Professor Gracelyn Smallwood resigned from the First Nations advisory group of the Queensland Police Service after Aubrey Donahue, an Aboriginal man, was shot and killed by the police. Donahue was shot four times by police officers who claim that he advanced on them with a knife in Mareeba, near Cairns. Smallwood received a call from a family member half an hour after the shooting occurred describing how four bullets were put into Donahue’s abdomen. She contacted Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll and asked why Donahue was shot four times and why close-range footage of the incident was not available. Smallwood believes that police officers shot Donahue because they felt intimidated and did not have their cameras on. She also called for changes in police procedures and for the government to work with Indigenous communities to reduce the number of children in out-of-home care and the criminal justice system. Smallwood has been an Indigenous activist for decades and has advocated for changes in the way police restrain people, particularly after the death of Townsville Indigenous man Noomba in 2018.