By Zachary Rolfe

I was a good cop; I loved the job. I did it because I wanted to help people who needed help, to protect those who needed protection, and I was good at it. The following is my opinion and mine only.

I have been painted as a racist, violent cop. I went to a boy’s school and then joined the army; my “playground” language is sometimes crass and rude, and most would find it offensive, but I use it in private with no intention to harm, with others who understand this. I have used rude and racist terms regarding nearly every race, most often my own. I have done so in private with others with a shared background. I should not use these terms, and I’m sorry for using them.

When I have used these terms in the past, they have meant nothing; words only mean what the person using them or hearing them puts as a value on them. If I were to insult you in a language you didn’t understand, it would be meaningless to you; you don’t get to choose what meaning someone else puts on the words they use. Despite my language, and my potential to be rude, I have risked my life for strangers multiple times; if anyone was in danger, I would put myself between them and that danger to protect them. I was raised believing that actions were more important than words, but this does not seem to be the case for others.

When private texts are made public, they become meaningful because others put their own value in the words, and it cannot be controlled.

Jamie Chalker, Coroner Elisabeth Armitage, Peggy Dwyer and every party in the coronial who agreed that the texts should be released knew this. They had access to every single one of my messages and knew that I did not treat a single race differently from others. In private, I talked shit about nearly every group at times. Yet they released just a tiny snippet to make me out to be a racist, a few messages out of thousands.

The parties knew that the messages had nothing to do with the death of Kumanjayi Walker; they knew the damage they would do once in public – they would hurt the community, the police force and the relationship between them. They didn’t care; it seems to me that personal crusades to validate bias are commonplace (even accepted) and are perverting the opportunities for growth, learning and natural justice.

If the coronial’s goal was to “heal,” it has failed.

Kumanjayi Walker was a young man with a violent past who abused many in his community, including young girls and boys. When he tried to kill my partner and I – and make no mistake, he tried to kill us – I did not think about his race, upbringing or his past trauma, I thought about defending my partner’s life, and that’s what I did. In a different state, I would have got a medal for it, and none of you would ever have known my name.

In 2014 in Victoria, an 18-year-old attacked two police officers with a knife outside a police station. He slashed the first officer on the arm before going to the ground and attempting to stab the other officer multiple times. The first officer shot the offender in the head, killing him. The officers were commended by their respective departments (AFP and VicPOL) and even praised by the Prime Minister at the time. But in that instance, the offender was of Middle Eastern descent.

In Western Australia in 2019, another officer was involved in a shooting a lot less clear-cut than mine. After approximately six months of investigation, he was arrested for murder, his name was suppressed, and, after about one year, he was found not guilty at a trial. He was then embraced by the WA Commissioner of Police and welcomed back to the job.

Facts still not made public during coronial, public not being shown the other side of policing

All parties involved in the Coronial have access to information that has not been made public yet; for example, the parties (and Chalker) know that my defence team reached out to the AFP and was granted permission to speak and share evidence with a current use of force expert whose qualifications far exceeded the now discredited NT Police use-of-force expert. The far more experienced and qualified expert believed the shooting was justified, professional and worthy of commendation.

My legal team followed the chain of command and requested permission from AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw to utilise this expert as an independent expert in the trial. Commissioner Kershaw denied this request stating a “perceived conflict of interest”. This is per the advice the DPP gave the NT Police, but they did not follow it.

It has also been made public knowledge that now, after arresting me for murder and attempting to put me behind bars for 25 years, the NT Police have finalised their investigation into the shooting and decided that the only outcome is remedial advice, which I have received via email.

Millions of dollars, thousands of wasted hours, exacerbated trauma for families and community, only for the result to be an email to me providing me with remedial advice – which doesn’t even count as a formal disciplinary breach.

Despite this, the coronial focus is still on me rather than on areas that could improve the circumstances of the NT.

The bias involved in the investigation against me is blatant and obvious.

If all you know of me is through the media, then you see me as a violent thug, an ex-soldier with a past. You don’t see me on duty finding children at 3 am, in breach of their bail in the city; you don’t see me talking to them and asking why they’re there only to find out they haven’t had a proper meal in days.

You don’t see me (instead of arresting them) taking them home past a 24-hour service station and buying them a meal, letting them choose some lollies as long as they choose something healthy as well. You don’t see me take that kid to a home full of drunks, find one sober grandma in a back room to leave the child with and watch as the first thing that child does is offer to share her food with her grandma after being hungry for days; you don’t see how that breaks my heart, good kids being failed by their families. I try to kick out as many drunks as possible in the hope that the child may get a few hours of sleep and go to school.

You don’t see me hug the suicidal 12-year-old boy for an hour in the hospital to restrain him as he tries to harm himself; once he finally falls asleep, you don’t see me go into the town camps by myself in the middle of the night looking for a sober family member, only to find his parents drunk and refusing to assist their son. You don’t see me going door to door until I finally find a grandma whose sober enough to come to the hospital, you don’t see the tears in the boy’s eyes as he sees a family member who actually cares enough to come.

You don’t see me responding to my fellow officers’ calls for backup when they’re attacked by a man with a metal pole who wants suicide by cop. You don’t see me protect my mates, restrain the man, and speak to him to find out he is suicidal; you don’t see me talk to my fellow cops and agree that he doesn’t need to be arrested; he needs help. While we wait for the ambulance, the offender and I sit on a guardrail next to each other, but you don’t see me notice him hopping from foot to foot because he’s barefoot and the ground is hot. You don’t see me allow a grown man who just assaulted my mates and fought me, to rest his feet on my boots while we wait, to protect his feet from the hot bitumen.

