Tomkins Incident - The Assault

The Assault

On November 2004, four Indigenous boys from the Toomelah Aboriginal Mission swam across the Macintyre River to a nearby Queensland property managed by David Hilary Tomkins (then 44 years old) and his son Clint Williams Tomkins (then 23 years old). The four boys, Alan Boland (16), Bevan “BJ” Bartman (19), Reg McGrady (23) and Jade, had said that they had previously bought marijuana from the Tomkins but had recently begun stealing it from the property instead.

The four boys broke into a building with the intention of stealing from a hydroponic crop inside, but were discovered by the Tomkins. McGrady and Jade escaped to the other side of the river, but the other two, Bartman and Boland, were caught by the Tomkins.

Bartman and Boland allege that the Tomkins pulled Boland back through the river, stripped him naked, bound his wrists and then dragged him up an embankment by a rope tied around his neck. They also allege the Tomkins tied Bartman to a tree and forced him to watch as they threatened to cut off Boland’s toes with a pair of pliers and beat them both with sticks.

Bartman has said he managed to escape after he faked an asthma attack while he was being untied from the tree. He then ran back through the bush and swam across the river. Boland said the two Tomkins then walked into the farmhouse and returned with a double-barrelled shotgun and 0.22-calibre rifle, loaded both in front of Boland and pressed the guns to either side of his temples, yelled racist taunts and hammered the boy’s face with their gun butts. The Tomkins called the police and allegedly removed the noose from Boland’s neck before they arrived. The police took Boland to Goondiwindi police station and charged him with break and enter.