Queensland Indigenous leader facing violence, drug charges

One of Queensland’s most influential Aboriginal leaders, Murrandoo Yanner, has been charged with domestic violence offences and supplying methamphetamines.

Murrandoo Yanner. Picture: Stewart McLean

One of Queensland’s most influential Aboriginal leaders has been charged with domestic violence offences and supplying methamphetamines in the state’s remote northwest.

Murrandoo Yanner, who in the 1990s famously led the successful fight for First Nations people to hunt traditional food on their country, fronted Mt Isa Court on Friday charged with five counts of dangerous drug supply, one count of possession, one count of fraud and two counts of unlawful stalking, a domestic violence offence.

He was arrested at Burketown in the Gulf of Carpentaria late last month.

A Mt Isa magistrate will decide whether to grant Mr Yanner, 50, bail on Tuesday after police ­ opposed his application.

Police on Friday said Mr Yanner’s five drug supply charges were for the supply of methylamphetamine, cannabis and MDMA ­(ecstasy.

“On August 25 a 50-year-old Burketown man was charged with five counts of supplying dangerous drugs, two counts of unlawful stalking (domestic violence offence) and one count each of fraud, possessing dangerous drugs, possessing anything used in the commission of crime and damaging evidence with intent,” a police statement read.

Mr Yanner is a Gangalidda man from Burketown, in the lower Gulf, who served as the chief executive of the Carpentaria Land Council Aboriginal Corporation between 1992 and 2001 before ­becoming an ATSIC commissioner for a year.

He rose to prominence in 1994 when he used a traditional form of harpoon to catch two small crocodiles on Aboriginal land near ­Doomadgee, in the Gulf.

He and other members of the Gunnamulla clan caught and ate the crocodile meat, and Mr Yanner froze the remaining meat and kept the skins.

He was charged with taking and keeping fauna without a permit under Queensland’s Fauna Conservation Act. Mr Yanner went on to win a High Court battle confirming hunting, gathering and fishing rights of Indigenous people.

The majority of High Court judges – led by then chief justice Murray Gleeson – found Mr Yanner did not contravene the state law because it did not extinguish his rights as a native title holder.

Former chief executive of the Carpentaria Land Council Aboriginal Corporation Murrandoo Yanner. Picture: Anna Rogers

The court was told the Gangalidda people of the Gulf had always sustainably hunted and fished in the river systems of the region, and the crocodile was part of their traditional diet.

In 1996, Mr Yanner led protests and sit-ins that held up the establishment of the Century zinc mine, 250km north of Mt Isa, until they had reached a compensation agreement

He was a vocal critic of police after the watch-house killing of his cousin, Mulrunji Doomadgee, who died in custody on Palm ­Island in 2004.

In 2020, Mr Yanner hit the headlines again when he clashed with One Nation leader Pauline Hanson at the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair, in a video that went viral.

“You’re just a racist redneck with your red hair. Go back to ­Ipswich and your fish and chip shop,” Mr Yanner said in the video. “You are intellectually dishonest and you’re not welcome here.”

If you or someone you know is affected by domestic or family violence, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732. In an emergency,
call triple-0.