As a child, Jermaine "Ozzie" Ostrofski dreamed of chasing bad guys and locking them up.
Now in his sixth year in the Northern Territory police, Constable Ostrofski is content in his career choice after a brief stint in the RAAF.
He realised Indigenous Australians didn't have a great relationship with police and wanted to make a difference as a role model.
"I wanted to be someone with Blak skin in the system to affect change and show our mob there are opportunities and that we can make a good life for ourselves," he says.
Like all jobs, the role comes with challenges and rewards.
For Const Ostrofski, the responsibility of being a bush cop based in the town of Kintore on the border of Western Australia in the NT delivers both.
"The most challenging aspect for me, right now ... is the isolation and distance but being an Aboriginal man in a uniform is also one of the most challenging parts of this job," he says.
Sometimes being Blak is helpful but often, in the heat of the moment, he's been called a "uniform", a "coconut" and a "traitor", which he finds hurtful.
"Thankfully, those words don’t get thrown around too much in the remote communities I‘ve worked in because I have had the chance to get to know people and them me," he says.
One of the most rewarding parts of being a bush copper is having a big enough positive impact so that whether people see him in uniform or not they have a smile for him and remember his name, especially the kids.
Const Ostrofski says his relationship with the community is what makes him happy, knowing he's bringing good influence to people's lives.
"It’s funny, in the last community I worked in, whenever the kids saw the police car driving around, they would yell out 'Ozzie! Ozzie! Blue Light' even if I wasn’t in the car," he says.
A big part of the job is building meaningful relationships with elders and traditional owners.
In 2020 Const Ostrofski won the NT Aboriginal Community Police Officer of the Year.
"We invest a lot of time in building rapport with community members when we’re out bush and this can be exhausting but we do this because we care," he says.
"When the award was announced I felt proud and happy and it made me realise the work I was doing in community was making a difference."
He takes a lot from this as both a Wulli Wulli and gay police officer.
"I am out and I'm proud, I've got a tattoo on my forearm that is a love heart and it's half Aboriginal flag and half rainbow flag so it's not something that I hide," he says.
"It doesn't affect my work too much. Obviously being gay informs me and the decisions I make and the way I make them, the same as being Aboriginal does."
Const Ostrofski says his sexuality never comes into play with fellow officers and everyone he works with treats him respectfully.
He encourages other Indigenous Australians considering joining the police to be brave, strong and just do it.
"It can be rewarding but it can also be hard and exhausting," Const Ostrofski says.
"I won't lie, we see some pretty bad things but if you get a chance to work in community somewhere you can make a real difference and we can make the police force better."
Const Ostrofski sums up life as a bush police officer in three words: "adventure, education and reward".
"You don’t need much imagination as to why I have picked them," he says.
