Alleged hit and run City bus interchange
Media Conference - City Station
Detective Superintendent Michael Chew
3 August 2005
Michael Chew: A 21-year-old university student injured in an alleged hit and run incident at the Civic bus interchange early Saturday remains in a critical condition at the Canberra Hospital. There have been a lot of public comments, through a variety of sources including TV news, talkback radio and other areas. As this is an active investigation and now currently before the ACT Children's Court, I won't be making any further comment on witness accounts or evidence that's been presented at this time. We're hearing through the media that there are people out there in the community who may have information or have witnessed the events on Friday night, Saturday morning or even the circumstances leading up to the tragic events that occurred on Friday night, Saturday morning. I'd urge those people to come forward, engage the police, contact Crime Stoppers, provide their details so that evidence can be collected and submitted in any brief of evidence. Additionally there are possibly members of the community who may have vision of some form, whether it be from a mobile phone, a video camera, mobile phone pictures; I'd urge those people to contact the investigators or contact Crime Stoppers so we can engage those people and organise to have that information downloaded or copied. This appeal for additional vision, or assistance from the community is quite relevant as we were informed late yesterday that the CCTV footage from Friday night, Saturday morning is irretrievable due to a technical problem. This problem has been fixed. I'd like to say that the community assistance so far has been excellent, in fact it was community assistance that led us to an early arrest within 36 hours of the incident where three juveniles are now before the Canberra courts.
Journalist: Can you tell us about the progress of the internal investigation so far?
Michael Chew: That's a matter for Professional Standards who are running a parallel or independent review of the matter and it would be inappropriate for me to make comment on their investigation.
Journalist: Is there any timeline or anything? How long do these things normally take?
Michael Chew: Well I can't comment on that; it's a matter for Professional Standards.
Journalist: You mentioned you want people to come forward with any phones or anything like that; is there any information you have that there might be other footage or is it purely the fact that we don't have the CCTV?
Michael Chew: There's no specific information, but we have seen or heard through various sources that there is vision, possibly vision around through members of the community who may have been in the Civic area at that time, perhaps not witnessed the event but perhaps witnessed the circumstances leading up to the event, on London Circuit or even after the event. All that evidence and information is vital to build a complete picture of what's happened.
Journalist: Can you tell me about people commenting on the case; you mentioned people have been talking about it in the media. Is this something you're against?
Michael Chew: I think comment, providing it's constructive and it's free and not damaging to the family or damaging to the investigation, then I think comment is a good thing. But I would urge that those people who do have comment to make, that may be relevant to the investigation, to come forward and contact Crime Stoppers or contact the police and provide that information so we can make a full assessment of it.
Journalist: So what was wrong with the CCTV footage; what was the technical problem?
Michael Chew: I don't have the information on what the technical problem was, but the data recording didn't occur for those periods.
Journalist: Superintendent, do you have any information on the latest state of health of the victim?
Michael Chew: She's still in a critical condition in ICU in Canberra Hospital.
Reporter: From the community, you know how you were urging witnesses to come forward who've seen, you know who saw it or got it on their phones or whatever, what happened, have you, has anyone actually come forward to the police, I mean you've obviously heard that through the media, but has anyone come forward to you guys yet?
Mick Chew: There's been significant community support from members of the community who may have witnessed the event or saw circumstances leading up to the event and that, as I said, lead to a very early arrest in this matter.
Reporter: Ok, because apart from identifying the alleged suspect, were there people who came forward about, who actually saw what happened as well?
Mick Chew: Well there is a number of witnesses who were in close proximity to the incident on Friday night, Saturday morning and they have provided evidence or statements to the police, but there, because of the circumstances and the time of night, there's potentially a large number of witnesses out there who may have seen something, and we'd like them to come forward and provide that information or evidence (to police).
Ends//