per 100,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adult population. At 30 June 2022: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander prisoners accounted for 32% of all prisoners.
between one in three and one in ten Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and communities in the period from approximately 1910 until 1970. '
The rate of incarceration of Aboriginal people has risen 35 per cent between 1988 and 1995. The rate has increased 25 per cent for non-Aboriginal people. The increase is most alarming in New South Wales and South Australia.
Back then, males lived on average 67 years (11 years less) and females 73 years (10 years less). Aboriginal life expectancy is so low because Aboriginal health standards in Australia let 45% of Aboriginal men and 34% of women die before the age of 45. About 71% die before they reach the age of 65.
Even though Aboriginal people had extensive knowledge of bush medicine, they were unable to treat an introduced virus like smallpox. They had no immunity to this destructive disease, and it spread rapidly. Devastatingly the epidemic killed at least HALF of the local Aboriginal people living in the Sydney area.
In the 1860s, Victoria became the first state to pass laws authorising Aboriginal children to be removed from their parents. Similar policies were later adopted by other states and territories – and by the federal government when it was established in the 1900s.
In 1803, British colonisation began and in 1876, Truganini died. She was the last full-blood and tribal Tasmanian Aboriginal. Within her one lifetime, a whole society and culture were removed from the face of the earth.
Starting in 1794, mass killings were first carried out by British soldiers, then by police and settlers – often acting together – and later by native police, working under the command of white officers, in militia-style forces supported by colonial governments.
On 26 January 1838 Nunn and his men massacred up to 50 Aboriginal people camped at Waterloo Creek.
Why were Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children taken from their families? The forcible removal of First Nations children from their families was based on assimilation policies, which claimed that the lives of First Nations people would be improved if they became part of white society.
In the 1900s, many Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and communities. It's estimated that as many as 1 in 3 Indigenous children were taken between 1910 and the 1970s, affecting most Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in Australia.
In 2019/20, 952 Aboriginal children across NSW were removed from their families, a 2.6% increase on the year prior. In total, there were 6,688 Aboriginal children in what is known as “out-of-home-care” – about 41% of the total number of kids in the system.
The islands were settled by different seafaring Melanesian cultures such as the Torres Strait Islanders over 2500 years ago, and cultural interactions continued via this route with the Aboriginal people of northeast Australia.