QUEENSLAND COP-OUT

Thanks for the update ( Bulletin, January 7) on the Palm

Island murder of Cameron Doomadgee – whose tribal name was Mulrunji – by a policeman. It is wonderful that a young Kiwi female judge, Debbie Mortimer, has made such a profound finding of the bleeding obvious.

But there was another young woman, deputy coroner Christine Clements, who was pilloried and verbally abused by police and politicians in 2006 after finding the cause of death was police brutality and naming the officer.

Such a practice of public shaming and abuse of diligent female officials was common in Queensland at the time. Some police officers, who should have been guardians of justice, were malignant, hiding each other’s crimes.

Queensland had journalists threatened with the murder of family members and a reformist police commissioner flee in the middle of the night.

Fleeing across the Tasman was a great idea for me and my family. Thank you, New Zealand. Lyndell Kelly (St Leonards, Dunedin)