Australians behaving badly in Bali forces police to act
A spate of drug arrests and booze-fuelled incidents have dramatically risen in favourite Aussie holiday spot Bali — and local authorities have had enough.
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Brawling Aussies and booze-fuelled bad behaviour — with the possibility of a night or two in the Kuta lockup — is so common in Bali that locals and tourists barely raise an eyebrow when the news breaks.
This week dozens of additional police have been put on patrols in areas deemed hot zones for street violence, including outside the Seminyak nightclub La Favela, which was the scene of many recent outbreaks of alcohol-induced aggression.
Social media platforms and the Denpasar District Court’s evidence room contain multiple videos of violent clashes and the Australian accent looms large on the footage.
October became a flashpoint for boozed-up brawling with;
• Melbourne Storm’s Nelson Asofa-Solomona unleashing his fury in a Seminyak street fight;
• an Adelaide tradie facing court over brutally fly-kicking a motorcyclist from his bike ninja-style;
• an Aussie film maker thrown into a lockup after throwing drunken punches following a boozy breakfast in a Kuta cafe and;
• a Gold Coast carpenter facing seven years in jail for bag snatching in Canggu.
Despite a visible boost in law enforcement on the streets, another raging melee broke out this week outside of Seminyak nightclub La Favela and was caught on video.
A woman is violently thrown out to the street and she immediately attacks the man responsible. Nothing is held back and the incident turns into an all-out brawl as men jump in to defend the woman.
A male Aussie accent is heard to yell “you don’t punch a girl’ as the free-for-all continues with the club’s security.
Now – Balinese police have had enough.
Police chief Petrus Reinhard Golose said local law enforcement has no tolerance for incendiary behaviour.
“There are lot of trouble makers everywhere (and) we will arrest them. We will arrest
violators,” Mr Golose told News Corp this week.
Last month was a horror stretch for raw street rampages among Aussies on holiday in Indonesia.
In response to berserk Aussies creating public uproar, Kuta police has beefed up their presence with 50 officers on standby every night.
According to North Kuta police chief, Dewa Putu Gede Anom Danujaya the flow of fight video has triggered the action.
“We are working with Kuta police station and making a combined effort with our security, particularly after seeing the videos of so many fights. North Kuta and Kuta police are directly leading a program of increased security (and a) greater presence on the street,” Mr Danujaya said.
It is well understood among police that alcohol is the major player when it comes to cases of assault.
“Friction usually starts when people are drunk in nightclubs. People are offended and that leads to friction and that has the potential for fights to break out,” Mr Danujaya said.
Recent footage went viral when, in broad daylight, traffic in Kuta ground to a halt as a group of brawling Australians spilt from the footpath to the street.
Tourists and locals looked on in horror as men launched at each other while women threw wild punches and pushed a man to the ground.
On the video one woman is captured kicking a shirtless man who writhes on the road in front of a car.
Attempts by police and security to stop the clash from unfolding appeared futile.
The confronting broadcast was uploaded to you Tube just days after another video captured Australian men fighting outside of the notorious Seminyak nightclub La Favela.
The group of athletic looking men are caught in a savage fracas on the road outside of the club.
These two incidents – which were not reported to police – came in the wake of the Melbourne Storm’s two-metre-tall front rower Nelson Asofa-Solomona’s now infamous nightclub turned street fight during an end of season holiday in Bali.
Also in October, Melbourne man Phoenix Daniel John Hanna was sentenced to five months’ jail in Bali’s overcrowded Kerobokan jail for tasering and assaulting his housemate and former friend of 20 years Nicholas James Carkeek — aka Nic Minniti — during a dispute about the North Kuta villa they shared.
According to Hanna’s police statement Carkeek/Minniti attempted to withdraw the allegation with the police before he fled back to Melbourne.
Earlier in the year, Sydney man Simon Wilson Menzies, 39, was stabbed in the stomach at the Santa Fe Grill in Seminyak.
