BDO death: sniffer dogs toblame?

Wed 4th Feb, 2009 in Local News

Following the tragic death of Perth teen Gemma Thoms after her collapse at the final date of the 2009 Big Day Out on Sunday February 1st, media attention of the issue has raged on with many looking to point the finger of blame surrounding the circumstances of the 17-year-old’s passing.

Reports on exactly what Gemma took and how much have varied (some say it was one before she arrived and another as she was in line to enter, but others have said it was up to three at once), however friends of the girl have gone on record telling authorities she consumed a number of pills – which they believed to be ecstasy – after panicking she’d be caught by sniffer dogs.

Police have countered this claim as it’s reported she was dropped at the festival by her mother, thereby avoiding the sniffer dogs which were positioned at the nearby Claremont train station. Authorities believe that it was the extreme heat on Sunday that would have attributed to Gemma’s collapse. “There were a whole pile of people. She entered the venue. It was all too much for her. About an hour later she just collapsed,” a police spokeswoman told AAP. “If you don’t get enough fluids into you, your body just shuts down.”

Slyvia Hale, a NSW Greens MP who has been campaigning against the use of sniffer dogs for several years, spoke out yesterday following the weekend’s heartbreaking incident. Citing a 2006 report by the NSW Ombudsman that established the ineffectiveness of drug dogs, she remarked to AAP; “That report concluded that not only were they ineffective, but they are likely to result in harm when young people panic and swallow drugs and this appears to have happened in Western Australia.”

Photo from news.com.au