SA’s police chief has opened up about a 1991 firearm incident — here’s what was said

When Grant Stevens was confronted by waiting journalists as he left the ABC’s Adelaide studios following a radio interview on Wednesday morning, he smiled wryly.

“I’m not armed. It’s OK,” the SA Police Commissioner said.

The quip was in reference to an incident from the commissioner’s professional past in which he had, he said, accidentally discharged his firearm during a raid on the house of an alleged drug dealer.

A recent newspaper story has drawn attention to the episode, which dates back to the early 1990s when the now-commissioner was a young criminal investigator.

Here’s a look at what happened, why it has now made headlines, and why an Office for Public Integrity assessment will be conducted.

What’s the story?

Earlier this week, Adelaide’s Sunday Mail newspaper published a report containing allegations relating to a “high-ranking South Australian police officer”.

The story claimed the officer had accidentally fired their gun while attending a house in the northern suburbs during the 1990s.

The article stated that, while no-one had been injured, the officer was now “under investigation over [the] historical claims” — and the report questioned whether details had been “properly disclosed” at the time in accordance with police rules.

The officer was not named in the story.

On Wednesday, the SA Police Commissioner — who disputed several of the claims made in the article, and insisted the incident had been handled in “accordance with our procedures” at the time — confirmed he was the officer in question.

“It was me,” he said at the start of the interview on ABC Radio Adelaide.

The commissioner said while rigid statutory restrictions typically prevented public reporting about details relating to police complaints and ongoing internal investigations, he was authorising disclosures to stop suspicion falling on others.

“In the interests of removing the cloud from other very senior officers in SAPOL … I’m making the decision to say this was me, this is what happened,” he said.

What happened?

According to the commissioner, the incident occurred when he was a junior Senior Constable with the Criminal Investigation Branch (CIB) at Elizabeth in 1991.

“We were doing a drug raid on a known heroin dealer, and during the course of trying to gain entry to the house, it became apparent he was trying to dispose of the drugs,” he said.

“On that basis, we started to force entry to the house and in the course of trying to force entry I accidentally discharged my firearm.”

The commissioner said his supervisor was present at the time and that the police internal investigation branch was notified.

“I received what we would call now managerial guidance and that is essentially the same process that would apply to a police officer who found themselves in a similar situation today,” he told ABC Radio Adelaide.

The Sunday Mail reported there was a second incident “several months later” in which the commissioner again accidentally fired his gun — a claim he strongly rejected.

“I’m aware of the incident they’re referring to but there was no discharge of a firearm,” he said.

“It didn’t happen twice. There has only ever been one occasion that I have accidentally discharged my firearm.”

What has the fallout been?

On Wednesday, the commissioner was asked about the fact that the incident had publicly surfaced after more than three decades, and whether he thought it was part of an attempt to undermine him.

The source of the story, he said, could have been someone who either had “access to records regarding the incident” or actually attended.

“I know who was there on the day — I consider most of those people friends, so I don’t know it would be them,” he said.

The commissioner later said he could not speculate “on the motivations for whoever relayed this incident to a journalist”.

“There are always going to be detractors for people who have positions of responsibility in the community,” he said.

But he added that he did not find the revelation “damaging” and that he had never “shied away from” discussing it with other officers.

“I’ve actually relayed the story on occasions over the last 34 years for different reasons to let other police officers understand how fragile circumstances can be,” he said.

“It serves as a lesson to the community that policing has inherent risks in it, mistakes do happen.”

What happens now?

The commissioner said that, because of the way in which the incident had resurfaced, authorities were now duty-bound to carry out a formal assessment.

“If you ask questions of the South Australia Police and in the context of that question there’s an allegation of wrongdoing, we must in accordance with the act treat it as a complaint,” he said.

“Our ethical and professional standards branch have received the information … so they are bound to do an assessment.”

That process would, he said, be overseen by the Office for Public Integrity.

“I’m happy to speak to our investigators if they need to do so,” he said.

“People who act in good faith generally aren’t adversely affected by those actions.”