Rebels boss Jamie Ginn died of cocaine overdose after ‘poor supervision’ in custody, WA Coroner finds

A WA Coroner has called for body scanners and radar-sensing technology to be installed at the Perth Watch House after a bikie boss died from a cocaine overdose while under “poor supervision” in custody. Inquest findings into the October 2023 death of Rebels president Jamie Ginn at the Perth Watch House concluded the 50-year-old died from a large, accidental overdose of cocaine. But WA Coroner Michael Jenkin was unable to establish when or how Ginn ingested the drug. Ginn was strip searched on arrival at the watch house. Mr Jenkin also raised concerns about a 15-minute delay before a cells control officer realised that Ginn, who was supposed to be under “continuous monitoring”, had suffered a seizure in his isolated unit. Ginn was found at 6.53pm and, despite resuscitation efforts, was pronounced dead at 8.05pm. While Mr Jenkin was unable to conclude if the 15-minute delay had contributed to Ginn’s death, he found the standard of supervision while he was detained at the watch house was “poor”. He made seven recommendations focused on improving security and safety at the centre. These included a call for WA Police to consider high-tech monitoring of detainees, such as body scanners, radar-sensing technology and artificial intelligence, to detect “unusual detainee behaviour”. The Coroner recommended WA Police review its search procedures to improve the chance of them discovering concealed items, such as illicit drugs. He also recommended WA Police review whether nurse staffing at the watch house is sufficient, after it emerged no night shift nurse was on duty when Ginn suffered his medical emergency. Ginn died about three hours after he was brought to the Perth Watch House, at about 5pm on October 10, 2023, after being arrested in Gnangara for firearms offences. He was due to face court the next day. Toxicologist David Joyce told the inquest Ginn ingested between 3g to 6.7g, or a rounded teaspoon, of cocaine soon before his death. The amount was “probably unsurvivable” even for a healthy person, he said. But how and when Ginn ingested the cocaine remained a “piece missing from the puzzle,” Dr Joyce told the three-day inquest. No evidence of drugs was found either at the place of his arrest or the Scarborough hotel where he stayed the night before, and an exhaustive analysis of CCTV at the watch house failed to identify an “ingestion event”. “We have got two sets of evidence which just seem to be irreconcilable,” Dr Joyce told the inquest. “One is the rapid onset of cocaine intoxication, which can really only be explained by a recent dose and can’t be explained by a dose taken at 1 o’clock (when Ginn was arrested.) “And then we have, as I understand it, CCTV footage which doesn’t identify that event.” In making his findings, Mr Jenkin said he was satisfied that the actions of the arresting officers and those who interacted with Ginn during his detention did not cause or contribute to his death. He also discredited a theory put forward by Ginn’s family that a meat pie he was given for dinner shortly before his death may have contained cocaine. “Despite the sensational nature of this allegation, there is simply no evidence to support it,” Mr Jenkin wrote. “In the absence of any definitive evidence of an ingestion event while he was at PWH, the more likely explanation for the mechanism which led to Mr Ginn’s death seems to be the rupture of a package of cocaine he had previously swallowed. “However, the absence of any packaging in Mr Ginn’s stomach or the first part of his duodenum, has meant that I have been unable to make any finding (to the relevant standard) about this issue.”