Commissioner Karen Webb says police willing to cooperate with gay hate inquiry – ABC News

The NSW Police commissioner has emphasised the organisation’s “ongoing willingness to assist and cooperate” with an inquiry into suspected gay hate deaths, after the judge overseeing it described claims within legal correspondence from police as “offensive”.

The special commission of inquiry is investigating dozens of unsolved cases in NSW between 1970 and 2010 that may have been the result of LGBT hate attacks.

The current block of public hearings is exploring the changing police approaches to identifying and investigating bias-motivated crimes.

Barrister Mark Tedeschi KC, representing NSW Police, began today’s hearing in Sydney by reading out a statement from Police Commissioner Karen Webb and her general counsel.

In it, they conveyed “their support for this inquiry … and their ongoing willingness to assist and cooperate with your inquiry to the greatest extent that they can”.

“They would like you to know that every effort has been and will be made to comply as completely and efficiently as possible with any requests for information, assistance or summonses by you,” Mr Tedeschi said.

Last week the inquiry commissioner, Justice John Sackar, dismissed as “offensive” an allegation within correspondence from police lawyers that the work involved in responding to the inquiry’s summonses had resulted in 12 live investigations being put on hold.

“I’m just happy to dismiss the allegation as a misguided and misconceived assertion by someone who may well have entirely underestimated the resources the New South Wales Police need to perform the tasks,” he said.

Mr Tedeschi today said Commissioner Webb had been made aware of the comments.

“It was not anyone’s intention to cause any offence to you and certainly not to place any pressure on your inquiry,” he said.

While the statement did not include an apology, it said Commissioner Webb understood the importance of the inquiry and its significance to the LGBT community.

“It represents a unique opportunity for these intolerable crimes to be examined at the highest level by a person with the status and the independence of a Supreme Court judge,” the statement said.

Much of the recent evidence has centred on the work of Strike Force Parrabell, which reviewed 88 suspected gay hate deaths between 1976 and 2000.

But Mr Tedeschi last week attempted to have the adequacy and methodology of the strike force deemed to be outside the inquiry’s terms of reference.

Justice Sackar ruled he was “entitled if not obliged” to investigate those matters.

The first police witness, Assistant Commissioner Anthony Crandell, the former commander of Strike Force Parrabell, defended the project and said the adoption of its recommendations led to greater commitment throughout the organisation to training about bias crimes.

Another witness, Sergeant Geoff Steer, the organisational expert on hate crimes, gave evidence that a specialised bias crimes unit was unexpectedly disbanded in 2015 after only two years.

He said the unit was “not popular” from the outset and he spent half of his seven years in hate-crime-related roles defending each action he took, while attempting to convince the organisation to take the subject seriously.

The inquiry continues.

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