New documentary dissects an Australian tragedy from all sides

Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains the name of an Indigenous person who has died.

Since 2019, Australia has grappled with the death of 19-year-old Warlpiri man Kumanjayi Walker.

The teenager, who was armed with medical scissors, was shot three times and killed by Northern Territory police officer Zachary Rolfe.

Reckoning has come slowly. First it was through a 2022 Darwin jury trial in which a jury found Rolfe not guilty of murder.  Then came a multi-year coronial inquiry that found the "hallmarks" of racism embedded within the Northern Territory police.

It was this tidal wave of uncomfortable information that led Blackfella Films producer and director Darren Dale (Redfern Now, Mabo) to 2.6 Seconds: Death in the Outback, a comprehensive four-part docuseries that chronicles the before, during and after of one of the darkest moments in modern Australian history.

Dozens of interviewees present their reflections throughout the series — from Walker's family members to police officials, legal professionals, journalists and community elders.

For Dale, it was the only way to understand the full breadth of the tragedy.

"I think the binarism that exists in the world leads us to not hear a lot. I really didn't ever want us to feel like we were shouting at people," Dale told ABC News.

"The power of hearing is one of the reasons I think this project for me feels vital. If we can listen and not look away, we might just understand what happens in our own country."

Life and death in Yuendumu 

It has been a long road for Dale, who travelled to Alice Springs and Yuendumu shortly after the coronial inquest began on the encouragement of Andrew Boe, a barrister for the Walker families who also appears in the series.

"I met some of the family, just to see and hear the things that were revealed at that inquest. I came straight back to Sydney, organised a meeting with SBS and said, 'Look, this story demands to be told over four hours,'" Dale says.

"[But] this story just isn't a story about Kumanjayi's family. This is a story about police. This is a story about people associated with the fallout. When one of these sort of calamitous tragedies happen, the fallout for everyone is immense."

The series first establishes the context of Yuendumu, a remote community about 300km north-west of Alice Springs, famed for its rich artistry and beleaguered with a long history of police violence and Walker's place within it.

Through interviews with family members and the professionals who cared for him, Walker is described as a funny, energetic, young man with under-identified cognitive and developmental difficulties and a history of run-ins with the justice system.

Rolfe is described by colleagues as a proactive officer who developed a reputation for pursuing difficult arrests within a police culture that rewarded risk-taking.

The days leading up to Walker's death and the night of the shooting are presented through largely unseen police worn body cam footage.

In one body cam clip post-shooting, an injured Walker is heard repeatedly wailing for his mother, Leanne Oldfield, who also features in the series.

"I felt that it was really important that if you're ever going to choose to look, you should look at this," Dale says.

Later, the body cam footage shows the frenzied aftermath of the shooting in which a dying Walker was locked in a police station while his community was prevented from seeing him or learning about his condition.

Only Derek Williams, a local Aboriginal police officer and Kumanjayi's uncle, was allowed inside but not for long enough to get a read on the situation. Walker's cousin Samara Nangala Fernandez-Brown and other residents began to broadcast live on social media as the growing crowd demanded information on Walker's condition.

"I stood outside that police station and I realised that from where the family was sitting, to where Kumanjayi was dying was between 7 and 11 metres away," Dale says.

The community gathered outside were not immediately informed of Walker's passing, assuming that an arriving police aircraft was taking Walker to Alice Springs for urgent medical attention.

In reality, the aircraft was there to bring police reinforcements in and get Rolfe out — he was airlifted to hospital for a shoulder wound. It wouldn't be until the early hours of the following morning that the community was informed of Walker's death.

"We wanted to truly understand what it was like to be outside and what it was like to be inside, what it was like to be black, what it was like to be white, what it was like to be a law enforcement officer, what it felt like to be like Derek Williams," Dale says.

"I thought that in that moment you got to appreciate the fault lines of this country, the gaps in our understanding and the work that needs to be done to bridge that 11 metres because [it] says everything about what leads us to who we are today."

Shining a spotlight

Among the 39 people interviewed for 2.6 Seconds: Death in the Outback, Dale says there's one more he would have liked to include: Zachary Rolfe himself.

Rolfe declined an interview for the series, with Dale instead including his testimony from the coronial inquest and 2022 interviews he conducted with Seven's Spotlight program.

"We needed to understand why he wanted to become a police officer. It was important that you knew that he went to Afghanistan to serve. It was important to know just the amount of jobs that he'd done as a young constable. These are uncomfortable truths we have to confront," Dale says.

The second half of Death In The Outback veers towards the three-year coronial inquest led by Northern Territory coroner Elisabeth Armitage. In 2022, when first questioned about his own alleged racism and that within the force, Rolfe declined to answer questions for fear it would expose him to penalty.

Then in 2023, Rolfe was dismissed from the Northern Territory police force in relation to a 2,500 word statement he posted online. When he returned to the inquest stand in 2024, Rolfe disclosed racist award ceremonies conducted by the Northern Territory police. When senior police figures initially denied the accusations, Rolfe and his team supplied certificates proving the use of offensive images and language used by NT police.

On July 7 last year, Armitage travelled to Yuendumu to deliver her findings: Kumanjayi's death was avoidable and Rolfe held racist attitudes in an organisation with the hallmarks of institutional racism, along with 33 other recommendations.

The series asserts that as of March this year, only 11 had been explicitly fully supported by the Northern Territory government and police.

"Who would have ever thought that Zachary Rolfe would be the whistleblower on racism in the NT police force?" Dale says.

"That, I think, is one of the most extraordinary ironies. I think it led the coroner to make the findings that she did.

"Will this bear the fruit that it needs? As Andrew Boe says, let's wait and see."

As the release of 2.6 Seconds: Death In The Outback approaches, Dale is feeling "trepidatious" but acknowledges the great privilege of being able to present all sides of a bitterly sad situation.

"I hope the series gives people an insight into how ill-equipped both men were and how as a country we've allowed that to happen," Dale says.

"As Kate Wild [author of award-winning book The Red House] says in the show, some people thought Kumanjayi had it coming and other people thought Rolfe was a bad cop but it's not as simple as that. It's never as simple as that."

2.6 Seconds: Death In The Outback premieres on SBS and SBS on Demand from November 10.