TV star Matt Wright trial live: Chopper pilot had 'party animal' reputation, Mr Wright 'cracked the whip' on paperwork
Mr Wright has pleaded not guilty to three counts of attempting to pervert the course of justice following a fatal chopper crash that killed his close friend and co-star, Chris "Willow" Wilson.
The charges relate to alleged events in the days and months after the crash, which occurred more than three years ago during a crocodile egg-collecting mission in remote Arnhem Land.
None of the charges against Mr Wright relate to the cause of the chopper crash.
Sebastian Robinson, who was piloting the aircraft at the time of the crash, has been accused of taking drugs in the months leading up to the crash — but he is not facing any criminal charges.
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ABC News
an hour ago
- ABC News
Domestic violence and a vicious shooting left Rawson with PTSD and a choice: would it make or break him?
Striding up busy Bondi Road in Sydney's aspirational eastern suburbs, personal trainer Rawson Kirkhope is a picture of strength and confidence — all delts and abs and quads and tattoos on tanned skin. He looks fit and well. But Kirkhope hasn't always felt that way inside. For years he has lived with complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a consequence of growing up in a violent home and, when he was 14, watching his father bash and shoot his mother as she cowered on the bathroom floor in front of him. For years after the shooting Kirkhope tried to outrun his trauma, self-medicating with booze to blur the sharp edges of anxiety, soaking in the "toxic cultures" of football and the navy where the M.O. seemed to be: don't ever show you're in pain or struggling, just get on with it, man up. Lately, though, he's been speaking out, sharing snippets of his "difficult past" on social media, talking in more detail about his "mental health journey" on podcasts, turning a struggle he was once ashamed of into a recovery story he's proud to share. Speaking publicly about his PTSD has been cathartic, a form of therapy, says Kirkhope, a co-owner of VRTUS, a Bondi gym whose ethos revolves around community, vulnerability and connection. He also wants to brighten the spotlight on domestic violence: on the deep physical and psychological scars it leaves — including on children, who are often referred to as "invisible victims" — and the sting of injustice he and many others have felt. For shooting his mother and at his sister his father was sentenced to four years' imprisonment and was released on parole after two. Weighed against the harm done to his family, Kirkhope feels strongly it wasn't enough. Because Kirkhope's experience of abuse remains disturbingly common. Almost 44 per cent of young people surveyed for the Australian Child Maltreatment Study reported being exposed to domestic violence as children, with shocking numbers disclosing they'd suffered physical abuse (32 per cent), emotional abuse (31 per cent) and sexual abuse (29 per cent) themselves. Crucially, those who experienced at least one kind of maltreatment were much more likely to have severe health issues: they were three times more likely to have depressive and anxiety disorders and problems with alcohol, and five times more likely to be diagnosed with PTSD. "It's crazy that this is still going on," says Kirkhope, now 38. "Especially with how much education we have around domestic violence — maybe that's something we can do more of. But it's horrible, and it's why I've decided to share my story … I want other people to know they can get through it. You're not alone." Kirkhope's father — an "angry, arrogant, vindictive guy" — had always been violent, he says. But he became even more so after sustaining serious head injuries in a car accident in 1987, which impaired his ability to control his temper. His mother Angela copped the worst of it — he still remembers the shame of her driving him to school with black eyes, of feeling powerless to help — but he and his older sister Amelia suffered as well. Growing up on a farm about 40 minutes' drive from Launceston in Tasmania, Kirkhope lived in a "constant state of fear". He became so hypervigilant he could tell what kind of mood his dad was in from the way he'd drive up their long gravel driveway (fast meant bad). "You'd do everything you could to avoid that bad mood coming on," he says. Eventually, just before he finished primary school, Angela managed to leave. They moved into Launceston and, for a while, things seemed relatively calm. But in February 2001, the night before Kirkhope was supposed to start year nine, his dad barged into their home, having spotted Angela inside with a man she'd just started seeing. He shot at Amelia with a semi-automatic pistol, narrowly missing her, then chased Angela into the bathroom, striking her over the head with