00:01We're taking you now to Cairns and to a media conference with police speaking about the
00:06death of a woman struck by a police vehicle.
00:09It has changed the life of a family forever.
00:14It has also been felt by the officers involved and the QPS as a whole.
00:21My sympathies go out to the family and friends of the 71-year-old woman.
00:28Police officers go out every day to serve and protect their community.
00:33A tragedy like this is not something we ever want to see happen.
00:39Around 6.55am this morning, police were called to a traffic incident at the intersection of
00:46Sheridan and Lillie Streets in Cairns North.
00:49Following reports, a marked police vehicle had collided with a 71-year-old woman.
00:56The officers in the vehicle called for further assistance.
00:59They provided immediate medical treatment to the woman.
01:04She was taken to Cairns Hospital with life-threatening injuries and was sadly declared deceased a
01:10short time later.
01:13The scene was immediately secured and the officers involved were taken away from the scene.
01:19Both the Forensic Crash Unit and the Ethical Standards Command are investigating to determine exactly how this incident has occurred.
01:32I can assure family and friends in the wider community that there will be full, thorough investigations by Ethical Standards
01:44Command with the oversight from Crime and Corruption Commission and the coroner.
01:50We are providing as much support as possible to the family of the woman.
01:56As I said, no police officer shows up to work expecting to be involved in a situation like
02:01this.
02:02And we will continue to provide support to those officers involved, the first responders and
02:09the wider QBS family who will be impacted by this.
02:14I am happy to take questions.
02:16However, there will be some information that I cannot give out today and that is because of
02:23the current investigation but also with respect to the family and friends of the 71-year-old
02:30woman.
02:30So thank you.
02:39So that will form part of the investigation.
02:44So, yes, they will be tested at the scene and that does form part of any investigation like
02:53this.
02:53Can you confirm whether the officers were responding to an active emergency at the time
02:59of the incident?
03:00If so, what was that call for service?
03:02Again, that will form part of the investigation and so I don't want to speculate now until we've
03:07got the full facts.
03:09And as I said, we want to know answers.
03:12We want to be able to give answers to the family and friends.
03:21Same response.
03:23It's part of the investigation and like I said, the investigation will continue.
03:28We'll have answers.
03:29We'll be able to give answers to the family.
03:32It might be the same situation with this question but was the vehicle under lights and
03:38sirens at the time of the crash shot?
03:40Again, same response.
03:42Have you been able to look at the dash cam or the body on camera from the incident?
03:47As I said, the investigation team will look at that.
03:52I guess what's important here is we need time for the investigation team to do their work.
03:58But what I could say is that we are appealing for witnesses that maybe have been passing
04:04when the event occurred.
04:05They may have been on, they may have had their own dash cam working.
04:10So we would like to hear from anyone that might have information around the event.
04:15Has the driver been charged yet?
04:17Are we expecting any charges to be late?
04:20We'll do the investigation first.
04:22And how many officers were actually inside the vehicle at the time of the crash?
04:26There were three.
04:27And were any of them injured?
04:30No.
04:31What were the ranks of those officers?
04:33I can tell you that there was one sergeant and two senior constables.
04:37And which of them was driving?
04:39That will form part of the investigation.
04:41What was the crew doing prior to these days?
04:44So the investigation will look at prior to what happened before the crash.
04:50They'll look at what occurred at the scene.
04:54And that will form part of any recommendations going forward.
04:58Based on the information that you have so far, are there any clear breaches of policy or procedure that are
05:04standing out to you?
05:05Or might this just be a tragic accident?
05:08Again, I'm not going to speculate until I've got the full facts.
05:11The investigation's finished.
05:13Police be classified as urgent duty driving.
05:16Sorry.
05:17Police be classified as urgent duty driving.
05:19Again, that will form part of the investigation.
05:22Police have obviously been speaking a lot this week about road safety given it is National Road Safety Week.
05:28What does it say that police are involved in this kind of incident in National Road Safety Week?
05:36Well, I guess, you know, there's a couple of things I'd say.
05:41Firstly, our staff come to work to do a really good job.
05:45And no one wants this to happen, you know, within their workspace.
05:53The road toll is unacceptable.
05:57And we all, as drivers on the road, need take responsibility for that.
06:02And so, like I said, this is a really sad, sad case.
06:09And no police officer wants to come to work to do this.
06:13So we'll just have to wait and see and work through the investigation.
06:16And so how confident are you, for now at least, that the officers involved acted in line with their training
06:22and all of the policies and procedures of QPS?
06:26Our people are trained really well.
06:30They're good people doing really good work out there.
06:33But the investigation will tell us if there's been any wrongdoing.
06:38Will those all green cops remain in active duty while the investigation is ongoing?
06:45That decision will be made once we have more information.
06:49When do you expect that decision to be made?
06:52That will be a conversation with ethical command.
06:58They'll make that decision.
07:00What support is being offered both to the family of the woman and also the police officers involved?
07:10What support is being offered to all parties?
07:12Yep.
07:13So for the family, we'll offer that any support that they need to help them with the situation.
07:23I won't go into details, but certainly from a police perspective, our police staff will be well supported by our
07:31welfare people.
07:32For more information, it will come up with their Court to us.
07:32We'll put the staff in a village in a village, but certainly we'll be there.
07:32I'll put the staff in a village as to a police officer.
07:33I'll put the staff in a village as to a police officer, the police officer and the police officer.
07:35And I won't let you look into that, too.
Comments