| Volcano | Music | 00:00 |
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| MARSHALL: This is living on the edge. The threatening volcano Mt Tuvavur looms over poor old Rabaul. | 00:13 |
| Man sweeps ash | Anyone who tries to get the better of this mountain is simply wasting their time. | 00:24 |
| Youths on street | Music | 00:32 |
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| MARSHALL: But it’s not the only destructive force here. In a country with a reputation for lawlessness this town has its share of crime and chaos. | 00:36 |
| Ship at dock | But Rabaul’s approach to law enforcement is unique. Local business people have got together to take crime fighting into their own hands. | 00:47 |
| Alexander | ALEXANDER: My name is Bruce Alexander, I’m the owner manager of the Rabaul Hotel, Rabaul, Papua New Guinea. | 00:59 |
| Woman walks to check in counter | ALEXANDER: Good morning. WOMAN: Hello. ALEXANDER: How are you today? WOMAN: Good thanks. ALEXANDER: My name’s Bruce. Pleased to meet you. WOMAN: Jessica. ALEXANDER: The high unemployment, | 01:07 |
| Street scenes | mixed with squatters, that is people from other areas, and also the drugs that they bring in, and that’s what’s causing the real problems here. | 01:13 |
| Fidelma at gas station |
| 01:22 |
| Fidelma | FIDELMA: I am Fidelma Tubal, I am the manageress of Volcano town service station in Rabaul. | 01:25 |
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| I think the main problem here is raskol activities - break and enters, and robberies in the business houses in Rabaul town. | 01:31 |
| Adam on dock | ADAM: Hey come on boys, hey time time , time you’re in the middle of this…hurry up. Come on let’s get these pallets loaded. | 01:44 |
| Adam | ADAM: I’m Adam Butler, I’m the shipping operations manager for Agmark in Rabaul. | 01:51 |
| Youth on street | We were hearing of people being stabbed in the streets mainly at night, and stores and homes getting broken into. | 02:01 |
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| MARSHALL: There’s hardly a business here that hasn’t been hit by the so-called rascal gangs and hardly a resident who hasn’t been a victim of crime. | 02:13 |
| Police van | But in this town, they don’t expect much of their police force. | 02:24 |
| Police station | There’s not much action here at Rabaul central police station. For much of the time the patrol cars sit idle. | 02:33 |
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| Station Sergeant Andrew Manamb told me the limited fuel rationed to the police is mainly used to ferry officers to and from work. | 02:42 |
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| MANAMB: Most of the time we run out of diesel. | 02:53 |
| Manamb | We don’t have handcuffs, sometimes we don’t have stationery to do our court papers. | 02:56 |
| Marshall in holding cell | MARSHALL: And how about this for a holding cell, we’re actually in the police foyer, padlocks one, two, three and chains, all set for an overnight stay. | 03:07 |
| Police station | Donors have supplied just about everything else here, from computers to air conditioners. Police have little money, low morale and not much energy. | 03:19 |
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| ALEXANDER: They’ve thrown in the towel. | 03:35 |
| Alexander | It’s a serious issue, they don’t really give a damn any more. | 03:37 |
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| MARSHALL: The business people in this town have back up power supplies and back up water. | 03:40 |
| Alexander picks up gun | And this is their back up law enforcement. They’ve joined up as reservists in the Royal Papua New Guinea Police Force. ALEXANDER: We’ve got a number of firearms | 03:50 |
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| mostly 12 gauge and various pistols, 9 millimetre and 40 calibre pistos. | 04:01 |
| Alexander leaves home, armed and in uniform | MARSHALL: After one weeks training a few months ago the reservists have the same clout as any other police officer in town. | 04:08 |
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| But the end of a business day signals the start of a long working night for these volunteer guardians of law and order. | 04:19 |
| Reservists in briefing | ADAM: I think everyone’s aware the situation has sort of deteriorated a wee bit with the law and order in town. MARSHALL: Our shipping line boss Adam Butler has some intelligence on some rascals. | 04:31 |
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| ADAM: We’ve also got Kenny, Kenny’s out there as well, he’s another murderer that we’re after, so keep an eye out for him. MARSHALL: And Hotel manager Bruce Alexander is on the trail of a rapist. | 04:42 |
