Police assessment and mitigation of suicide risk in Australian Indigenous custody

Australian indigenous group or populations are the initial inhabitants of the continent of Australia and the neighboring islands. This population migrated from India through the Southern route approximately 50,000 years ago and arrived in the Australian continent about 45,000 years ago. Notably, the Australian indigenous population has a significant and huge diversity since there are different indigenous communities and societies in the country. Each of these communities and societies has its own distinct mixture of customs, cultures, and languages. The difference of the Australian indigenous people is also evident in the fact that they are currently divided into local communities. Most of this population or group lives in the South-east and are mainly based along the Murray River.

Current State of Australian Indigenous People:

Many of the existing Australian indigenous people have maintained a strong link with language, culture, and their traditional lands. Actually, 70% of these people recognize their conventional country as 21% speak an indigenous language. This is regardless of the fact that many languages have been lost over time while more schools have started various programs to promote the revival of local languages ("About Indigenous Australia," 2007). In the past few years, there have been numerous attempts to recognize indigenous native title rights with an increase of 3% of such attempts in 2006. Furthermore, there are large numbers of Australian organizations and services that are controlled by the indigenous people.

Currently, the indigenous people account for 2% of the Australian population. The proportion and number of these people in comparison to the rest of the Australian population has been increasingly in the recent past. Actually, this group also has a young population as an estimated 70% of the population are people aged 25 years and below. New South Wales and Queens are the regions that contain a huge portion of this population with 29% and 25% respectively. On the contrary, the Northern Territory and Western Australia have the lowest percentage of the Australian indigenous people. While these regions have the smallest number of the population, there are large numbers of small indigenous communities. In increasingly remote areas, there many indigenous communities in which English is considered as the second or third language.

Issues facing Australian Indigenous Population:

While they are the original inhabitants of the Australian continent, the indigenous people have undergone numerous issues in their history. Currently, the Australian indigenous population is the most disadvantaged group of people in the country. Based on the statistics of the major indicators, the population is worse off than other Australians in issues of education, health, employment, and housing. The main reason associated with the gap between the indigenous and non-indigenous Australians is that the indigenous people tend to live remote communities, which have some major forms of disadvantage such as health. Moreover, statistics indicate that migration to cities by these people does little to lessen the disadvantage they experience. Generally, the non-indigenous people in urban areas are usually better off than the indigenous people who are over-represented in the poorest parts of town and suburbs.

Some of the major issues relevant to individuals from this population or ways in which the Australian indigenous people are disadvantaged include & #8230;

Remoteness:

This is the major issue facing many indigenous people living in Australia since a huge portion of the population lives in remote areas. The remoteness has in turn created various challenges and disadvantages to these people to an extent that it restricts their access to necessary and important services like health. Moreover, remoteness leads to less employment opportunities that contribute to high unemployment rate among the group ("Challenges Facing the Indigenous Community Today," n.d.).

Social Attitudes:

The other unfortunate challenges that still face the community today are the negative social attitudes that remain common. While several significant initiatives have been taken to promote understanding among the non-indigenous people regarding the history of this population, indigenous people are still largely affected with negative social attitudes from the other Australians. This is despite of the fact that reconciliation has become a major characteristic in building better understanding of the culture of indigenous people and developing strong relationships within the entire community.

Education and Employment:

Education has been singled out as one of the major concerns that need to be tackled among the indigenous population since 1967. While there have significant improvements in indigenous education, these people still have the lowest education statistics than other groups in Australia. In the modern society, the main indigenous education concerns are related to high rates of absences and low rates of retention. These concerns are further complicated by the negative perspectives from older indigenous people about European education because of their own experiences in the past.

The negative perspective towards the existing educational system has contributed to high unemployment rates among the indigenous people. The high unemployment rate is also fueled by the fact that a huge portion of the population lives in remote areas where there are few vacant positions. Even though the Australian government has funded and supported indigenous employment initiatives, there is still more to accomplish in relation to indigenous employment. This is primarily because unemployment has become a situation that has been constantly passed through the indigenous generations.

