A comatose Indigenous man has been handcuffed and shackled to a hospital bed in Western Australia after collapsing during a court appearance.
Noongar man Nathan Khan collapsed in front of a magistrate at the Midland magistrates court about 11.30am on Friday, partway through entering a plea to a driving offence that carried a penalty of up to 18 months in jail.
He was led to the courthouse cells and then taken to Midland health campus via ambulance and placed under guard. He was also restrained with shackles despite slipping into a coma on Friday that lasted until Monday.
It comes four weeks after footage of shackled Indigenous children prompted a royal commission into youth detention in the Northern Territory.
Khan’s mother, Margaret Hansen, said Khan had seemed groggy before being called on by the magistrate but not alarmingly so. When his matter was called, however, it became apparent something was wrong.
The 30-year-old father of two was a regular methamphetamine user and had overdosed. At some point – either in court, in the ambulance or at hospital – he had choked on his vomit and cut off his oxygen supply, his doctors told Hansen.
Khan was taken to hospital where he was placed on life support with a ventilator for his breathing.
“The only movement was his chest going up and down every time the machine made a noise. Shackles on his hands and legs,” Hansen said.
“I just can’t understand it. I said to the guard, ‘How the fucking hell is he supposed to get up and run when he can’t even wake up? He is in a fucking coma and he is tied down like a dog.’”
Khan was tethered to the bed by one arm and one leg, Hansen said. After she complained the metal handcuffs were replaced with velcro restraints, “like in a mental ward”, but the leg shackle remained.
Hansen said the situation was made more distressing because the family was not told of Khan’s condition after he collapsed in the courtroom.
“He was standing there in front of the judge and he started to feel a bit weak so he sat down and the judge told him to stand up,” Hansen. “Then the [magistrate] looked at him and said, ‘You don’t look well’, told him to sit down and they would check to see if he was fit to continue.”
The court was adjourned, with Khan inside, surrounded by court staff, for half an hour. When it was reopened, Hansen said, Khan was gone. It was four hours before authorities told Hansen where he had been taken.
“Four of my daughters were on their mobiles ringing, I was on the home phone ringing, we couldn’t find him anywhere,” she said. “By that time I was sobbing. [I told them], ‘All I want to know is whether my son is alive or dead.’
“They didn’t tell me anything about his condition. I thought that I was walking into a hospital to see Nathan and he would be awake and I would say, ‘Nathan, you scared the shit out of me.’”
Instead she was directed to the hospital’s intensive care unit and told to present her driver’s licence to the guards.
According to Department of Corrective Services policy, all prisoners that are on remand, like Khan, are required to be secured by two points of restraint and escorted by two guards at all times.
“Operating procedure directs all prisoners held in secure facilities are to be restrained when escorted outside of the prison unless a medical condition dictates otherwise, the prisoner is minimum security and approved following completion of a risk assessment,” a department spokesman said in a statement.
The spokesman said guards could remove the restraints if “a prisoner is seriously ill to the extent that it is apparent security will not be breached”, or if advised to do so by doctor.
“While the option of removing restraints is often utilised it was not done so in this case other than to remove leg restraints to allow for a medical procedure to take place,” he said.
Hansen said her son was not a flight risk and should have been released from custody as soon as he fell ill.
“The nurse said to me at 1am on Saturday morning, ‘Go home, have a rest, in case you have to make a big decision’,” she said. “I could have buried my son. I could have buried him. I don’t want any other family to ever have to go through that.”
Serco, which has the contract for courtroom guards in WA, said Khan was in their custody when he became sick at Midland custody centre, which is attached to the courthouse, and guards had administered first aid and called an ambulance. “Our staff acted quickly with Mr Khan’s health and wellbeing the priority,” a spokesman said.
Prisoner advocate Mervyn Eades, who is also Khan’s cousin, said the use of shackles was commonplace in the WA prison system but he was disgusted hospital staff had allowed it.
Eades said Khan’s treatment showed that images showing children at the NT’s Don Dale detention centre being unnecessarily restrained in conditions the United Nations likened to torture were replicated across Australia, in both the adult and juvenile prison systems.
“What’s happening in the adult system is 10 times worse,” Eades said.
