THE Northern Territory Police Force is proud of its Aboriginal Community Police Officers except, it seems, when they act like Aborigines.

Gwen Brown, 53, one of the most awarded and senior ACPOs in the Territory, has been sacked for hitting her nephew with a stick, but she says she has the cultural right to do so.

Ms Brown, from the Ali Curung community, southeast of Tennant Creek, said her nephew, Patrick, had in September last year stolen the battery from her private vehicle and put it in another car so he could go to Tennant Creek to buy alcohol. Ms Brown said she went to the Ali Curung police and asked an officer to log her complaint. She says he did not do so.

That evening, when Patrick returned home drunk to Ms Brown's house, she dealt with the matter herself.

"I got him and hit him on the butt with a stick, about three times," she said. "It was just a long, thin ceremony stick. He put his arms behind him and I accidentally broke his arm."
Ms Brown says Patrick went to the clinic the next day, which reported the matter to police.

He was persuaded to file a complaint against his aunt.

Ms Brown's police colleagues approached her at home that afternoon and served a complaint in front of her relatives, which she found humiliating.
She said she was entitled to strike her nephew. "In our way, I have that right. He's an initiated fella and he should have respected me.

"He lived in my house ever since he was a baby. I raised him after my sister left him for dead." Ms Brown's sister has since died.

Ms Brown was suspended with pay and appeared in the Tennant Creek court in November on assault charges. The magistrate, John Birch, gave her a six-month good behaviour bond, but declined to record a conviction.

Three weeks ago, Tennant Creek police superintendent Bruce Porter told Ms Brown she was out of a job. Asked why he had sacked Ms Brown, Superintendent Porter said: "I'm not at liberty to say. It's an internal disciplinary matter."

Northern Territory Police Association president Senior Sergeant Vince Kelly said Ms Brown had been treated poorly. "We have made submissions to the commissioner ... that she shouldn't be dismissed and we're appealing the decision," he said.

Ms Brown, who had served as an ACPO for seven years and was last year awarded the Administrator's Medal for her work, was seen as a valuable conduit, especially for women in Ali Curung.

"The community needs an ACPO," said Ms Brown, who was the only women officer at Ali Curung. "Women are the ones who keep violence secret in their heart; they don't want to share it with the police. I make them confident so they can talk."

Ms Brown said she and her nephew -- who is in jail for unrelated reasons -- remained close and he accepted she had the right to strike him.

"The police like Aboriginal police officers but not when they act as Aborigines," said Ms Brown, adding that she would return to the force if she was invited.

Senior Sergeant Kelly said ACPOs provided a valuable service in linking the community with police and encountered strong pressures from their own people, while maintaining their own strong cultural beliefs.

"It's one of the conundrums facing the commissioner of police," he said. "It is one of the difficulties he faces in applying harsh black and white rules to ACPOs."