his gun and calling her a "two-timing bitch" as he shot her. Miraculously, she survived. But Kirkhope, who watched on in horror from the shower, thought his mother had been killed. The bullet fractured her arm, shattered her sixth rib, passed through her lung and lodged in her liver, where it remains today (she still limits her travel because it's distressing having to explain to airport security why she sets off the metal detector). Kirkhope doesn't remember much about what happened next; he knows his father smashed the telephone on his way out, making it harder to call police, and that Amelia found him under his bed. He didn't go back to school for three months. Having to testify against his father in court was another trauma. "I felt like I was telling on him, which is a crazy way of looking at it now," Kirkhope says. "I wanted him to be held accountable but … I didn't want to have to go up against him. I still wanted his approval." His dad was found guilty of two counts of aggravated assault and one count of committing an unlawful act intended to cause bodily harm. He pleaded not guilty, though, claiming he'd "slipped" and accidentally shot his ex-wife. At his sentencing hearing the judge called out his "cunning and violent temperament" and concluded he was "an all too typical example of a man who uses violence in a domestic situation and thereafter refuses to fully accept responsibility for the grievous wrong done". It still bothers Kirkhope that his dad's initial charges — two counts of attempted murder — didn't stick. He says a prosecutor told his mother that they were being withdrawn because his dad, who'd served in the army, was a good shot and could have killed her if he wanted to. In other words, proving that he intended to kill was going to be difficult. "But they also didn't take into account that he was right-handed when he was in the army," Kirkhope says. "Because he was later paralysed down his right side, he shot [Mum] with his left hand. I think they could have easily argued it." It would be years before Kirkhope understood the impact of the trauma he'd experienced, that it had a name. Complex PTSD can develop in people who have been exposed to prolonged and repeated traumatic events, often interpersonal in nature, from which escape can seem impossible: chronic childhood abuse, domestic violence, and living in war zones are common examples. "I was just a nervous wreck most of the time, constantly in fight-or-flight … always surveying the room, always looking for an 'out' in every conversation I had," Kirkhope says. Serving in the navy for eight years after he left school and hanging out in macho footy clubs made it easier to ignore the pain. He drank, too, to numb his anxiety, to forget. He struggled to sleep. He pushed people away and "sabotaged" relationships — a subconscious strategy to leave before he could be left. "My mind was just constantly on," Kirkhope says. "I felt like I was just floating through life and didn't really have any purpose." It took a relationship breakdown a few years ago for him to finally get professional help. He's worked with several therapists — talking, feeling and journalling his way through shame, guilt and grief, learning his triggers and how to manage them. He recognised his "victim mindset" — his "poor me" negativity spiral — was holding him back and that positivity was the path out. And he's only recently stopped seeking in other people the validation he didn't get from his dad. "When he passed away when I was 19, it set me back big time," says Kirkhope, who wishes he'd been able to talk to his father about what he did — whether he was remorseful, "how it was going to result in him and I having a relationship". It probably wouldn't have changed anything, he says. "But it would have given me some closure. I would have been able to move on with my life a lot easier." Perhaps one of Kirkhope's most powerful weapons has been friendship, especially with Hamish Young, with whom he runs VRTUS. Young was waiting for Kirkhope when he eventually went back to school in year nine, ready to support and protect him, and the two have been best mates since, bonding over their respective troubles — Kirkhope's trauma and Young's battle with Crohn's disease. "Hamo is a brilliant man. He's very calm, very level-headed … He actually lives upstairs from me now, we do everything together," Kirkhope says. "My granddad bought me a weight bench when I was 15 and Hamish and myself just started training — we'd catch the bus home from school and train … we became kind of obsessed with it. We'd sit there and design the gyms that we were going to open one day." The duo flung open the doors of VRTUS — named for the Roman goddess, Virtus — in late 2021, hoping to tap into the loneliness and listlessness many people were feeling during COVID lockdowns. "Community and connection