 Yeah, Ross Barnett, Deputy Commissioner, Specialist Operations, one, two, three. Are we good to go? Alright, well thank you everybody. We just wanted to give you a bit of an update about the results from Operation Unite that's been run for the last two nights here in Queensland. Over the last two nights we've charged 574 people with a range of offences including good order offences, assaults and drink driving. We're disappointed that this level of police enforcement is necessary to ensure community standards of behaviour are being met. We will continue to enforce the law to ensure that all members of the community can enjoy a night out in public places without their evening being ruined by a selfish few who have no regard for the rights of others. The small minority who continue to flout the law defy police directions and destroy the amenity of others are out of step with what the community will accept as appropriate conduct. Happy to have questions. This is the fourth in a series of Operation Unites. The arrests and charges for this last two days are slightly down but only slightly on the previous operations. There are obviously some environmental factors. The last one was done two weeks before Christmas last year so in terms of the time of the year, holiday season where those sorts of things have some influence but generally as a whole I've got to say that the level of enforcement required hasn't really changed and that's a disappointment for us. In terms of what the challenges you face were they particularly violent or were there more people around or anything like that? No, it would be fair to say that across Queensland we have police out every Friday and Saturday night and there are always good order issues particularly in some of the bigger precincts like the Valley, the City, Sunshine Coast and the Gold Coast particularly around surface paradise but it's very disappointing that we still have these very high numbers of people who still cannot go out and have a good time without coming to the attention of police destroying the night for other people who just want to have a good time and these people don't seem to understand their concept of being able to have a good time within the limits of the law. Yeah. It is, I don't know what else we can do to get the message through to people that if you're going to drink and drive particularly in some of the more populated areas you can expect that there will be a heavy police presence anywhere, anytime and that if you're going to take that risk there is a very high probability that you're going to get caught. Unfortunately the public education that we have been conducting for decades does not still seem to be sinking in with some people and sadly that's reflected in still some of the very high readings that we're getting. These aren't people who are just 0506 just on the border having just made a miscalculation. We're still talking readings that are above 0.20 in some cases and that's very, very disappointing. That's someone who's seriously impaired. I'll be able to get those details for you but there was certainly one from memory who was about 0.25 or higher. So again, that's a mistake. That's just someone who's got a total disregard for the law and there's a fatal accident waiting to happen. Sadly for them or for some innocent person. Yes. I mean they were stopping a lot of people. Were you surprised at how many people still are carrying drugs or using drugs that have been knocked out of it? What's been a high risk that they're taking? Well again, that's a high risk that they're taking. Taking drugs for a start is a very risky occupation for your health but people who go to nightclub precincts know that without warning we conduct random operations involving sniffer dogs and other strategies. This is a series of rolling operations that will be done on the Gold Coast and people who want to go to nightclub precincts with drugs can expect that we will be there unexpectedly and we will use these strategies and the fact that we caught a number of people again last night shows that this is a crime that's still prevalent in some of those precincts. Last night we caught 10 and they had a range of drugs, cocaine, methylamphetamine but we can give you further details from police media. That's just from that operation in the surface paradise in Brewer Beach nightclub precincts last night, yes. High quantities of drugs? We can give you the exact quantities but there was someone caught with multiple numbers of ecstasy tablets. What do you think about the violence that we're seeing? Was there any... Has there been any change since operation United started? Violence in the CBD or in nightclub precincts generally is always a concern. We want to have a community where people can go out at night, enjoy themselves. We want our friends, our family to be able to go out, have a night out and not have that ruined by somebody who is either a drinking to excess and or taking drugs and they have absolutely no regard for the law. They're incredibly selfish and arrogant. They think that they can go out and do as they please and they have a total disregard for what the community will expect and accept as appropriate conduct and they just feel they can go and do as they please and if anyone gets in their road these are the sort of consequences that ensure. So sadly we are seeing people who are being the victims of unprovoked assaults and that's very, very disappointing and with the One Punch Can Kill campaign, potentially very deadly. Some of the arrests that we've seen, has there been any complaints at all about excessive use of force from the weekend or what? Not that I'm aware of from this weekend. We've seen injuries to our own members as a result of having to make some of these arrests and that's obviously a situation that we don't like to see either. We don't want to see police officers injured in the course of having to arrest people who show no regard for the law and no regard for directions from the police. No, I'm not familiar with that specific incident but no, here's a short answer. It's something we talk about. Generally we try and do it about twice a year anticipating the next one may be in the Christmas New Year period towards the end of the year. Well, we'd like to think so. This is just an ongoing, never-ending enforcement action until the people in the community who don't respect the law get reeducated about what's acceptable and what's not and if that's going to take a trip to the watch house, whenever they break the law, so be it until those standards of behaviour are properly understood by everybody because this is for the benefit of the good people in the community and we all want to be able to go out and have a good time and that shouldn't be ruined by people who just will not obey the law and are totally arrogant about what they see as their rights. The drink safe precincts have been leaked. You're still getting high numbers of offenders. Is drink safe failing or failing to meet expectations? No, the formal evaluation of drink safe hasn't yet been concluded because we're not at the end of our first 12 months but anecdotally the evidence we're getting back from the officers in those precincts is that the extra police are having a very positive impact on the behaviour of people in those particular areas. Assaults on police are down and arrests generally for good order offences are declining in those precincts