Police allege that Menzies was drunkenly yelling at people passing the restaurant when American John Bruce Lews entered the diner.
He attempting to ignore Menzies but the Australian pushed Lews to the ground and hit him repeatedly. Police claim that Lews then produced a knife and stabbed Menzies in the stomach. The Australian was rushed to hospital.
The majority of boozed up brawls fly under the radar and don’t rate a mention in
local media.
In September, Wollongong personal trainer Michael Gregory Franklin, 37, allegedly
flew into a rage after drinking heavily at Seminyak’s La Favela nightclub where he
went “berserk” before shouting and kicking before trashing several motorbikes
parked on the street.
He was handed over to Kuta Police where he spent the night passed out in the lock
up. Once he regained consciousness, police returned him to his Legian hotel without
charge.
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The list of aggressive drunk Aussies is long.
“There was a recent incident between and three Australian men and one New
Zealander in a street fight in Sanur. We did not record their identity as they did not
make a report,” SAID south Denpasar police chief Nyoman Wirajaya.
“The parent of one Australian man in the fight paid RP4.5 million ($450) to the owner of a jewellery shop where a glass door was broken due to the fight.”
Bali’s deputy Governor Tjokorda Oka Artha Ardhana Sukawati, said that violent
tourists breaking the law will be deported.
“Of course we have to deport them. This is the only way to ensure that they will not
come back and repeat their actions,” he said.
Bali politicians have been given a special green light from the central government in
Jakarta to improve the quality of tourists coming to the island by controlling the numbers and prices of accommodation rooms after the floodgates were opened when Indonesia switched to free holiday visas.
“Once Jakarta allowed many travellers to come to Bali with a free visa we immediately became less strict on who enters the island for a holiday. So badly behaved tourists have become a serious matter for law enforcement,” Mr Sukawati said.
Scientists report that just two vodka-based drinks can trigger changes in the brain
region linked to aggression. And when it comes to boozy holidays in Bali, alcohol-induced blackouts are not uncommon.
Adelaide tradie Nicholas Carr claims to have consumed 20-30 vodka-based drinks before launching into brutal rampage where he viscously fly-kicked an innocent motorcyclist from his bike at 5.30am and raged through town raiding a house and terrifying locals.
“On the night of August 9, I drank a lot of vodka in Seminyak. Because I drank a lot,
my memory was unclear. I woke up in hospital,” Carr told the court during his trial for assault.
At any one-time, Bali hosts about 20,000 Aussie tourists and Indonesia is second only to New Zealand as our favourite destination.
Of the 1.2 million Australians who visit Indonesia every year, the majority stay in Bali – an island without any RSA laws and a cultural problem with saying ‘no’ to foreign guests.
A continuous supply of cheap booze and relentless heat can cause serious dehydration, fray tempers and impair judgment.
According to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s most recent figures from
2017-2018, Indonesia tops the list of countries for assault cases with 23 reports and
is second to Thailand for the number of Australian’s landing in hospital, which was
143 people in 2017-18.
The Bali Consulate had a total o 480 assistance call outs in 2017-18, which included
32 arrests.
Bad behaviour in Indonesia comes at cost – and not just of national pride and personal injury. The majority of travel insurance providers have a blanket exclusion for drugs and alcohol use.
The big shiny private hospitals in Bali aimed at tourists — and where English is spoken —
often demand payment upfront and costs can quickly escalate to thousands of dollars.
While Bali is becoming infamous for alcohol-related violence and brawling Aussies as it is famous for its beaches and relaxed holiday vibe, emergency medicine consultant Dr David Caldicott of Canberra’s Calvary Hospitals believes that personality is key to what separates aggressive drunks from everyone else.
“I think the reality is that the sort of people who are going out and hitting other people when they are drunk are the sort of people who would go out and hit other people when sober,” he said.
Originally published as Australians behaving badly in Bali forces police to act