The COUNTED - 2026

The issue

SCROLL for POLICE/CORRECTIONS or MEDIA reporting timelines

If you are aware of a police or corrections related death not currently reflected within The Counted, contact ANZLEAC4PRD to ensure Dashboard accuracy.

Provided as part of The NET 000 Challenge this resource petition serves to confront and reform the tragic reality of police-led mental health emergency fatalities. Respectfully acknowledging those who have passed, and the loved ones they have left behind, Australia New Zealand Lived Experience Advisory Council for Police-Related Deaths (ANZLEAC4PRD) submits its ever evolving efforts to amplify the voices of those impacted at the highest level of risk within the nation’s justice systems.

The Counted - Australia 2026 data dashboard is a crucial feature of the Operation WATCH OVER ME movement. It is designed as a real time holistic sector response to complement the parliamentary Standing Orders 637, which requires the Attorney General to provide quarterly reporting on deaths in custody.

By reporting police suicides, police operational deaths, non fatal shootings and deaths in custody together, ANZLEAC4PRD seeks to explore patterns across these categories, including Work Health and Safety gaps. This also includes examining barriers created by officer employment classification along with industrial agreements or EBAs, embedding the principle that what gets measured gets managed.

A recent NSW Auditor General Report found that nearly 75 per cent of NSW Police compensation costs over a five-year period were linked to psychological injury claims. NSW Police spent more than $1.7 billion on those claims between mid-2019 and mid-2024. The report found that NSW Police had failed to adequately investigate whetherworkplace hazards, fatigue, role overload, burnout or psychosocial stressors contributed to the 171 critical incidents and deaths recorded between mid 2019 and mid 2024.

‘Hush money, or confidentiality clauses in settlement deeds. point towards a systemic misallocation of public resources, where funding is repeatedly directed to managing the consequences of harm rather than preventing it. These are not marginal costs. They represent a recurrent draw in the tens of millions on public funds at a level that would comfortably resource significant preventive infrastructure.

While Senate reporting remains important, it is retrospective in nature. The Counted provides a more immediate, accessible and independent picture of police related critical incidents, deaths in custody, police shootings and officer fatalities across Australia.

Its purpose is not only to count deaths after they occur, but to identify patterns, risk factors and opportunities for prevention before further harm occurs.

In this way, The Counted supports transparency, strengthens public confidence and reinforces a central proposition: the preservation of life is not a retrospective objective. It is an operational duty.

We invite you to help build awareness around safer police responses, mental health emergencies and the right to life.

You may also be interested in;

Operation WATCH OVER ME

ROYAL COMMISSION Into Police Shootings In QLD

The Virtual INQUEST

SELF- REPORTING citizen researcher - National Coroner’s Court Listing Dashboard project

UNGAGGING AUSTRALIA Suppression REFORM

Your support helps grow the conversation around police-led mental health responses, real time oversight, the OPCAT National Preventive Mechanism and the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Recommendation 35

TIMELINE

10 Sept NSW

Death in police operations, Burnett Heads - Maryborough

Media FootPrint

10 Sept NSW

Critical incident declared after man hit by garbage truck - Mount Druitt

MediaFootPrint

8 Sept NT

An investigation is underway after an Indigenous man died at the Alice Springs Correctional Centre on Tuesday.

Media FootPrint

__________________

30 Aug NSW