was something that had been taken away from people, so we really tried to focus on that," Kirkhope says. "We put a big emphasis on getting to know every single member. And we don't care if we have the most technical coaches in the world, it's about how they communicate, how they make people feel. We want people to feel welcome, that for the hour they're there, it's the best hour of the day for them." Really, it all boils down to this: "I'm trying to help others by doing what's helped me," Kirkhope says. "Getting together with like-minded people, training together, moving your body, letting them know what's worked for me: discipline, structure and routine … talking, sharing." Not that it has always come easy. Before he first spoke publicly about growing up with domestic violence and PTSD — on Instagram in 2022 — Kirkhope says he wrote and deleted and rewrote the post "probably 20 times" before he finally worked up the courage to share it. His fear? "Judgement? People thinking I was doing it for the wrong reasons, just to get a bit of clout, I guess." It was maximum vulnerability. What came back, though — to that post and others since — made it all worth it: hundreds of messages of "Thank you", of "I'm going through something similar", and "I wish more people were this open". "It's a big thing, something I couldn't do for years," Kirkhope says. "Mum's so proud of me for telling this story, I wouldn't do it without her backing. I guess I'm her voice as well, and she wants me to share on the off chance it helps other people … And for me, talking has been the best thing I could have done. I'm not hiding behind quick fixes and escapes anymore."
ABC News
an hour ago
- ABC News
'Lessons to be learned' after AFP gun fired during Sydney Airport arrest
A security expert says he expects there will be "lessons" from an internal review into how a police firearm was discharged during an attempted arrest at Sydney Airport. Australian Federal Police (AFP) officers were responding to reports of a man allegedly acting suspiciously inside the T2 domestic terminal about 6am on Wednesday morning. It is alleged that when officers tried to speak with the man, he became verbally and physically aggressive. A current and retired NSW police officer who were both in the area at the time also assisted with the incident. During the arrest, an AFP firearm was discharged into a nearby cafe wall and oven. No one was injured. A 41-year-old man from Victoria has since been charged with obstructing and hindering a Commonwealth official, and creating a disturbance at an airport. An internal review has been launched into how the gun, a short-barrelled rifle, was fired. AFP acting commander Scott Raven said while he could not comment on the circumstances, he was grateful no one was injured. "All our AFP officers are professional, highly trained and skilled, and as part of their duties at all our airports, we have a counterterrorism first response, and that includes carrying short-barrelled firearms," he said. "When that firearm discharged, it was very low to the ground, and it was ultimately lodged only a metre away from where the firearm was discharged into an oven, into that cafe." Security expert Neil Fergus, who is the chief executive officer of consultancy firm Intelligent Risks, has welcomed the review into how the gun was discharged. Mr Fergus, who has advised the federal government on two major reviews of airport security, said it was possible the AFP may need to review its protocols. "I'm not criticising the officers concerned, (but) there are always lessons to be learned from any of these incidents," he said. "When the AFP are called by airport staff to deal with a matter like this, they are very well-prepared and trained to deal with it, but were their protocols and training sufficient in this case? That's going to be something for AFP professional standards to look at." AFP officers began using short-barrelled rifles in major Australian airports in 2019 as part of beefed-up counterterrorism measures. Mr Fergus said he was confident such firearms were necessary as AFP officers had to deal with "very challenging circumstances, virtually every day". He pointed to a recent security breach at Avalon Airport in Victoria, in which a 17-year-old allegedly boarded a flight armed with a loaded shotgun, as another example of the "serious nature of airport security". "The point is that the police have to be appropriately equipped to deal with all those sorts of contingencies," he said. Mr Fergus said he hoped the findings from the internal review would be made public. "I don't think they would be going into the operational detail of their preparedness and exercising, but there'll need to be some sort of statement made." The 41-year-old man has been granted conditional bail and will face Sydney's Downing Centre Local Court on September 1.
