‘I have been robbed of my son’: Family speaks out after Indigenous man’s death in custody

Warning: This story contains the name and images of an Indigenous person who has died.

Jeffrey Winmar was his family’s protector. A beacon of positivity and a man of strong values, he died two days after police placed him in handcuffs on a Melbourne nature strip.

Police called an ambulance to attend to him, but officers later cancelled it.

Winmar, a Noongar man and one of 13 siblings, died in hospital days later following repeated cardiac arrests in November 2023.

Medical staff found he also had litres of blood in his abdomen due to unexplained lacerations to his liver and methamphetamine in his bloodstream.

Coroner Sarah Gebert has begun examining the circumstances of Winmar’s death after it was revealed police were attempting to arrest the 28-year-old for alleged aggravated burglary, theft and deception offences when he fled a Burwood property and scaled the roof.

He jumped a string of backyard fences while being pursued by police, including the dog squad.

Winmar, the nephew of AFL great Nicky Winmar, was arrested soon after being found in a tree.

“Don’t let it bite me,” he said four times about the dog as police attempted to get him to surrender and climb down.

“Get on the f—ing ground, last warning,” the dog squad officer said.

Body-worn camera footage of Winmar’s interaction with police show he appeared to collapse and fall unconscious as he jumped down, before appearing to briefly come to. Police called an ambulance but then cancelled it, until Winmar suffered a suspected cardiac arrest.

Police called for an ambulance a second time, and it took Winmar to hospital, where he was placed in intensive care. He had earlier consumed a significant quantity of methamphetamine.

Winmar never fully regained consciousness and died in Box Hill Hospital two days later, on November 11, 2023.

“The community and Jeffrey’s family have a natural concern that his passing is one in an all-too-long line of Aboriginal men passing away in the setting of police contact or custody,” Rachel Ellyard, the counsel assisting the coroner, told the inquest.

The court heard an internal police report commended the 11 officers involved in the arrest, and no disciplinary action was taken against them.

One officer told the coroner that although he was unaware Winmar was an Indigenous man when called to assist in his arrest, he wouldn’t have done anything differently and believed appropriate risk assessments were conducted before and during the arrest.

He said Winmar was known to run from police and had outrun them in the past due to his speed and agility.

Winmar’s mother, Ursula Winmar, said that shortly before his death, her son had started speaking to her more about learning humility, patience and about becoming the best version of himself he knew he could be.

“He was the kind of person who shared that knowledge freely, like a gift he couldn’t keep for himself. Jeffrey was 28. I am looking for justice for my son. I want people to be accountable for what happened to him,” Ursula said.

“We should not have had to come this far to seek the truth. Two years later, we are still in the dark about how he ended up in hospital with internal bleeding and organ failure.

“Until this country properly accounts for First Nations deaths in custody – and until those responsible for their care are genuinely held to account – there will be more Jeffreys. More mothers like me. More broken homes like ours. I have been robbed of my son.”

Winmar’s father, Jeffrey “Pepe” Anderson, called for accountability. “Jeff wasn’t a nobody. He was my boy,” he said.

Nerita Waight, the chief executive of the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service, said 626 Aboriginal people had died in custody in the three decades since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody.

These included Veronica Nelson, 37, and Joshua Kerr, 32.