I knelt in Jason Palmer’s blood – his death still haunts me 16 years later

The useful part

In 2010, corrections officer Jason Palmer died after being punched in the head by prisoner Latu Kepu. Sixteen years on, nurse Cathy van Miert remembers trying to save his life on the prison floor, and the many injustices she believes Palmer was dealt in death. This feature was made with the support of the Auckland Radio Trust, sponsors of the Vince Geddes In-Depth Journalism Fund.

How it works

• Not as a metaphor, but in the literal sense that only someone who has knelt in a man's blood as his life ebbs out of him will understand.
• Sixteen years later, if I close my eyes, I can still smell the metallic tang pooling under my knees mingled with the stench of vomit on the concrete floor of Unit 16A at Spring Hill Corrections Facility.
• I can feel the grit sticking to my skin while prisoners shriek in their cells.
• I was the first nurse on the scene when prisoner Latu Kepu stepped out of his cell and ended Jason's life with a single punch.
• I was there while Jason was still on the floor, fighting for his life, before the event had been translated into reports, findings, legal argument and institutional language.

What to take from it

I was shouting "status one, brain injury, decerebration" over the cacophony of the roaring prisoners because I knew, as a nurse, that I was looking at a catastrophic brain injury. The official narrative, throughout the coronial inquest, its findings, and the media reports at the time, placed great emphasis on the concrete.

Details worth keeping

I saw the airway obstructed with vomit and blood. The public account of Jason Palmer's death has always felt incomplete. He fell back and his head hit the concrete, end of story.