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| ALEXANDER: But there are witnesses to say that he had a knife to this young girl’s neck and then dragged her off into the bushes. | 04:54 |
| Fidelma in briefing | MARSHALL: Service station owner Fidelma Tabul has put her three kids to bed and is out on patrol too. | 05:01 |
| Fidelma in patrol car with Alexander | FIDELMA: But they don’t stay in one place, they just move on. ALEXANDER: We’ll go down to the harbour on the way back, to see what we can stir up there. | 05:10 |
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| ALEXANDER: Kenny will be foolish, you watch, he’ll get drunk again like he did an hopefully this time… | 05:19 |
| Alexander pulls along side two men on street | MARSHALL: It’s 8pm and the only people here after dark are drinkers. It’s illegal to drink alcohol in public, but the reservists are prepared to give these offenders a warning. | 05:30 |
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| What’s more worrying are the sometimes deadly home brews being traded on the road side. | 05:46 |
| Confiscating bush knives | ALEXANDER: There’s a lot of people in our hospitals now that have got bush knife wounds and arms chopped off and all the other bits and pieces and just about always that fellow has been on jungle juice. | 05:54 |
| Alexander to man | ALEXANDER: You’ll have a hangover tomorrow. You’re drunk and you’re nuts. | 06:04 |
| Patrol car POV | MARSHALL: It’s 10pm and there’s still no sign of the rapist or Kenny the murderer. | 06:18 |
| Kid handcuffed on footpath | But the reservists have handcuffed a 16 year old boy. They’d nearly run over him as he slept in the middle of the road. | 06:25 |
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| MARSHALL Bruce, why do they sleep on the road? ALEXANDER: Well it’s warmer they reckon, and they get full of JJ and they don’t know where they’re sleeping. Do you know what, there’s probably | 06:36 |
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| ten fellows die a year from that. | 06:46 |
| Marijuana bust | MARSHALL: At midnight the evening livens up. | 06:58 |
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| A culprit has fled, but left behind drugs he was selling. ALEXANDER: These fellows have gotta be faster out the back, Joe. They’re being far too slow tonight. I don’t know what’s their problem. | 07:08 |
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| ALEXANDER: It’s about a hundred packets of marijuana. | 07:21 |
| POV from Patrol car |
| 07:24 |
| Raid on house | ALEXANDER: Open up, police. | 07:33 |
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| MARSHALL: Two a.m., and the search for the Kenny the murderer, and the rapist, continues in some abandoned houses. Still no sign of sign of them. | 07:35 |
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| ALEXANDER: We’ve taken out in the last six months just about all the top ten criminals in Rabaul. | 07:51 |
| Super: Bruce Alexander | We’ve either captured them, or they’ve run away, and that’s calmed the situation down a lot. | 07:55 |
| Bruce inspecting break in | ALEXANDER: Well there you go. They’ve just pushed this up here. That looks still fairly solid actually. MARSHALL: But there’s little joy for Bruce after this night. While he was out chasing the criminals, they broke into his hotel. | 08:03 |
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| ALEXANDER: Looks like they’ve got a whole heap of sheets and bowls and maybe a few fireworks. | 08:18 |
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| Yeah but they’ve probably propped it up… | 08:23 |
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| ALEXANDER: I think most police officers throughout the world probably enjoy a collar, like catching bad fellows, and we certainly do. | 08:25 |
| Alexander | But we like to think that those people that are predating on us are now being predated back… so and we’ll chase them hither and tither and we’ll catch them. That’s our policy, we’re very committed to it. | 08:33 |
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| Music | 08:46 |
| Empty looking police station | MARSHALL: Back at Rabaul central police station it’s still all very quiet. | 08:51 |
| Man welding | But something is happening out the back. | 08:59 |
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| Local businesses have chipped in to build a holding cell. Now all the volcano town needs are some apprehended rascals to make it all worthwhile. | 09:03 |
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| Music | 09:15 |
| Credits: | Reporter: Steve Marshall Camera: Ron Ekkel Editor: Bryan Milliss Producer: Trevor Bormann | 09:20 |