Yuendumu trial: I couldn’t have saved Kumanjayi Walker, says remote nurse

A nurse who left Yuendumu shortly before Kumanjayi Walker was shot believes she could not have saved the Aboriginal teenager’s life even with the best available medical support.

Kumanjayi Walker.

A nurse who left Yuendumu shortly before Kumanjayi Walker was shot believes she could not have saved the Aboriginal teenager’s life even with the best ­available medical support, contradicting evidence presented at ­Zachary Rolfe’s murder trial.

The experienced remote-area nurse, who spent several months in Yuendumu, also claimed non-Aboriginal staff working at a local not-for-profit brought “scary” Walker into her clinic under a false name while he was on the run.

Constable Rolfe shot Walker three times after the latter stabbed him with scissors.

Yuendumu clinic staff had left the community earlier that day, in November 2019, after ­enduring a series of break-in ­attempts to their vehicles and living quarters.

Some accounts have characterised the nurses as “fleeing”. A few community members have blamed the nurses for Walker’s death. Cassandra Holland said she did not want to leave Yuendumu but was “ordered” out by Health Department bosses.

Ms Holland was moved to speak after her police statement was leaked to the media, and a prosecution witness in Constable Rolfe’s trial suggested the Yuendumu nurses could have saved Walker’s life had they been in town.

“It’s impossible,” she said.

“Even in the best situation, if I had a full team with me – even if I had the Royal Flying Doctors already in Yuendumu – I still don’t think he would have survived.”

Ms Holland is specially trained in trauma first aid, including some of the advanced procedures Walker would have required to have the best chance of survival.

Nevertheless, she believes getting him to a hospital would still have taken too long.

“People who get life-threatening injuries in remote (areas) often don’t survive,” she said.

Walker had escaped from an alcohol-rehabilitation facility in Alice Springs and was wanted for breaching a court order. He had returned to Yuendumu to attend a relative’s funeral.

Ms Holland described him as a “scary man” and said she believed he was the ringleader behind attempts to break into the nurses’ quarters using picks and shovels.

“He came into the clinic under a brother’s or a cousin’s name. He was wired like you wouldn’t believe,” she said.

“He had broken into the Warlpiri Youth Development Aboriginal Corporation, I think. He was injured, and he was hungry … he was on the run.”

Ms Holland said she asked a colleague to join her so she would not be alone with Walker. Then she went to the clinic kitchen and found him some food.

WYDAC is understood to be in the process of appointing a new CEO. Emails to a media contact address bounced. Messages to other addresses did not receive a reply.

Ms Holland retrained explicitly to work with Indigenous people and delivered care in far north Queensland before moving across to the Northern Territory, including the Barkly region, and finally to Yuendumu – her hardest posting.

She described an incident in which a 14-year-old girl had suffered chest burns from a firecracker during a family dispute and how she had to treat the girl with dozens of angry people outside the room clamouring to get inside.

After leaving Yuendumu, she says she was disciplined by Health Department managers for posting to a Facebook group, warning other nurses to avoid going to Yuendumu.

“I feel safer working in a ­maximum-security jail,” she said.