so it is having a positive impact in those particular places. What are your views on that? These operations give us the opportunity to have more staff doing more walkthroughs of hotels and with the greater police presence we're obviously potentially going to detect offences where they're occurring. Generally across Queensland we have a very good understanding with the licensees and the local liquor records that we have in each of the districts. They work very cooperatively with us and generally they are very responsible in the way that they manage their business and in keeping unruly patrons out of the premises and serving them appropriately. That's the general outcome. Generally what we're finding is that licensees and their staff understand the implications that they have under the law in terms of serving intoxicated people serving underage people out of their establishments. A range of them are moving to ID scanners and proof of ID and those sorts of things so generally we find that they're very responsible. There were a range of things where people were... we had a number where people had liquor tipped out outside of premises, those sorts of things but the actual breakdown of any liquor enforcement issues we can get to you after this. Were dogs in a raid in White Rock, Kansas yesterday? Yeah, that incident arose out of the closure of a major drug operation by the Far North Queensland Drug Squad. Police were entering that premises to execute a search warrant looking for evidence of drug production and distribution. They were attacked by a savage dog and... By a branded dog? I don't know, we'll find out for you. And the officers were forced to shoot the dog and they did. Yeah, there was only one dog? To my knowledge, yes. Yeah, some reports had more than one. To my knowledge, no, one. It was a vicious dog, it's previously bitten someone at the house and the police involved there had no alternative to shoot the dog. It was unfortunate but necessary. And what was the result of the raid? Number of people who were living at that address have been charged with serious drug offences, including drug trafficking. There will be details, if they're not already provided, there will be details available about the ages and charges of those people and they'll be appearing and the cancer magistrates court tomorrow. No, no, 574 people have been either arrested or given notices to appear. So charged with offences either by direct arrest or being given an NTA? Yes, yes, that's right. So 574 people, a total of 774 charges, yes. 778 charges, yes. I don't know, but we'll certainly get that detail for you. Okay. It would appear the investigations at this stage indicate that the man may have fallen whilst he was attempting a planking episode and it would appear on the investigations as they appear at the moment that in the course of trying to plank on the balcony on the seventh floor, he has tragically lost his footing and fallen to the carpark below. My understanding was that he had put his feet outside of the balcony and was preparing to lay on the balcony rail and he overbalanced and fell to his death, so it's a tragedy. I don't know how exactly he fell, but we're told from the person who was with him that that's how the incident unfolded. Is this a part of the report? No, there's only he and another person with him. They had been out in the city earlier and we're told that they may have done some planking on the way home and that this was to be another occasion, another episode which tragically ended in the man's death. Were they filming the incident? The last incident, I don't know. It is what we've been fearing and you might remember police, both in Victoria and locally here during the week, have issued warnings to people about the dangers of this type of activity. In some circumstances it can be fairly harmless, but as people become more and more competitive and try more and more obscure and difficult episodes of planking, which inevitably lead to greater levels of risk, then we were and remain concerned that this is the sort of thing that will eventuate and no one wants to see that. You see some of the photos of around and people lying on chairs, but it's obviously... Well, you know, someone could be planking on a park bench and that can be fairly benign and harmless. Once you start taking it up seven stories or on top of a set of traffic lights or on a set of railway lines or there are a whole range of things or on a bridge, or anywhere that accentuates the risk and the daring, that obviously puts it into an area. Not only where it can be breaking the law, it more importantly is putting the risk of the person at significant danger. I don't know what the attitude is of the people who were with him or what his family is, whether in fact they knew that he engaged in this sort of activity, so it's all far too early to speculate on that, but as far as we're concerned, the death of anybody in these circumstances is an absolute tragedy and we just want to reinforce to people who might be thinking about this that it might seem like fun, but as this episode has shown, it carries great risk depending on the circumstances, the time of the night, whether people have been drinking, all of those things come into play and the last thing we want to see is a repeat of what happened this morning. So people who want to engage in this need to think about the consequences very carefully, not just for themselves, but should something serious happen for the people around them and their families. That's still being looked at in the investigation. To my understanding, it was his residence, but we're yet to confirm that, so perhaps we'll be able to get you some confirmation of that later. You know how old he is? No. To police? I'm not aware that there's any contemplation of charges, but I'm sure we'll be issuing an updated release later once investigations are more progressed. Could we describe him as a young man? We'll be able to get confirmation. Once we're sure the next of kin have been advised, we'll be able to provide some further details about age and other personal particulars. Is there a charge? Nothing comes immediately to mind when you say someone might be eagling them on. Obviously, the primary responsibility always remains with the person doing the act to estimate the risk and to think about the consequences of what they're going to do. There's no suggestion, as far as I'm aware, in this case that there was anything other than a voluntary act, but we will obviously, all of those things will be investigated and a matter that will have to be ultimately reviewed by the coroner. There is, depending on where they do it, if you, you know, to climb onto an unauthorized structure such as a bridge, it's very similar, you know, base jumping, that sort of activity. It depends where you go to do it. You can bring yourself into the realm of having committed an offence. Is that the detective thing? Yes. Yes, absolutely. It's only a very recent phenomenon. We had our first sort of episode involving the police earlier this week where a young man was charged with planking on a police car at the police station and it's also become quite prevalent in Victoria caused some concern down there. Is it a threat to our rule of law? I don't personally know. You know, so, yeah, I don't know. It's certainly, it's just a tragedy for everybody, for the person and his family and we'd like it to be the last.