‘Mayhem’: 72 hours of hell in Alice Springs
Alice Springs residents have described a weekend of hell, with stolen cars, sexual assaults, and children looting and ransacking shops.
As the rest of the country carries on as normal, residents in Alice Springs have endured yet another weekend of terror as locals describe being held hostage by crime.
National attention towards anti-social behaviour in the rural Northern Territory town reached fever pitch earlier this year after a surge in offences. With a brief visit from Anthony Albanese, troubled Alice Springs faded from the headlines, but residents say the violence rages on.
Here are just some of the shocking incidents that rocked the town of 25,000 people this weekend.
Have a similar story? Get in touch — chloe.whelan@news.com.au
Young girl sexually assaulted in Woolworths
Local business owner Darren Clark, who runs the Action for Alice Facebook page, said last weekend was one of the worst for crime that his town had seen in some time.
A 15-year-old girl and an older woman were allegedly sexually assaulted in broad daylight at Alice Springs Woolworths on Sunday, according to multiple witness reports.
Off-duty police officers and supermarket staff responded to the “traumatising” incident, the witnesses said. NT Police and Woolworths have been contacted for comment.
Elsewhere, an aggressive bushfire raged in a residential area by Alice Springs airport for the second time in two days.
The fire burned overnight into Monday morning on Colonel Rose Drive in the town’s south and destroyed multiple properties before Fire and Rescue NT could extinguish the blaze.
The initial fire, which burned into Saturday morning, was believed to have been deliberately lit.
The bushfires were not the only fires burning in Alice Springs on Sunday. That same night, neighbours were evacuated after an abandoned house on Bruce Street went up in flames in a suspected case of arson.
Primary schoolers ransack local business
A slew of businesses were broken into in the early hours of Saturday morning, including the ransacking of Alice Fish and Chips for the second time this week.
Shocking footage provided to Action for Alice showed a group of young children smashing the store’s glass front door and climbing inside. The boys then threw the store’s cash register to the floor, busting it open and stealing its contents.
Most distressing was the ages of the children in the clip. Some appeared to be primary schoolers.
NT Police made a public call-out for information in relation to two more incidents of unlawful entry on Saturday morning that resulted in the theft of three cars from two businesses.
Strike Force Viper, a force established to address property crime and vehicle theft in Alice Springs, was investigating the incidents, police said.
They released a further call for information in relation to three cases of suspected arson on Saturday, after multiple videos emerged of cars engulfed in flames.
Police received reports of three vehicles on fire in different parts of the town between 4.20 and 5am on Saturday, a spokesperson said. The fires have been extinguished and an investigation is ongoing.
75-year-old woman’s home targeted
News.com.au previously reported what local Mr Clark described as “another night of total anarchy” in the earliest hours of the weekend.
Mr Clark described reports of a 75-year-old woman whose home was broken into overnight on Friday, just two months after she was allegedly threatened with an axe at the same property.
He shared footage of a home burned to the ground and several clips of police cars chasing allegedly stolen vehicles.
The cars, Mr Clark said on Monday, were being used to hoon and raid bottle shops. One allegedly stolen Toyota Prado was seen crashed into the Alice Springs Shopping Centre, causing serious damage to the stores facing the road.
Several businesses including an Indigenous TV station were ransacked, Mr Clark said. A car full of technical equipment was stolen and the store’s roller door found crumpled and discarded on the other side of the road.
‘Don’t ignore us’
Speaking at the weekend’s close on Monday morning, Mr Clark said Alice Springs was in “mayhem”.
“You can’t make this stuff up. It is out of control,” he told Sky News.
“Little kids are out on the streets. There are kids, young girls not even up to my kneecap, walking the streets at night. What the hell is going on?”
Mr Clark, who said he had “given up” on the NT government, had a sobering message for the Prime Minister.
“You have to come up and see this for yourself,” he said when asked to deliver a personal message to Mr Albanese.
“Walk the streets at four in the morning and talk to these little kids. Go see the people in Darwin and see for yourself what’s going on. Go to Katherine and Tennant Creek. This is a state of emergency. We are going to lose more lives.”
Mr Clark said NT residents were “fed up” with the lack of action.
“They’re scared, they’re worried, their livelihoods are ruined,” he said.
“You can’t expect people in the Northern Territory to stay silent … Albo, don’t ignore us because we’re not going away. I will fight and fight and fight for the people of the Northern Territory, for the people of my town that you have ignored.”
‘We lost’: Tourism operators flee Alice
A local tourism operator told of the “harsh reality” in Alice Springs as business owners flee what was once a thriving tourist town in the heart of the country.
The industry veteran, who went unnamed, said in a post to a local community board that they had been hosting tours in the area for almost 50 years and had “thoroughly enjoyed showing Alice to thousands of visitors”.
“Now it is a very different story. As their guides around town, we have no choice but to ask [tourists] not to go out in town after dark,” the business owner said.
“In the past, they would walk around the mall, have an evening coffee or perhaps an ice cream, visit a hotel or restaurant for dinner. Alice was such a great place to show off. Not any more.
“It’s now dangerous and visitors just want to get out of the place … Anyone trying to run any business in Alice is currently beating their head against a brick wall with very little support. Look after your families, your fight is now over and we lost.”
A crime wave grips the NT
Alice Springs is not the only hotspot for crime and anti-social behaviour in the NT, according to Mr Clark.
A crime wave has swept large parts of the territory in recent months, culminating in the death of a young bottle shop worker in Darwin last week.
A 19-year-old man has been charged with murder over the death of Declan Laverty, 20, who was allegedly stabbed to death after refusing to provide alcohol to a customer at a drive-through BWS.
Member for Namatjira Bill Yan, who has lived in Alice Springs for 30 years and manages the town’s correctional centre, said the constant shuffling of police resources around the NT pointed to a dire shortage of officers and constant surges of crime.
Speaking to Sky News on Monday, Mr Yan slammed the federal and NT governments as “out of touch” and said it was time for Mr Albanese to “come back and have a decent look” at crime in the territory.
A large portion of the criminal behaviour came down to a “child protection problem”, Mr Yan said.
“If you look at some of the kids that are out on the street in the middle of the night, the police take them home. Mum and dad are often unable to care for them,” he said.
“These kids, some of them out there, are stealing just to get food because they’re hungry.”
Have a similar story? Get in touch – chloe.whelan@news.com.au
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