Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email<\/a><\/p>\nIn the 2021 census, 6.6% of the town\u2019s population identified as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander \u2013 almost three times higher than the rest of South Australia. That census also recorded a median household income that was slightly below the rest of the state, but that figure doesn\u2019t capture the discrepancy between millionaire tuna barons at one end, and extreme poverty at the other.<\/p>\n
So far, the inquest before deputy state coroner Naomi Kereru has heard that Budda came from a home described as loving but disadvantaged. Some who knew him well described him as a mischievous storyteller who was kind and funny, others as a troubled boy with hearing and learning impairments, who was often roaming the streets at night.<\/p>\n
In Adelaide this week, hearings focused on the DCP\u2019s actions and why it was not considered a priority case.<\/p>\n
Port Lincoln, known as the seafood capital of Australia, is a town of both wealth and extreme poverty. Photograph: John White Photos\/Getty ImagesAdolescent at risk<\/p>\n
Budda\u2019s mother, Deborah Betts, the inquest heard, was desperately worried about her sonbut could not keep him home and was struggling to cope.<\/p>\n
In her opening statement, Rebecca Schell, the counsel assisting the coroner, said Betts had a \u201cvolatile relationship\u201d with Budda Spencer\u2019s father when they were living in Ceduna, and that there were several alleged domestic violence episodes. In 2019, the father went to prison and the family moved to Port Lincoln.<\/p>\n
In March 2021, DCP assessed Budda as an adolescent at risk. He was skipping school, and out on the streets at night.<\/p>\n
At one point he stayed at a mate\u2019s place. SA police family violence intervention officer Madison Sellick told the inquest it was \u201ca very active drug address\u201d.<\/p>\n
His home, she added, was a mess.<\/p>\n
\u201cI recall seeing many mattresses on the floor with little to no bedding \u2026 lots of dishes piled upon the floor and on the different surfaces throughout the property and other rubbish piled up in corners,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Sellick said she had several interactions with Budda and his family. In April, one month before her son\u2019s death, Betts told her he would \u201cjust take off on her\u201d and she \u201cfelt like there was nothing that she could do for him any more\u201d.<\/p>\n
Sellick said she didn\u2019t think Budda had a good understanding of police cautions, his offending, or his bail conditions. Schell told the inquest he had a hearing impairment, and a severe language disorder, but refused to wear a \u201chearing hat\u201d that would have helped.<\/p>\n
Tony Perks, a senior youth worker and manager at the Port Lincoln based West Coast Youth and Community Support centre (WCYCS), described it differently, saying the house was messy not in \u201ca hoarding or squalor style situation\u201d but in \u201cthe nature of a busy household\u201d.<\/p>\n
Perks said he \u201chad a lot of connection\u201d with the \u201cmischievous\u201d preteen.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe would love to drop past the office or our youth hub and come have a yarn or share a story with one of the youth workers,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe loved to have a yarn, he loved to have a chat and he loved to stretch his stories.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe spent many a times hearing about fishing adventures where I\u2019m pretty sure he didn\u2019t catch crocodiles and the like.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also had a caring, loving grandmother, Perks said.<\/p>\n
\u2018Inadequate supervision\u2019<\/p>\n
By 2021, Budda was increasingly getting in trouble. He tried to hitchhike to Ceduna, about 400km away, to see his family \u2013 but didn\u2019t get far.<\/p>\n
In late April 2021, he was arrested for trespassing and spent about a week in the Adelaide Youth Training Centre, a detention facility. No application was made for bail, the inquest heard, because Budda said he did not want to go home.<\/p>\n
Betts was becoming \u201cincreasingly worried about her son,\u201d Schell said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was spending time away from his family home and he would run away from family when they saw him,\u201d Schell said.<\/p>\n
\u201cDeborah Betts thought she was losing control of her son.\u201d<\/p>\n
A meeting between police, Aboriginal family support services, WCYSS and the departments for youth justice and human services was held on 4 May to discuss his case, under the state\u2019s vulnerable family and young person framework. DCP representatives did not attend.<\/p>\n
Perks says it was \u201cfrustrating\u201d that DCP didn\u2019t always come to the vulnerable families meetings, where information was shared. The community services can\u2019t access the child protection system to see what\u2019s going on, he says.<\/p>\n
The inquest heard the DCP was understaffed and overwhelmed. They were only able to deal with the most urgent cases, and had to triage and assess notifications quickly, preferably within an hour.<\/p>\n
Because Budda was not considered to be in imminent danger, deemed as having \u201cinadequate supervision\u201d rather than being abused or neglected, his case was not escalated. Lower tier notifications have a 10-day timeframe for investigation.<\/p>\n
Budda Spencer and his friends slept in the skip bin behind Repco. Photograph: Google Maps<\/p>\n
Betts last saw her son on Friday 7 May. The family looked for him that weekend.<\/p>\n
On Sunday 9 May, police found Budda Spencer with his two friends N and D, but he ran away. That night, he and his friends slept out at the Centenary Oval grandstand.<\/p>\n
On 10 May the boys went to the house where D had been placed, under out-of-home care. Budda wasn\u2019t allowed to be there, so they were moved on.<\/p>\n
A local manager for Aboriginal Family Support Services, Angela Backman, saw them that day.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s risky being out all night when we don\u2019t know where [you are],\u201d she told them.<\/p>\n
\u201cCome home, make sure that you\u2019re warm. We\u2019re worried about you, your family is worried about you.\u201d<\/p>\n
The boys told her they would make safe choices.<\/p>\n
They didn\u2019t want to go home. But they did not want the cops to catch them out overnight.<\/p>\n
So they decided to get into an industrial bin in the car park of the local Repco autoparts store.<\/p>\n
At 5.15am on 11 May, the truck arrived to empty the bin. At 5.50am, Budda Spencer was declared dead.<\/p>\n
The inquest continues, with findings expected by the end of the year.<\/p>\n
Indigenous Australians can call 13YARN<\/a> on 13 92 76 for information and crisis support; or call Lifeline on 13 11 14, Mensline on 1300 789 978 or Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On a cold night five years ago, three boys crawled into an industrial skip bin, pulled cardboard over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":871885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-871884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/871884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=871884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/871884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/871885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=871884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=871884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=871884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}