Health:

Health has become a major issue among indigenous Australians because these people are not as healthy as other Australians despite of recent improvements ("Summary of Australian Indigenous Health," 2012). Researches on the health of the Australian population tend to indicate that indigenous population has the worst health status and high mortality rates in the country.

While many indigenous people have similar access to healthcare like the rest of the population, they still have the highest rates of poor health. The major reasons attributed to the poor health status of this population include the prevalent negative social attitudes, remoteness, and lack of trust towards the medical sector or industry. To address the underlying health issues, there is need for more health advancement initiatives, better identification of health problems before they become severe, and increased provision of healthcare services to this population. The government needs to identify issues and help the population to achieve improved health.

Australian Indigenous People and the Criminal Justice System:

Since the British colonization of Australia, there have been five major phases of government policy regarding the indigenous people and other aborigines. These distinct governmental phases include annihilation, protection, assimilation, integration and advancement, and self-management. Annihilation is generally based on the concept that that this population would die out as a race while protection involves taking the indigenous children away from their parents and placing them in custody of white families or mission families. The assimilation face was pursued until mid-1960's on the basis that the culture of this people would not survive and the assumption that they should integrate into an Australian lifestyle. On the contrary, integration and advancement was a phase characterized by various legislation such as land rights and anti-discrimination legislation. The final phase, which is the current one, is self-management, which is basically the existing government policy (Andrews & Eames, 1994).

In relation to the administration of justice and legal issues to the Australian indigenous people, the population's legal status was mainly complicated by the fact that every state had its own legislation until 1967. As a result, these people have been subjected to a long period of discrimination because of the significant difference in the degree of control that state laws exercised over them. Some of the major differences in these laws included varied definitions of aborigines, differing minimum wage rates, and the enforced limitations on liquor.

The high imprisonment rate of the indigenous population is associated with the inappropriate way with which the law treats the minor crime of public drunkenness. Actually, more than one-third of incarcerated indigenous people are in Australian jails because of being intoxicated in a public place. This has contributed to concerns and recent calls by the Royal Commission for the elimination of the crime of public drunkenness and the establishment of sobering-up centers that serve as alternatives to jails, particularly for these people.

In the past few years, many States have enacted anti-discrimination policies that focus on protecting the disadvantaged groups, especially the indigenous people and other Aborigines. These legislations mainly focus on protecting this population from unfair treatment in housing, provision of services and facilities, and employment. Consequently, the legislations are enforced to also deal with or address the negative social attitudes towards the indigenous people from the non-indigenous Australians. Due to the enactment of these laws, the legal status of the Aboriginal population has improved even though discrimination is still prevalent in the actual operations of the legal system and other people's attitudes.

One of the major concerns and problems brought by the remaining discrimination are police attitudes and behaviors towards the indigenous population. According to the findings of the Royal Commission, police tend to use racist language, cultural insensitivity, and rough treatment in their relations with these people. These attitudes and behaviors have played a significant role in creating great injustice for this group.

While it's impossible to evaluate and determine the exact extent of the indigenous people's over-representation in the criminal justice system, the Royal Commission has reported that a measure of structural bias within the criminal justice system is partly the reason for the population's arrests, incarceration, and detention. Despite the assumption that these people commit more offenses due to certain underlying factors, the high rates of crime do not completely explain the varying jurisdictions in Australia. However, while the Commission cites structural bias as one of the reasons, it acknowledges the existence of several and multifaceted underlying reasons that result in high rates of crime among the indigenous people. Some of these major underlying factors include issues associated with housing, education, employment, substance abuse, and the need for fostering the indigenous family and cultural lifestyle ("Aboriginal People and the Criminal Justice System," n.d.).

Police attitudes, actions, and behaviors towards the Australian indigenous people as well as the structural bias in the criminal justice system has partly resulted suicidal ideation and self-harm for these people. The risk of self-harm and suicidal ideation among the indigenous people occur to those held in custody. The other possible factors that contribute to such thoughts and feelings include the underlying issues that these people continue to face and the widely spread discrimination or negative attitudes from the non-indigenous Australians. This has led to the need for police to adopt necessary measures to evaluate and lessen the risk of self-harm and suicidal ideation.

