Kwementyaye Briscoe in the watch house.

DAVID O'Keefe stared down at the iPod in front of him with tired eyes, unaware that an Aboriginal man in his protective custody was close to death.

The 28-year-old police officer had pulled the late-shift in the Alice Springs watch house and was feeling lazy when he clocked on at 11pm on January 4.

His colleague, Janice Kershaw, also spent time checking emails and surfing the internet.

The two probationary constables had been left to run the watch house for more than two hours after Sergeant Andrew Barram ducked out, telling them to check on the 27-year-old man, known since his death as Kwementyaye Briscoe, who was heavily drunk and injured, lying face-down in a cell.

Constable Kershaw checked on Briscoe only once, at 11.30pm.

At 1.41am, when Sergeant Barram returned, he found Briscoe dead. Constable O'Keefe lied that he had repeatedly checked on Briscoe, while Constable Kershaw threw up in a rubbish bin.

Constable Kershaw told an inquest in June into the death in custody that she did not respond to an alarm set off by prisoners concerned about Briscoe because she was busy with another detainee.

Before being picked up by police, Briscoe had taken his nieces and nephews for a splash in the town's pool. He then went to the bed of the Todd River to begin a long drinking session with cousins and friends.

As night fell, the group moved on to the shadows of the oval on Flynn Drive. At 8.47pm, someone called police to report a drunken fight in the area.

Constables Gareth Evans and Anthony Blansjaar spotted Briscoe's group gathered on the other side of the oval.

A group of about six, including Briscoe, fled. He fell while being chased by Constable Evans.

Constable Evans said Briscoe confronted him when he got up, so he pushed him back. After falling, Briscoe was placed in a hold and marched to a police van.

On the way to the watch house, another man taken into custody pulled out a full bottle of rum that he had hidden in his shorts and passed it around. Police either failed to search the man, or had not done so adequately.

Briscoe drank half of the bottle within 20 minutes before the van arrived at the watch house at 9.38pm. At the watch house, an officer with the lowest rank of the NT Police, Aboriginal community police officer Robyn Parker, was left in charge. The rum had yet to kick in while Briscoe walked through the station and was ushered into cell 1 for observation.

CCTV footage captured seven minutes later shows him becoming agitated and unpredictable, repeatedly taking off his shirt and putting it back on. A hopelessly drunk Briscoe was taken out of the cell and fell on the floor. Constable Evans dragged him along the floor into a reception area.

Briscoe eventually and unsteadily rose, with fists clenched.

Constable Evans aggressively grabbed his arm and swung him into a reception desk, with Briscoe's head and arm smashing against the surface.

CCTV shows Briscoe lying on the floor soon after, blood pooling around his head, before he was frisked and carried to cell 9, leaving a trail of blood on the floor.

The officer in charge of the Alice Springs command that night, Sergeant William McDonnell, said cleaning the blood off the floor was seen as more important that night than helping Briscoe.

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Cleaning blood off cell floor 'more important' than helping