ABC News
an hour ago
- ABC News
Information kept secret, despite senior Tasmanian official questioning why redactions made
A senior Tasmanian department official internally suggested some of the redactions to a Right to Information document did not "stack up", before the document was ultimately sent redacted to the ABC. The ABC had requested department correspondence on the issue of Tasmanian children being kept in watch houses, also known as reception prisons. An "issues register" document detailing staff concerns and Department of Justice responses to those concerns was accidentally sent unredacted to the ABC in July. It was followed minutes later by the properly redacted version, which blacked out most of the 14-page document. Having access to both versions of the same document has allowed the ABC to analyse what was redacted and scrutinise the reasons given for each redaction. The ABC has since used the Right to Information (RTI) process to ask for internal communications on the decision to redact the document. Newly obtained emails show one senior government employee had reservations about the reason for blacking out some of the information in the document, before its release. The director of the Justice Department's Office of the Secretary, which is the office that manages RTI requests, said she was unsure that a legal exemption for personally identifiable information could be used. In an email to the RTI officer, she wrote: "I've just had a look at the proposed redactions and my only additional comment for your consideration is in relation to page 2 and the s36 exemption. Doesn't that require the identity of the person to be ascertainable from the information? If so, I'm not sure the two dot points redacted stack up?" The correspondence in the emails ends there. The ABC has asked what the response was to the email. The two dot points suggested, and ultimately redacted for the reason of personally identifiable information, read: The dot points were examples prison staff gave for why the environment of a watch house may be unsuitable for young people. Section 36 is an exemption under Tasmanian RTI legislation that stops personally identifying information from being made public, as a protective measure. The legislation states: Information is exempt information if its disclosure under this act would involve the disclosure of the personal information of a person other than the person making an application under section 13. It defines personal information as being information in which an individual's identity is "apparent or reasonably ascertainable". Before obtaining these internal emails, the use of section 36 in this watch house document had already been slammed by an RTI expert. Johan Lidberg, an access to information researcher at Monash University, said the raw document, which ABC was sent by mistake, proved there were no names or personally identifying information contained in it, including the two points questioned in this email. The director at the Centre for Public Integrity, Geoffrey Watson SC, also said the law was clear. "Now the law on that is very clear, that there is a presumption in favour of granting access. "If there is a doubt about it, then the documents should be produced." The original decision to redact the dot points stated that: "The personal information of people who have been held at a watch-house in either the Hobart or Launceston Reception prisons is not in the public domain and those persons might suffer discrimination by reason of their having been in these facilities if disclosed." Asked why the redactions were made despite internal uncertainty over them, a Department of Justice spokesperson said responsibility sat with the "RTI delegated officers" who make decisions under the Right to Information Act 2009. "Although the department has in place a quality assurance process relating to RTI applications, which may involve feedback to the delegated officer, under section 50 of the act a delegate must not be unduly influenced in the exercise of the power to make decisions in accordance with the act," the spokesperson said. "As with any quality assurance feedback relating to RTI applications, the delegated officer will note any feedback, whether it be administrative, typographical or interpretive and then confirm and release their decision, in accordance with the act." In the "issues register", prison staff told the Department of Justice that children and young people endure trauma while in adult prison watch-houses, saying they are unable to access basic hygiene, health care or support. Children can also spend days in what is meant to be temporary detention, according to a report by Tasmania's Custodial Inspector. Staff reported "high anxiety levels" and stress, saying they struggled to manage risks to detainees and to themselves. They have urgently requested measures such as body-worn cameras to allay workplace risks — which the department said is expected to be operational by the end of October this year. The department said all staff in reception prisons would be required to activate the cameras for all interactions involving children and young people in watch houses. Watch house cells are where children and adults charged with offences await court appearance, police interview or bail. They are adult custodial facilities meant for temporary detention, and are not child-focused. Children as young as 10 years old can be held in watch houses. Since 2023, the longest period a child or young person was held in a watch-house was four days and seven hours, the Department of Justice disclosed in its response to a previous RTI request. Centre for Public Integrity's Geoffrey Watson said Right to Information systems were "aspirational stuff" and intended to improve society.
