Police ‘ignored’ transgender Aboriginal woman who tried to report rape

One of the officers told the court when the woman ‘yelled out something along the lines of I’ve been raped’ he ‘just stood there’ without saying anything before later going back to patrolling the CBD.

The court heard police ‘ignored’ the woman’s pleas for help after she was allegedly raped outside the Throb nightclub on New Year’s Day last year.

A transgender Aboriginal woman who tried to report being raped outside a Darwin nightclub was “ignored by no less than four police officers” while the alleged perpetrator walked away, a court has heard.

Crown prosecutor Tami Grealy told the Supreme Court last month the man was eventually tracked down and charged — before being acquitted on all charges — after the woman was finally able to flag down a female police officer on horseback.

Ms Grealy said the woman told detectives she had chased the man past police who were guarding a broken window at the nearby BWS after he allegedly raped her outside Throb.

“I just spotted the police officer, so I ran straight to him and (the man) ran past the police officer and then I ran toward him and kept pointing at him and the police didn’t believe what happened,” the woman told investigators.

Ms Grealy said closed-circuit television cameras backed up the woman’s account of her interactions with police on the night.

“There were police officers at Woolworths, there were other people around, the accused did go past the police, (she) did call out for help, she did point out the accused, that’s corroborated by the CCTV,” she said.

“It’s even acknowledged by the two police officers involved, there is clear evidence that (she) had told them that she was raped and that the police response was as she described, they did nothing, the man that she had been following got away.

“By the time she gets to a police officer who’ll listen to her, the accused is already gone.”

The man was acquitted on all charges in the Supreme Court last week. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

One of the officers guarding the break-in scene, Senior Constable Mark Derksen, told the court he was “just maintaining the scene, making sure that no one else gained entry or stole anything” when the woman approached him.

“He (sic) yelled out something along the lines of ‘I’ve been raped’,” he said.

When asked what he did in response, Constable Derksen replied that he “just stood there” without saying anything.

“There was another person walked along and believe walked past and at some point they’ve come back and said that someone needs their assistance before she told me that I should be doing my job and she left the area,” he said.

“The complainant walked back to our area and sat down maybe five metres away on the ground near us.

“He (sic) said that he’d (sic) been raped to me again, I asked him (sic) whereabouts, he (sic) said ‘in my arse’.”

Ms Grealy asked “Did you respond to that at all?” to which Constable Derksen replied “No.”

“After that, the complainant stood up, said that he (sic) was going to report me and walked past further up past Woolworths,” he said.

“I went back to patrolling around the CBD.”

A spokeswoman for NT Police said: “The overall response to this incident was thoroughly reviewed and later resolved through the NTP internal discipline process to ensure the highest levels of accountability.”