Death in Yuendumu

Where everything is black and white and nothing is - a haunting true story of death and a search for justice in a remote outback community


Just hours after his grandfather's funeral in the remote Northern Territory community of Yuendumu, nineteen-year-old Warlpiri man Kumanjayi Walker was dead. He'd been shot three times by police constable Zachary Rolfe during an attempted arrest, after Walker had stabbed the officer in the shoulder with a pair of surgical scissors.

Three days later, Rolfe was charged with murder, the first time a police officer had been charged for killing a First Nations person in the Northern Territory in 130 years. Following Rolfe's acquittal, a coronial inquest was called, where Rolfe made sensational allegations about institutional racism within the police force.

In Death in Yuendumu, the ABC journalist who broke the story gives a clear-eyed account of the failed systems that led to this tragedy. Steven Schubert recounts the tragic and disturbing tale of a young Indigenous man with a difficult past and uncertain future; an ex-military policeman who became mired in allegations of misconduct; a family in mourning; and a community fighting for justice.

Death in Yuendumu is powerful, haunting, riveting and unforgettable - it describes a world in which everything is black and white, and yet nothing is.