You don’t see me work a 36-hour long shift, conducting a successful search and rescue with IRT to locate an escaped criminal who needed to be found after getting lost in the bush, finding him just in time before his kidneys shut down from dehydration.

You don’t see me risk my life to save two people by swimming through 5kms of floodwaters despite it getting international media coverage.

You don’t see me transition from protector to medic, immediately trying to save Walker once he is no longer a threat. You don’t see me call him my brother when he asks for my help, you don’t see me and the boys do our best to save his life for over an hour, you don’t see us comforting him and reassuring him as he dies, despite our team’s best efforts.

You don’t see all the countless people I’ve done my best to help.

You should have noticed that no police officers that I have actually worked with have spoken poorly about me in the coronial or the trial; it is the opposite. The only members who have spoken poorly about me are those who have never met me or senior police who hide behind desks.

You see a small number of incidents, out of context, with several maligned cops talking badly about me. I was in the job to protect people, but if you were a violent offender, causing others harm, or you tried to prevent me doing my job to protect and defend, I make no apologies for doing my job. Legitimate authority should win; otherwise, what’s the point of a civilised society?

‘When a clown takes over the castle…’: NT Police broken while its commissioner pursues his own agenda

Cops in the NT are being punished for doing their jobs these days by the current NT Police Commissioner Jamie Chalker and his hand-selected executive. Cops are being praised for running away i.e., failing the community.

There are many problems in the NT, the most significant being in people’s homes, then education, employment, and medical services, among others. Police are called in to address these problems at the coalface to protect, defend and uphold our society’s endorsed laws. Just because the biggest problem is within some homes, doesn’t mean the compounding issues along the problem chain shouldn’t be fixed.

Right now, the NT Police is broken. And it has no chance of being fixed until Chalker, and his cronies leave.

The executive has now decided that they will attempt to medically retire me due to “mental health”. I was directed to attend an independent medical exam with a psychiatrist; the psych reported that I have no diagnosable issues, he believes I am right to return to work with a supported return to work plan. The executive has refused to offer that plan and instead has served me with notice of their intent.

That was two weeks ago. Since then, I have received yet another section 79 (a disciplinary notice) for daring to speak out about the poor treatment I have received by Chalker and the executive. Chalker says he cares about his members and that he will attempt to improve and support mental health in the workplace, yet when I am stood down under the guise of “poor mental health”, the organisation continues to come for me for daring to set the record straight.

They fired Mark Casey, an outstanding cop of 25 years, against the discipline panel’s advice because he criticised them. When narcissists in positions of power feel like they lose control of a subordinate, they often commence smear campaigns against them. This seems to be standard procedure for the current NT Police executive.

When a leader exhibits behaviour most closely attributed to a liar, a coward, and a narcissist, it is not wrong to challenge this behaviour. If he cannot handle any personal criticism of himself and responds with “misinformation” and abuses his position to exact revenge, then he is no longer serving the people, rather he is treating the NT Police as his own personal fiefdom with impunity.

He defends the murder charge and trial of me, the millions of dollars and thousands of wasted police hours (while the NT suffers the highest crime rates they’ve ever seen) with the fact that I sent private messages to friends and family that should never have been public.

The executive has access and have known about these messages since November 2020; they did nothing about them at the time as they did not care, while some people involved in the messages were even promoted afterwards despite sending their own personal texts of a similar nature.

It seems that Chalker specifically went out of his way to weaponise these messages through the coronial to cover up his direct influence, the ineptitude of the investigation against me, the failure to follow DPP advice, the discredited use-of-force expert, the edited documents, the influence of witnesses and the failure to disclose evidence that didn’t help their narrative. All this is out there now, but nothing has been done to address this documented corruption.

The most senior police officer in the NT does all this, hurting the community he is sworn to protect more than anyone else.

If any police officer is on the job right now and their main priority isn’t to help people, they should resign; if their main priorities are to protect their career, progress their career or destroy someone else’s, they should leave immediately.

Despite my multiple offers, Commissioner Chalker has steadfastly refused to meet me; he’s never even spoken to me. Despite doing my job as trained (and this has been extensively proven during the trial that cleared my name), I have been used as a pawn over the last three years to satisfy the political goals and personal egos of narcissistic clowns in positions of power.

When a clown takes over a castle, he doesn’t become a king; the castle becomes a circus – this is your legacy Commissioner Chalker.

If no one in the circus tent has told you this yet, Commissioner Chalker, if you cared about the NT police and loved the community you’re supposed to serve, you would leave right now and never take any public office again. The community wants you gone; the good police want you gone. The community want to be safe again, and the police want to be supported in making people safe again.

To the men and women still on the street, know that policing with you was the best job I ever had. I am proud that you are still doing it, facing attacks from the front and more dangerous ones from behind from your bosses. I hope you keep doing it and are strong enough that when the integrity-compromised executive decide to come for you, they fail time and again.

As for me, I will continue to help people who need help and protect those who need to be protected; if it’s not in the police, it’ll be somewhere else. I’ll live my life knowing I have the loyalty of those I worked with and those who know me, knowing that when I was in the NT, the community was safer for having had me there. I was a good cop, my integrity is intact, and I am proud of that.

Constable Zachary Rolfe joined the NT Police in 2016, graduating Dux of his class. He had joined the Australian Army after high school and completed one tour of Afghanistan. He was awarded multiple bravery awards for saving the lives of two tourists who were swept down the flooded Hugh River in December 2016. In 2022, he was found not guilty of murder by a Supreme Court jury over the shooting death of Kumanjayi Walker in Yuendumu in November 2019.