2004 Palm Island Death in Custody - Related Events

Related Events

In 2007 Tony Koch, The Australian's chief reporter in Queensland, won the Graham Perkin Australian Journalist of the Year award for his coverage of the 2004 Palm Island death in custody and related events since.

In 2012 Tony Krawitz, film and television writer and director won the Walkley Foundation Long-form Journalism: Documentary award for his Tall Man Documentary based on the book the Tall Man by Age newspaper journalist Chloe Hooper.

Brisbane based band Powderfinger wrote a song Black Tears which was said to mentioned the Palm Island death in custody by the words "An island watch-house bed, a black man's lying dead". The song was to be released as part of their 2007 album Dream Days at the Hotel Existence.

Fearing that the lyrics of the song might prejudice the case against their client, Chris Hurley's legal team referred the song to Queensland's Attorney-General, Kerry Shine, in an attempt to get the song banned or the lyrics changed.

The band's management claimed that while the lyrics of the song reference the Chris Hurley case, that they were not specific enough to warrant a ban.

The band's response to the issue was to use an alternate version of "Black Tears" on the album, one that had differing lyrics to the originally intended version, but to keep the launch date the same as originally intended. In contrast to the report from the band's management, the band reports that the song was originally influenced by offences relating to people climbing the Australian attraction Uluru (deemed sacred by indigenous Australians), acknowledging nothing relating to the legal case.

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