Thirty years after the royal commission, why do First Nations people keep dying in custody?
The 1991 royal commission, its recommendations, and the gap between them and what was implemented.
What worked, what failed, what is reusable.
The recommendations already exist. The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (1991) made 339 recommendations. The fight is not for new findings; it is for implementation and the custody safeguards that follow from them.
Notification saves lives. The Custody Notification Service, a lawyer called for every First Nations person taken into custody, is the single measure most tied to preventing deaths. Expanding it is concrete and winnable.
The movement half. Change the Record and the custody-notification campaigns keep the toll visible and the recommendations on the public record.
Reusable kit: treat the 1991 recommendations as binding unfinished business, push the custody-notification safeguard jurisdiction by jurisdiction, and keep the count public.
Research resource, not legal advice. Read the original source before acting. Cases and campaigns are gathered by shared issue tags; some may be machine-extracted and pending human review.