Evaluating and Mitigating the Risk of Self-Harm and Suicidal Ideation:

Due to the probability of self-harm and suicidal ideation to emerge in incarcerated indigenous people, there is a huge need for police officers to evaluate and mitigate the risk of these aspects to occur. The need for such measures is further enhanced by the fact that the prison experience for the indigenous people is quite different from that of non-indigenous people. This is despite of the fact that prison regimes and standards are developed for the Western society and implemented across all prisoners despite of their descent and background. Some of the major ways for dealing with the risk of self-harm and suicidal ideation as well as improving the prison conditions for the Australian indigenous people include & #8230;

Changing Protocols:

Police officers can effectively assess and mitigate this risk through changing protocols to cater for the majority of indigenous inmates and avoid structural racism ("Improving Aboriginal Prison Conditions," 2012). The need to cater for these specific cultural needs of incarcerated indigenous people across prisons is enhanced by the fact that Australia's prison rates indicate that many prisons currently house a majority of indigenous housemates. While these prisons house many Indigenous inmates, they have not addressed their specific cultural needs, which have significantly contributed to structural racism.

Notably, the concept of structural racism does not imply that individual staffs have racist or discriminatory beliefs or attitudes but is generally looks to outcomes instead of intentions (Harding, 2008). In this case, structural racism occurs if the provision of amenities, conditions, and services show that they will not simply be tolerated in non-indigenous prisons. Therefore, the structural racism originates from systemic difference or the failure of all levels within the organization that raises doubts regarding an individual's own assumptions about what is acceptable. The difficulty associated with this overt and attitudinal racism is that it's more difficult to confront and challenge.

The need for police officers to deal with structural racism is fueled by the fact that it's the major contributing factor towards self-harm and suicidal ideation among indigenous inmates. Police officers can assess and mitigate this risk by identifying conditions or situations adopted in indigenous prisons that are not acceptable or used in the non-indigenous prisons. Following the identification, these officers can proceed to change the protocols while taking into consideration the cultural needs of the indigenous inmates. Such measures would not only be critical in avoiding structural racism that has characterized indigenous prisons but it would help to mitigate the risk of suicidal ideation and self-harm by these inmates.

Adopting Indigenous-sensitive Standards:

The change of protocols to address the risk can be supported by the adoption of indigenous-sensitive standards by police officers. Actually, the Office of the Custodial Inspector has developed and established some aboriginal-sensitive standards. These standards could be helpful in evaluating and mitigating the risks since they address the cultural needs of the indigenous inmates.

Some of these standards include lessening long-distance transports, recognizing leaders in their specific roles in prison, increasing indigenous staff working in the prisons, training the current prison staff to be culturally respectful and stop using racial abuse or slurs, and recognizing the funeral obligations of the indigenous people. The other standards are conducting mandatory health checks when the indigenous prisoners are admitted, preparing for the release of these inmates through suitable training and treatment programs, and releasing the prisoners back to country.

Nonetheless, conducting in-country custody and minimizing long-distance transports have emerged as the two major standards that police officers can use to lessen the risk of self-harm and suicidal ideation among indigenous prisoners. This is primarily because many indigenous inmates are subjected to out-of-country custody in which they are incarcerated several kilometers from their home country. Secondly, long-distance transport contributes to the death of these inmates like in 2008 when it resulted in the painful death of an indigenous prisoner in extreme temperature of 42-degrees.

Necessary Considerations to Satisfy the Duty of Care:

As the oldest inhabitants of the Australian society, the indigenous people are one of the oldest living cultures across the globe (Schnierer, 2010). These indigenous communities continue to live their culture through practicing and handling down tradition, language, knowledge, rituals, and arts. As this population has undergone discrimination throughout its history despite the recent attempts to eliminate the discrimination, there are some necessary considerations to satisfy the duty of care for the group. Some of these considerations include: