Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.
Speaker 1: Detective see a side of life the average person is
Speaker 1: never exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop.
Speaker 1: For twenty five of those years, I was catching killers.
Speaker 1: That's what I did for a living. I was a
Speaker 1: homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,
Speaker 1: I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.
Speaker 1: The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories
Speaker 1: from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
Speaker 1: and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some
Speaker 1: of the content and language might be confronting. That's because
Speaker 1: no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.
Speaker 1: Join me now as I take you into this world.
Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of Eye Catch Killers. Today we're
Speaker 1: going to talk to two forms of policemen who are
Speaker 1: victims of a terrorist attack that nearly claimed their lives
Speaker 1: and resulted in the terrorists being shot and killed. These
Speaker 1: two officers have not spoken publicly in detail about this
Speaker 1: incident for a variety of reasons, but today they've agreed
Speaker 1: to come on Eye Catch Killers and share their story.
Speaker 1: The attack occurred ten years ago. Both officers were working
Speaker 1: as counter terrorist detectives when they are attacked and stabbed
Speaker 1: by an eighteen year old Newman hater who they were
Speaker 1: speaking with about concerns he has been radicalized by the
Speaker 1: Islamic State. As you could imagine, an incident like that
Speaker 1: has a profound impact on those involved. What people sometimes
Speaker 1: don't realize is behind the tough exterior, police are just human.
Speaker 1: They feel pain and have emotions like everyone else. Taking
Speaker 1: someone's life, even someone who is trying to kill you,
Speaker 1: comes at the cost. Today we're in the Melbourne studio
Speaker 1: talking to an Australian federal police officer, Matt and a
Speaker 1: former Victorian police officer called Nile. We're going to find
Speaker 1: out who they are, talk about the incident in detail,
Speaker 1: how it changed their lives, and a lot of other
Speaker 1: things about policing and terrorism. And now upfront, I'd like
Speaker 1: to thank Nile and Matter for coming on I Catch
Speaker 1: Killers and sharing their story because it can't be easy
Speaker 1: talking about what they went through. Welcome to I Catch Killers.
Speaker 1: I've got two guests in the studio today, so firstly,
Speaker 1: let me welcome Mart Matt.
Speaker 2: Hey, Gary, thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: Matt, you're a Australian Federal Police officer. Yes, and we've
Speaker 1: also got them. We can't forget Nile here. Nile you're
Speaker 1: a former Victorian Police officer. Yeah, that's rightery Well, i'd
Speaker 1: just like to thank both of you for coming into
Speaker 1: the studio. In the introduction, I talked about an incident
Speaker 1: that brought you guys very close together. It was a
Speaker 1: terrorist attack in which you were both injured and also
Speaker 1: resolved in the person who injured You've been shot, shot
Speaker 1: and killed. Pretty heavy, heavy topic, and we're going to
Speaker 1: discuss that in detail. But how come? And I just
Speaker 1: wanted to put this out because the public listening, well,
Speaker 1: why have we got an AFP dude here and a
Speaker 1: Victorian cop? Why were you working together? How did that
Speaker 1: come about?
Speaker 3: So the Joint counter Terrorism Team prize as the local
Speaker 3: police force, so in this case Victoria Police, the Australian
Speaker 3: Federal Police and then also the security security agencies and
Speaker 3: the Joint counter Terrorism Team operates in all our states
Speaker 3: and territories across Australia. So this was Victoria Police detectives
Speaker 3: combined with federal agents and the intelligence services. That's how
Speaker 3: we came to be working together in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 1: Are you're happy to be working with him?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Well, funny you should say that I started the JCTT
Speaker 4: on the first of September in twenty fourteen, and I'd
Speaker 4: been there a day or two and Nile came up
Speaker 4: to me, and as we know, Victorians are very parochial
Speaker 4: around the AFL, and he asked me what my footy
Speaker 4: team was and I looked at him and said Paramatta
Speaker 4: and he looked at me in disgust and walked off,
Speaker 4: and yeah, and saying that heels had me again overly.
Speaker 1: Flash last year to be bragging about.
Speaker 2: It, but stand by them. But he yes.
Speaker 4: So that was our introduction, and then I think I
Speaker 4: was there a couple more weeks and then we got thrust.
Speaker 2: The incident together.
Speaker 1: It's funny and it's not unique to policing, but I
Speaker 1: think it's something that we all understand. How you look
Speaker 1: when you're at tasked with a new investigation or a
Speaker 1: new team or a new role. You look closely at
Speaker 1: the person you're going to be working with because you
Speaker 1: know you're going to get to know that person very well.
Speaker 1: You're going to spend a lot of time, and you're
Speaker 1: even going to like them or hate them more, it's
Speaker 1: something in between. First impressions.
Speaker 3: Well, with this one it was completely different. Gary Bias,
Speaker 3: myself and Matt Ryan different teams, So that night it
Speaker 3: was a combination of different members from different teams, all
Speaker 3: of who I was aware of, but we hadn't worked
Speaker 3: closely together, so not knowing Matt's capabilities or the other
Speaker 3: AFP members that were present, that sort of made it
Speaker 3: a little bit more difficult to operate.
Speaker 1: It was you're bought in another aspect there, because there's
Speaker 1: an assumption that we all come with this knowledge and
Speaker 1: skill set working with police, but until you see it,
Speaker 1: really the pressure on you don't know if they're going
Speaker 1: to come to the four.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right, probably one of the real benefits. I
Speaker 3: didn't know Matt's background, but because he was a Victoria
Speaker 3: Police member prior to joining the AFP, there was a
Speaker 3: specific element of our training that Matt remembered and actually
Speaker 3: said while we were out there on the night that
Speaker 3: I say saved our lives and that is due to
Speaker 3: the interoperability of our skills and both of our trainings.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about the incident, and we'd talk briefly
Speaker 1: because I want to find out a little bit more
Speaker 1: about you guys before we go in the full detail.
Speaker 1: But it was on the twenty third of September twenty
Speaker 1: fourteen outside in dever Hill's police station in Melbourne. You
Speaker 1: were both stabbed and the offender was shot and killed.
Speaker 2: Matt.
Speaker 1: Firstly, you're stabbed in the eye. You're stabbed in the chest.
Speaker 1: My understanding of it is a stab wound in the
Speaker 1: chest was sending meter from your heart. They're potentially life threatening.
Speaker 1: Taught me through what happened at the time.
Speaker 4: Yes, so yeah, or during the attack, and I don't
Speaker 4: know what order it happened in. And you know, you
Speaker 4: sort of your body shuts down and does weird things
Speaker 4: during a critical incident. And you know, I went as
Speaker 4: soon as I saw the knife, I went. I had
Speaker 4: auditory exclusion, so I lost all my hearing. And then
Speaker 4: he sort of attacked me, and you know, I'm sort
Speaker 4: of fighting, fighting with him, trying to get my gun out.
Speaker 2: You know, I couldn't.
Speaker 4: I couldn't. I lost fine motor skills, so I was
Speaker 4: struggling with my whole stir and everything else. So when
Speaker 4: I say, like, I don't remember the order of the attacks,
Speaker 4: of their stabbing, I can't sort of assume, but yeah,
Speaker 4: I had a couple sort of over my left one
Speaker 4: dawn over my left eye and down the left side
Speaker 4: of my face, and then too in my left shoulder
Speaker 4: and that severed a few tendons and muscles in there.
Speaker 4: And then the one in my chest that went into
Speaker 4: my liver, and that was the life threatening one way.
Speaker 4: I had to have a few units of blood put
Speaker 4: in in the hospital and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 4: But yeah, they showed me the photos after the surgery
Speaker 4: and you could see the hole in the liver and
Speaker 4: then just to the right I guess of the photo. Yeah,
Speaker 4: it was my heart, so it wasn't too far off.
Speaker 1: Well, we'll talk in detail about it. But you were
Speaker 1: lucky in a way in one Sanda Mator And you've
Speaker 1: probably we've all been the police and you've seen it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's just one stab wound that can take someone's life.
Speaker 1: Now you were there Nile obviously, and you were stabbed
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3: So I was stabbed first as I've gone to search Newman.
Speaker 3: The first stab wound entered the my left forearm, which
Speaker 3: severed through the older nerve. Now the owner nerve controls
Speaker 3: your motor skills in the hand and the muscles, so
Speaker 3: it essentially rendered my left hand inoperable, so I couldn't
Speaker 3: use any of the fingers. And then the second knife
Speaker 3: wound was a defensive one where I was trying to
Speaker 3: throw my arm onto the blade which slashed me across
Speaker 3: the wrist with fish superficial cuts.
Speaker 1: Okay, and again a traumatic incident and the best of things.
Speaker 1: But another layer that do you fed the fatal shot?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: And I've been involved in numerous police shootings and investigations
Speaker 1: into police shootings, and I've never seen anyone come away
Speaker 1: from it that hasn't been impacted. I'm not taking taking
Speaker 1: someone's life.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're right, Gary, And look, I always acknowledge action
Speaker 3: normally beats reaction. Myself and Matt were very lucky to
Speaker 3: escae that incident with our lives. That's how I firmly
Speaker 3: believe that. But the impact, Yeah, there's the personal, there's
Speaker 3: the professional and the family impacts. For example, I had
Speaker 3: surgery with my left hand to reattach the nerves and
Speaker 3: get the strength back. And my daughter was very young
Speaker 3: at the time of the shooting. She was about twenty
Speaker 3: two months old, and I remember being on sick le
Speaker 3: even trying to put a scrunch in her hair, and
Speaker 3: because I lost all the fine motor skills, I just
Speaker 3: couldn't do that. And for me, that's the family impact
Speaker 3: that really concerns me. My wife and daughter didn't sign
Speaker 3: up for policing. It was me and I accept the
Speaker 3: risks of when we go to work every day and
Speaker 3: wearing firearms, there is a reality we might use them,
Speaker 3: whereas the family have no control over this whatsoever. So
Speaker 3: to see my family impacted due to things I couldn't
Speaker 3: do at home anymore, that really causes me emotional turmoil.
Speaker 1: A heavy situation that you both found found yourself in.
Speaker 1: Well we'll unpack that, but before we do, I want
Speaker 1: to find out a little bit about about you guys.
Speaker 1: Who are you? As a young fellow, Matt, I grew.
Speaker 4: Up in I was born over seat in pap New Guinea,
Speaker 4: and then moved back and spent a bit of time
Speaker 4: in North Queensland and then moved down to the mid
Speaker 4: north coast of New South Wales.
Speaker 1: So that was with all the moving, the around and
Speaker 1: puppy in New Guinea. Was it your parents work or
Speaker 1: I know, just.
Speaker 2: You know, Mum went over there to have me.
Speaker 4: She moved over there with her sister and brother in
Speaker 4: law and had a few kids over.
Speaker 2: There in Lay.
Speaker 4: So she went up there and spent a bit of
Speaker 4: time there and I was born, and then came back
Speaker 4: and and she met my dad or my who like
Speaker 4: I call my ad, you know, probably twelve months or
Speaker 4: so after she moved back to Australia and then yeah,
Speaker 4: spent a bit of time, went back to New Guinea,
Speaker 4: spent a bit then back to North Queensland and then
Speaker 4: down to the mid north coast of New South Wales.
Speaker 1: Did you always have aspirations to become a cop?
Speaker 2: Poor? Not really. It was more.
Speaker 4: I wanted to join the military, So out of school
Speaker 4: I joined. I joined the RAF as a photographer and
Speaker 4: I had a few years there and then got out,
Speaker 4: did a bit of photography around Melbourne, and then thought
Speaker 4: I need a full time job, and Vic Poul were
Speaker 4: recruiting pretty heavily and saying that like I had thought
Speaker 4: about joining the police sort of towards the end of school,
Speaker 4: but it was more just thoughts and talks and nothing
Speaker 4: really sort of all that serious. And then I thought,
Speaker 4: you know they got good leave and good super and
Speaker 4: so in ninety six, so I joined up to Victoria Police.
Speaker 1: Okay, how long did you just stay in Victoria Police
Speaker 1: before you went across the a.
Speaker 4: P About seventeen years I think, I think, yeah, ninety
Speaker 4: six to twenty thirteen.
Speaker 1: All right, what about you you as a young guy.
Speaker 3: So I grew up in country northeast Victoria, so up
Speaker 3: in ned Kelly Country, came down to Well. I wanted
Speaker 3: to be a policeman from about four years of age.
Speaker 3: He's having a little police station at home. When mum
Speaker 3: and dad would get home, I would go out and
Speaker 3: put a ticket on their car and raking some fines.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm surprised you haven't ended up in the highway patrol. Yeah,
Speaker 1: nothing wrong with I opener correctly. We patrol absolutely.
Speaker 3: So I came down to Melbourne in nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 3: got into hospitality, but he was at that stage. Matt
Speaker 3: got in when it was a boon recruiting and then
Speaker 3: it dried up until early two thousand. So I then
Speaker 3: joined in two thousand two days after my twenty fourth
Speaker 3: birthday in January two thousand, So twenty three odd years
Speaker 3: in policing.
Speaker 1: Okay, you've had a couple of interesting You worked on
Speaker 1: the Pirana Task Force. Yeah, just explain that the people
Speaker 1: that might know it.
Speaker 3: So, the Parana Task Force was investigating organized crime and
Speaker 3: also the Gangland murders which were prevalent from two thousand
Speaker 3: onwards down here, with something like twenty eight deaths or murders,
Speaker 3: should I say at that stage. So I came to
Speaker 3: Parana Task Force in January twenty ten, promoted to the
Speaker 3: rank of detective and we were allocated in investigation on
Speaker 3: a Middle East and organized crime character that had significant
Speaker 3: influence in Melbourne, Sydney and elsewhere. Usual ill gotten gains
Speaker 3: and elf So the Primo Task Force that was a
Speaker 3: dedicated crew that was then looking at the Phase three
Speaker 3: mop up of people who have survived the Ganglan wars.
Speaker 1: As we all knew about the underbelly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly right, And that's really where I was working
Speaker 3: with some great detectives Mick Hughes, Detective Inspector Dave Jones,
Speaker 3: Steve Cooper, some really good investigators there which gave me
Speaker 3: mycraft within the detective world of investigations.
Speaker 1: There would have been a lot of pressure on there
Speaker 1: because it was so high profile, and we were talking
Speaker 1: before we started the podcast about the impact that has
Speaker 1: on family and that you could be home but not
Speaker 1: actually present, And I would imagine the job like that,
Speaker 1: getting a sense of the pace that investigation was going.
Speaker 1: At the nature of the work, that would have been
Speaker 1: one of those times where your focus was very much
Speaker 1: on your work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, Gary, And as you know, with investigations, it's
Speaker 3: not just focused on a sole area. This many different
Speaker 3: branches off that it goes that you've got to allocate
Speaker 3: resources and time to that, whereas it's not just an
Speaker 3: eight till four Monday to Friday job. You're playing catch
Speaker 3: up football by trying to find out what's been occurring
Speaker 3: on the phones, listening devices and other methodology that's in
Speaker 3: play to try and predict the next move of what
Speaker 3: that organized crime figure would do. But then when you're
Speaker 3: getting home, you are you're president at home, but quite literally,
Speaker 3: you're still thinking about work and what's got to be
Speaker 3: done the next day, the weeks after and onwards. I
Speaker 3: was very lucky that we always had very strong detective
Speaker 3: sergeants and inspectors and superintendents running our investigations that would
Speaker 3: really keep us focused on what the main goal was,
Speaker 3: so when it would try and branch off into different areas,
Speaker 3: it would be brought back into That's interesting.
Speaker 1: I've seen long investigations. You can start chasing rabbits down
Speaker 1: holes because you uncover so much and your head's in overdrive.
Speaker 1: But yeah, a good leader or officer in charge of
Speaker 1: an investigation does keep it the focus. This is your role,
Speaker 1: this is the focus of what we terms of reference
Speaker 1: and let's stay stay on track.
Speaker 3: Absolutely. We had the AFP Detective Superintendent Des Appleby worked
Speaker 3: really well with our vic pohal To Textive Inspector Mick Hughes.
Speaker 3: They were siding, they were sidestepping everything that would occur
Speaker 3: handing glove responses. It was a really proactive, targeted investigation
Speaker 3: that we were doing and it actually got the relationship
Speaker 3: with Victoria Police and the AFP in Melbourne back on
Speaker 3: track again for the work that we did, because previously
Speaker 3: we'd had the Tomato Tin's investigation of the ecstasy tablets
Speaker 3: where Victoria Police had been removed from the building by
Speaker 3: the AFP. So several years later the relationship was back
Speaker 3: on track to target all.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's been that over the years that with a
Speaker 1: pushback from state police and AFP, but hopefully that's across
Speaker 1: the board that's getting better. Yeah, and I think with
Speaker 1: AFP and Matt you can talk to this because you're
Speaker 1: worked in both AFP are getting this. They haven't been
Speaker 1: in terms of police in the round for that long
Speaker 1: a time, but they're starting to get the experience. And
Speaker 1: you're getting people who have had their whole career at
Speaker 1: the sharp end of policing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and yeah, I think you know, they've they had
Speaker 4: their sort of issues early on, and I remember in
Speaker 4: Big Poll, you know, I was walking down to do
Speaker 4: our early on just to forget how the academy. Actually
Speaker 4: I was posted into Melbourne. We were walking down La
Speaker 4: Trope Street. We were walking because we were going to
Speaker 4: use the range at the AFP offices and one of
Speaker 4: the detectives from the Melbourne COB said to me, oh,
Speaker 4: you know, we're going to the AFP and you know
Speaker 4: they're useless and hopeless and that do too much. But
Speaker 4: sort of you know, fast forward, you know, fifteen sort
Speaker 4: of twenty years and with that experience and over time
Speaker 4: plus working pretty closely with other police forces around Australia,
Speaker 4: and you know, that experience in the AFP, and there's
Speaker 4: a few things that they do really really well, and
Speaker 4: that's what they're sort of trying to focus on, you know,
Speaker 4: like the big drug imports, terrorism and all that sort
Speaker 4: of stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So plus they're also actively sort of trying to recruit
Speaker 4: police from other police forces, which sort of I mean
Speaker 4: you're sort of buying experience and you're sort of bringing.
Speaker 1: Someone in bringing in that experience. Well, you said the
Speaker 1: seventeen years in vic Pole and then you went across
Speaker 1: to the AFP. What was the decision that swung you
Speaker 1: to go across.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was I was doing actually I was working
Speaker 4: in intel at the time, and I was doing a
Speaker 4: secondment with the AFP out at the airport in a
Speaker 4: joint in the joint intel group out there, and and.
Speaker 2: We had some.
Speaker 4: Victoria Police detectives that were out there in the in
Speaker 4: the investigations team. So it was these joint team and
Speaker 4: it was really it was really well resourced, and you know,
Speaker 4: we're looking at basically trusted insiders around the airport and
Speaker 4: just sort of seeing the opportunities that the AFP offered
Speaker 4: was like, you know, this is you know, there's something
Speaker 4: bigger than vic Pole because you know Vic Pole. You know,
Speaker 4: while I had I had a fantastic time there and
Speaker 4: worked in all different places, but you know, sort of
Speaker 4: state based.
Speaker 1: I know what you're saying. And I would often when
Speaker 1: I was in New South Wales police look at the
Speaker 1: AFP and think, oh, well, you could get stationed overseas
Speaker 1: or different investigations a bit broader. So I can see
Speaker 1: the temptation there. You've come together. Let's start talking in
Speaker 1: the build up to the incident, what drew you both
Speaker 1: to counter terrorism?
Speaker 4: So I I was in the Security Intelligence Group at
Speaker 4: Big Pole for a couple of years in intel there,
Speaker 4: and i'd started studying my masters in intel. But just
Speaker 4: before I sort of around about that time going to SIEG,
Speaker 4: I sort of started seeing you know, the national security
Speaker 4: sort of things, sort of got interested in in terrorism,
Speaker 4: and then I switched over and started to do my
Speaker 4: masters in terrorism and security, started working at Security Intelligence
Speaker 4: Group and then and which dealt with issue motivated groups
Speaker 4: and terrorism. And so this is when they started sort
Speaker 4: of started working in with the early days of the
Speaker 4: j C T T Joint counter Terrorism Team what Nyla
Speaker 4: and I were part of. And yeah, and I guess
Speaker 4: it just kicked off from there and sort of working
Speaker 4: in the area and you know, sort of getting that interest,
Speaker 4: I guess was the main motivation. It took me a
Speaker 4: few years to get over there, but yeah.
Speaker 1: Look, I think it's a fascinating area of policing. And
Speaker 1: my thing was homicide. But if I had a choice
Speaker 1: of where I'd go outside of homicide, and a regret
Speaker 1: that I didn't do counter terrorism because I think it
Speaker 1: gives you a world view of things. You've got to
Speaker 1: look at things deeply, and you've got to be more
Speaker 1: proactive and from a criminal investigation point of view, at homicide,
Speaker 1: we sort of kick in when the shit's happened and
Speaker 1: come and investigate the crime. But with counter terrorism, it's
Speaker 1: about predicting the crime and preventing the crime more. Now,
Speaker 1: your interest in counter terrorism, how did that come about?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so there was some self interests in there at
Speaker 3: that stage. There was some reshuffling at Parana Task Force
Speaker 3: of our crews and we're then given the offer of
Speaker 3: what other task force would you like to go to? Now,
Speaker 3: because the Organized Crime Task Force was operating in the
Speaker 3: Federal Police building, I had my security clearances, computer access,
Speaker 3: understood who the different detectives and federal agents were there.
Speaker 3: Victoria Police traditionally had one crew of detectives in counter
Speaker 3: terrorism and they were due to be rotated out, so
Speaker 3: there was an opportunity to stay within the AFP building
Speaker 3: working in counter terrorism. At that stage, I thought to myself,
Speaker 3: from a resume perspective, the self interest of this is
Speaker 3: a crime type really unique to common legislation, the opportunities
Speaker 3: that come with it, as Matt spoke about with the AFP,
Speaker 3: the travel, the experiences is far beyond what Victoria Police
Speaker 3: could provide. So working jointly with the Commonwealth and bringing
Speaker 3: the machineries together was something that really interested me. So
Speaker 3: in twenty twelve that's when I transferred over to the
Speaker 3: Joint counter Terrorism Team.
Speaker 1: All right, well, it's interesting that's what drew you to
Speaker 1: counter terrorism, and I would suggest it at that stage
Speaker 1: you didn't think you'd be victims of a terrorist act.
Speaker 1: You thought your role would be preventing those acts and
Speaker 1: keeping the public safe. But as it turned out, you
Speaker 1: guys became victim of a terrorist attack. Nineteenth or twentieth
Speaker 1: of September twenty fourteen, el Bag Daddy issued a fatwah.
Speaker 1: What I understand and you guys might be able to
Speaker 1: add to this. It's like an edict or a ruling
Speaker 1: by a recognized religious authority on the point of Islamic law.
Speaker 1: So fatwah if I'm pronouncing it properly, This fatwa related
Speaker 1: to calling for attacking five Western countries including Australia, Canada, France, USA,
Speaker 1: and United Kingdom, targeting specifically targeting police and military intelligence.
Speaker 1: When that was issued, Let's hold on to the date,
Speaker 1: the twentieth of September two thy fourteen. The incident that
Speaker 1: you guys were victims of was twenty three three days later.
Speaker 1: You would have heard about that encounter terrorism or be
Speaker 1: aware of it, and at any point in time you
Speaker 1: think that would impact on you so deeply and personally.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 4: I remember rocking into work on that Monday, was at
Speaker 4: the twenty second and our analysts had got the fat wa,
Speaker 4: and so they downloaded it and gone through and highlighted
Speaker 4: it and emailed it out to us all, and I
Speaker 4: remember reading it. You know, it was you saying, you know,
Speaker 4: attack the disbelievers in their own countries, and you know
Speaker 4: especially you know, the US, Canada, the filthy French and
Speaker 4: Australia and sort of reading it going oh, yeah, you
Speaker 4: know this is just the usual rhetoric, and you know
Speaker 4: that that isis carries on with and just more sort
Speaker 4: of more proof to what we're about.
Speaker 2: As in the j C. T. T.
Speaker 4: You know, we've we've got to look at this a
Speaker 4: little bit more closely. And yeah, so and you sort
Speaker 4: of think, you know whatever, you know pretty much and
Speaker 4: and then I guess when you start sort of in hindsight,
Speaker 4: you're looking back and there's all these indicators around what
Speaker 4: did happen at that stage, you know, throughout the western
Speaker 4: countries and you know in the Middle East, and you
Speaker 4: know that that fat wire was a pretty important call
Speaker 4: to arms for ISIS, and.
Speaker 2: Yeah it was. I guess it was the start of
Speaker 2: bigger things to come.
Speaker 1: Well, when they're when they're identifying the potential targets as
Speaker 1: police and or military, we stand out like it's not
Speaker 1: it's not hard. And I remember when that came through,
Speaker 1: there was a point in time when it was just
Speaker 1: reiterated to us that you've got to be careful out there. Again,
Speaker 1: your your take on it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, as Matt said, the intelligence tellists had done some
Speaker 3: work around it that stage. I don't think any of
Speaker 3: the Western intelligence agents has had any strategic knowledge of
Speaker 3: where this document would end up, and essentially the world
Speaker 3: was watching and certainly our incerdent then hallmarked what occurred
Speaker 3: from that data on September onwards twenty fourteen, with many
Speaker 3: terror attacks inside inspired by ISIS in those different countries
Speaker 3: that were nominated specifically against police and military mainly that
Speaker 3: were targeted. So Curtis Cheng in New South Wales in
Speaker 3: twenty fifteen, absolutely, yeah. The police in New York ken
Speaker 3: Healley on foot patrol a month after our incert when
Speaker 3: a Muslim convert took to him with a hatchet to
Speaker 3: the back of the head and the police fatally shot
Speaker 3: the offender.
Speaker 2: There.
Speaker 3: We saw attax in France for the police in their
Speaker 3: police station and it can you need on So when
Speaker 3: we myself and Matt both had a trip to New
Speaker 3: York and we met with the director of counter Terrorism
Speaker 3: over there and he spoke about whenever New York speaks
Speaker 3: about terror attacks, they always speak about Davie Hills, Melbourne, Australia.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that's well when we're looking at it. When
Speaker 1: it was issue, that was three days before you guys
Speaker 1: were attacked. So how were your tasks that day? What happened?
Speaker 1: You got together and that was a tasking you had
Speaker 1: to go to speak to Newman.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we were originally we were originally tasked on the
Speaker 4: Monday to go and speak to him and Victoria Police
Speaker 4: their security there security and organized Crime Intel unit. We're
Speaker 4: going to go and speak to one of haters mates.
Speaker 4: And it was sort of a bit of doing and
Speaker 4: throwing on that on that Monday, and it was decided
Speaker 4: we didn't have enough people, so it was put off
Speaker 4: until the Tuesday.
Speaker 1: So can you explain going to speak to him the
Speaker 1: purpose of what you were trying to achieve?
Speaker 3: So for us, I looked at three objectives here. To
Speaker 3: start off, there was no arrest power for what we
Speaker 3: knew about what his behaviors had been. So the first
Speaker 3: one was around disruption. So I look at it if
Speaker 3: we're talking about the crime type of drugs, if we
Speaker 3: were to knock on a drug dealer's house and alert
Speaker 3: them that the police are watching you, you would see
Speaker 3: them stop drug dealing straight away. They'd move out their
Speaker 3: hydro crops so their pill press whatever it is, and
Speaker 3: start up in another location in a few weeks time.
Speaker 3: So disruption for us. Initially, I'm thinking, okay, if we're
Speaker 3: in front of him, he'll see that there's some interest
Speaker 3: in his behavior and he would de escalate that because
Speaker 3: what he'd been doing was google searches on Prime Minister
Speaker 3: at Tony Abbott at the time, had been looking at
Speaker 3: how to make explosives example, and also the daily agenda
Speaker 3: of Tony Abbott where he'd be when he was next
Speaker 3: coming to Melbourne. So there was behaviors we're aware of,
Speaker 3: as well as him waving the Shaharta flag at the
Speaker 3: Dandidong Shopping Center on the Friday before our winter.
Speaker 1: And just to explain those that don't know what that flag.
Speaker 3: Is, yeah, so the Shaharda is an Islamic display of faith,
Speaker 3: essentially meeting there's one God and only one God, which
Speaker 3: is black and white in color and was similar to
Speaker 3: the one I think displayed at the Link Cafe siege
Speaker 3: out the windows by Man Monas. So Newman had been
Speaker 3: waving that flag at the Dandidong Shopping Center, which is
Speaker 3: a very multicultural suburb where you've got Sunnis and Shia Muslims,
Speaker 3: and again there's some social disharmonies between both of those
Speaker 3: religious groups, so for him to be waving the Shaharta
Speaker 3: flag caused significant alarm. Now, luckily for us, we had
Speaker 3: twenty five Victoria police recruits doing a foot control at
Speaker 3: that shopping center, doing a training operation, getting confidence speaking
Speaker 3: to the public and being seen in public with their
Speaker 3: accouterments on. They spoke to Newman on the day where
Speaker 3: he cooperated with them, gave them his identification, but also
Speaker 3: told them that he wasn't here to cause harm to
Speaker 3: the shoppers or the shopping center, but at some stage
Speaker 3: our government would pay for what it's done.
Speaker 1: Okay, And this is coming from an ada and year
Speaker 1: old kid that's well not intimidated by police. Yeah, that's right, dynamics.
Speaker 3: A little bit, absolutely correct. So that was part of
Speaker 3: the reason why we're speaking to him about the flag waving.
Speaker 3: So the second objective was intelligence gathering and the third
Speaker 3: one was human source acquisition potentially.
Speaker 1: Okay, So did you consider it the high risk? It's
Speaker 1: something that you did informally going out to speak to
Speaker 1: and how many police went out to speak to him?
Speaker 1: Where are you going to find him?
Speaker 4: So, like I said, you know that Monday was decided
Speaker 4: we wouldn't go out and then on the Tuesday, we
Speaker 4: came into work and they said, okay, we got and
Speaker 4: they bought four in them. So it was me and
Speaker 4: the other guy who were going to go out on
Speaker 4: the Monday, plus Nile and one other so we had
Speaker 4: sort of four people.
Speaker 1: Okay. So at that point you anticipated that was a
Speaker 1: potential risk you're taking four police out, and.
Speaker 2: You know it was.
Speaker 4: And it was sort of around this time that because
Speaker 4: he was an asy O person of interest, so they'd
Speaker 4: sort of pass that down into the j C t
Speaker 4: T that that they're obviously a part of, and they
Speaker 4: wanted us to go and speak to him because there
Speaker 4: was some intel around him wanting to purchase some knives
Speaker 4: because they're not armed and police are. Then that was
Speaker 4: sort of their sort of that they're there thinking. And
Speaker 4: importantly that the previous week when he was waving that
Speaker 4: flag around, there was some counter terrorism raids in Brisbane
Speaker 4: and Sydney and now I think there were fifteen arrests,
Speaker 4: and that was why he was waving the flag.
Speaker 1: Around, showing support for the YEP as well as you.
Speaker 4: Know that well at the time we didn't know, but
Speaker 4: you know that that was all that you know, you know,
Speaker 4: travel to the Middle East, you know, for you know,
Speaker 4: for Western has traveled to the Middle East. Yeah, fight
Speaker 4: and that. So it was all and his passport had
Speaker 4: been canceled and all this sort of stuff by Asia
Speaker 4: would sort of done this. But yeah, on that and
Speaker 4: funnily enough, we'll go back to that. That Thursday when
Speaker 4: he was waving the flag, he went home and made
Speaker 4: a phone call that night. There was someone in the
Speaker 4: room with him. We don't know who that was, but
Speaker 4: he was making a phone call and as because he
Speaker 4: was a person of interest of Asia, they had his
Speaker 4: at his phone tapped and as it sort of started ringing,
Speaker 4: he was talking to the person in the room with
Speaker 4: him and said, referring to the police officers at the
Speaker 4: Dannlong Plaza that day, if I had had a knife,
Speaker 4: I would have stabbed them. And that shows where he
Speaker 4: was at in his own head. But the Azio interception
Speaker 4: team didn't listen to that phone call because it was
Speaker 4: not answered. That went off and just sat in the ether.
Speaker 4: And you know, that wasn't discovered until you know, months
Speaker 4: into the coronial investigation. So you know, there was a
Speaker 4: lot of intel you know that wasn't passed on or
Speaker 4: that was missed sort of in the lead up and
Speaker 4: on the day of us going out there, saying that
Speaker 4: we did know that Hayda was with some of his
Speaker 4: mates out at Warburton doing some bushwalking and clicking spring
Speaker 4: water and this sort of thing, because we were getting
Speaker 4: reports from Asia surveillance that they are out there. So
Speaker 4: that's why we decided I would go and speak to
Speaker 4: his mom and dad and just sort of get a
Speaker 4: bit of an insight and a feel into what they
Speaker 4: were like as well as what Newman was sort of
Speaker 4: going through with their thoughts. So that's when, yeah, the
Speaker 4: four of us went out to the family home. The
Speaker 4: two other guys stayed in the car and Nyla and
Speaker 4: I went and had to chat with their parents and
Speaker 4: his two brothers were there at the same time.
Speaker 1: And what saw the field? Did you come away from
Speaker 1: the house after speaking to the parents.
Speaker 3: So initially Gary my role was to be on the
Speaker 3: cover team purely for this deployment. The day before, on
Speaker 3: Monday twenty second of September, I'd been promoted to the
Speaker 3: rank of sergeant at Nari Warren Police Station, so about
Speaker 3: fifteen minutes away from Daver Hills would have been the
Speaker 3: uniform station where I was going to be starting at
Speaker 3: in counterterrorism at this stage for coming up to three years,
Speaker 3: who had completed all my counter terrorism training, had a
Speaker 3: reasonably good feel for investigations. I was a Tier four
Speaker 3: interview advisor. So being comfortable with people and knowing their
Speaker 3: body language generally and how they'll react to us gives
Speaker 3: us that insight that ye're speaking of. So at the
Speaker 3: last minute, the decision was made by the AFP acting
Speaker 3: team leader out there to put me and Matt together
Speaker 3: to speak to the Hater family. We arrived about three
Speaker 3: o'clock in the afternoon with the Hater family greeted by
Speaker 3: the mother and father in a modest house. From memory
Speaker 3: it was they were very nice, respectful people to us.
Speaker 2: There was no.
Speaker 3: Sign of any animosity or hatred towards the West from them,
Speaker 3: and they are absolutely the people and their sons that
Speaker 3: were contributing to the social cohesion that the Australian or
Speaker 3: Victoria was enjoying at that stage. So we spoke to
Speaker 3: them at lengths about Newman's behaviors, what he'd been up to,
Speaker 3: the sort of the life movements of what he's been
Speaker 3: up to, and they were speaking reasonably positively about some
Speaker 3: futures with enrolling in Tafe to do a course. He
Speaker 3: had a part time job, So for me, there wasn't
Speaker 3: the worrying factors that this is coming up to a
Speaker 3: fatal intersection with him because of the way that they
Speaker 3: were letting us know that they were monitoring him. They
Speaker 3: told him to stay away from extremists, and they had
Speaker 3: a picture of him, which we knew behind the scenes,
Speaker 3: he wasn't telling mum and dad the complete truth as
Speaker 3: to his associations with those people.
Speaker 1: I put him myself in that position if I went
Speaker 1: and spoke to a family and you're looking at getting
Speaker 1: the background or the feel of an eighteen year old kid,
Speaker 1: and then you meet the family like that give you
Speaker 1: some sort of comfort that aka, well it's maybe it's
Speaker 1: just a kid being a kid, and his radicalization hasn't
Speaker 1: run that deep, the offense hasn't happened. Then you've got
Speaker 1: to sort of anticipate what's going to happen.
Speaker 3: As you know, within policing, there's the guilty act, guilty
Speaker 3: mind that's got to be complete there now from a
Speaker 3: risk assessment point of view. On the Monday, the twenty
Speaker 3: second of September, Newman had some involvement with Victoria police
Speaker 3: from July, so three months earlier, well two months earlier,
Speaker 3: where he'd actually been present at the fountain Gate shopping
Speaker 3: center in Endeaver Hills, fountain Gate at midnight, where a
Speaker 3: shotgun had been produced by a third party, when Newman
Speaker 3: actually took the firearm off that person and voluntarily gave
Speaker 3: it to Victoria police investigators in July and made a
Speaker 3: statement to support the prosecution about the person that had
Speaker 3: had access to that firearm. So certainly when I got
Speaker 3: access to that statement, I readit that provided me some comfort, thinking, well,
Speaker 3: in July, he could have turned that firearm on the
Speaker 3: investigating police members, but chose to give it to them
Speaker 3: and make a say.
Speaker 1: We're only talking three four months before, correct, Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: all right, so you went to the family home. You're
Speaker 1: then due to meet him at the police station. The
Speaker 1: arrangement's been made for him to come to the police
Speaker 1: station or no.
Speaker 2: Not. At that stage.
Speaker 4: We'd sort of spent about an hour, I guess, talking
Speaker 4: to his mom and dad and his two brothers, and
Speaker 4: you know, they sort of they were, you know, allaying
Speaker 4: some of their concerns, but also just looking around the
Speaker 4: house and you know, like it was, you know, and
Speaker 4: they were really nice, care you could just tell that
Speaker 4: they were a caring, caring family. And because we'd heard about,
Speaker 4: you know, wanting to purchase knives and and he was
Speaker 4: waving that Shaharta Flager the previous week at dwan Non
Speaker 4: shopping center, we asked to look at his room and
Speaker 4: we went up had a search of his room, just
Speaker 4: a very it was a cursor research, but just to
Speaker 4: make sure that there was nothing there, and there wasn't.
Speaker 4: Like he was pretty sparse. I think he was living
Speaker 4: between that house and his mate's place, so they were
Speaker 4: sort of he was going in between. So we had
Speaker 4: a look there and then we asked his mum and
Speaker 4: dad for his phone number and they gave it to us,
Speaker 4: and his mum I think her comment was, he never
Speaker 4: answers his phone. You can try, but he won't answer,
Speaker 4: and we thought okay, So then we left and knowing
Speaker 4: that he was still out out east with his mates,
Speaker 4: and we went back to in Devil's police station and
Speaker 4: we were sort of sitting around and Nile said, well,
Speaker 4: we've got his name, we might as well give it,
Speaker 4: give it a guard and lo and behold, he answered
Speaker 4: after about the second ring, so from an unknown number,
Speaker 4: and there was a bit of discussion between him and
Speaker 4: I ale to where we were going to meet. They
Speaker 4: initially wanted to meet us at Hungry Jack's in Hellum,
Speaker 4: and as we know, it's probably not a good place
Speaker 4: to talk about issues of terrorism around families and all
Speaker 4: that sort of stuff, plus our security and all that.
Speaker 4: So there was a lot of toing and throwing about
Speaker 4: coming into the police station, and eventually he agreed to
Speaker 4: come in and I think it was about a quarter
Speaker 4: past seven when that phone call was made. He said, yeah,
Speaker 4: I'll be in there and about in about half an hour.
Speaker 4: So we were sitting in the mess room at the
Speaker 4: police station, the four of us, you know, we just
Speaker 4: sort of discussed what we would, you know, where we'd
Speaker 4: go about it. And because Nile and I had spoken
Speaker 4: to his parents and his brothers, it was sort of
Speaker 4: a pretty obvious decision that we would be the ones
Speaker 4: that would go and speak to him, and yeah, the
Speaker 4: other two just sort of hang back and.
Speaker 1: Did it just be about so he arrived at the
Speaker 1: police station, or saw him out the front of the
Speaker 1: police station.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so the phone called a newman as Matt said
Speaker 3: was about quarter past seven. There been a decision within
Speaker 3: the four police members there that myself and Matt would
Speaker 3: continue on with speaking to Newman in regard to it,
Speaker 3: because we'd had the information. Yeah, considering my role was
Speaker 3: purely covered team, I didn't have an interview plan done up,
Speaker 3: so as Matt spoke about we quickly workshopped what appropriate questions.
Speaker 3: Without knowing him, there was a bigger counter terrism investigation
Speaker 3: going on behind the scenes, So in my diary I
Speaker 3: Will wrote down some basic topics to discuss with him.
Speaker 3: I spoke to Matt and the other AFP members about
Speaker 3: the need to search him upon his arrival because some
Speaker 3: of the information we'd known was that a month earlier
Speaker 3: he'd been seen playing with a knife. So when we
Speaker 3: look at our control of weapons legislation, you've got to
Speaker 3: suspect on reasonable grounds so that they've got access to
Speaker 3: a knife. I'm thinking about the legalities of information from
Speaker 3: one month earlier, with no current intelligence around that do
Speaker 3: we So as part of the planning, we're going to
Speaker 3: search him when he arrives. Because Newman had stated to
Speaker 3: me on the phone he didn't want to come inside
Speaker 3: the police station, which for me and our three objectives.
Speaker 2: That was fine.
Speaker 3: We could meet with him anywhere, as Matt said, as
Speaker 3: long as it's safe and secure and we had our
Speaker 3: numbers there without impacting public safety. So Newman said he'd
Speaker 3: be there in fifteen minutes. In reality, it took him
Speaker 3: five minutes to get there because what was unknown to
Speaker 3: us at the time, he was running every single red
Speaker 3: light to get to meet with us.
Speaker 2: Now that is.
Speaker 1: A telling benefit of hindsight, isn't it absolutely creeped himself
Speaker 1: up into a friend.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3: The myself and Matt don't have the ability to We've
Speaker 3: not heard him speak before on a telephone, so I
Speaker 3: don't know when I'm speaking to him about whether he's
Speaker 3: being guarded, whether he's being honest and open with us,
Speaker 3: apart from my own sort of intuition as to what
Speaker 3: I think this phone call is. In the background, I
Speaker 3: heard someone saying, get them to come to us, top stuff.
Speaker 3: And that's why we decided no, no, they come to
Speaker 3: the police or he.
Speaker 1: Comes out a good call.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in hindsight, absolutely, but standard policies essentially.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you've decided that you'll speak to him, did
Speaker 1: he ring you or you just wait out in front
Speaker 1: of the police station for him.
Speaker 3: So he then phoned us up within that five minute
Speaker 3: period to say I'm out the front of the police station.
Speaker 3: So I asked what car he'd be in, which he
Speaker 3: described it, and then myself, Matt, and the other AFP
Speaker 3: members spoke about essentially the order of March.
Speaker 2: So myself and Matt would go out to speak to him.
Speaker 3: There's no way I'm taking four police members out to
Speaker 3: speak to an eighteen year old who's voluntarily coming into
Speaker 3: a police station. It's the wrong look, absolutely it is.
Speaker 3: So the decision was leave the two federal police members
Speaker 3: inside the police station. So if we can bring him
Speaker 3: back in, great, we've got coverage. But if not, we
Speaker 3: knew there was surveillance outside covering us as well.
Speaker 1: How far away were they from when you guys first
Speaker 1: approached him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, look, not aware of where they were. I suspect
Speaker 3: they would have been probably around one hundred one hundred
Speaker 3: and fifty meters away with from what I understand, they
Speaker 3: didn't have a clear eyeball about what was happening, but
Speaker 3: they were in the vicinity and they knew our proximity.
Speaker 3: So myself and Matt walk out we both had our
Speaker 3: day books with us casually dressed. Now it was about
Speaker 3: seven thirty in the evening. The weather had been a
Speaker 3: beautiful day, but then in the evening it turned reasonably chilli.
Speaker 3: So if I knew we'd be out that late, I
Speaker 3: would have had a jacket. So the car was parked
Speaker 3: about thirty meters away in a combined area where it
Speaker 3: was residential. There was the childcare center and then the
Speaker 3: police station and close proximity to each other. Now, the
Speaker 3: first thing I noticed was newman had reversed his car
Speaker 3: into the car park and was sitting on the bonnet.
Speaker 3: So for me, that was a little bit unusual, ast
Speaker 3: wide revers his car in considering no other car spots
Speaker 3: were taken and he had free run essentially that car park.
Speaker 3: So I called out to him, caught out his name,
Speaker 3: and he acknowledged it was him, and he started walking
Speaker 3: towards us, And again understanding or looking for risk factors
Speaker 3: on looking at his behavior, there's nothing in his eyes,
Speaker 3: as nothing in the way he's walking towards us that
Speaker 3: indicates some sort of attacks imminent. But the alarming thing
Speaker 3: for me was he had his right arm in his
Speaker 3: right jacket pocket, and his left arm was down by
Speaker 3: his side. Now, for me, if I've got a jacket on,
Speaker 3: it's either both hands in my pocket or both hands out.
Speaker 3: So the one hand in the pocket was reasonably alarming
Speaker 3: for me considering the intelligence it was known. So as
Speaker 3: I'm walking towards him, I'm thinking, how do I see
Speaker 3: what's in that pocket without disrupting the intelligence gathering, the
Speaker 3: human source acquisition and disruption. If I was to stop
Speaker 3: and pull a firearm on him and ask him to
Speaker 3: open his jacket, if he didn't have a knife on him,
Speaker 3: that would have been a national incident and I would
Speaker 3: have been looking for a new job. I suspect the
Speaker 3: next day. So I thought, if I extend my hand
Speaker 3: from a distance, he'll see that it's an act of chivalry,
Speaker 3: will shake hands, and that will be a good judgment
Speaker 3: point to see whether he's going to respond to that.
Speaker 3: So I took my hand out, he took his right
Speaker 3: hand out. We met, shook hands, and I introduced.
Speaker 2: Him to Matt.
Speaker 3: We walked back to his vehicle, where I then placed
Speaker 3: my daybook on top of his his car roof and
Speaker 3: then said to him, Okay, I'm going to give you
Speaker 3: a search out to make sure you've got nothing on you.
Speaker 3: From that point, Newman asked why, and I repeated, as
Speaker 3: we're going to search you. So with that, Newman turned
Speaker 3: around with his back to me to make it look
Speaker 3: like he was complying with a pat down search. So
Speaker 3: Newman put both hands on the car bonnet, and that's
Speaker 3: when I stepped in with the left and right hand
Speaker 3: up to start the patdown search from the shoulders back down.
Speaker 3: At that stage, Matt was at the about two meters
Speaker 3: or a meter and a half away from it, looking
Speaker 3: in the back window of the car to make sure
Speaker 3: there was no one else in there and what other
Speaker 3: intelligence might be seen. So as I'm just about to
Speaker 3: step in to do the search, Newman, unbeknown to me,
Speaker 3: in that right jacket pocket I was speaking about, he
Speaker 3: had a pocket knife with a blade of probably about
Speaker 3: six centimeters on it. So with that knife he spun
Speaker 3: around and has impacted me in the left forearm, slicing
Speaker 3: through the older nerve. And at that stage, the brain
Speaker 3: and the body working at two different speeds. Here, I'm
Speaker 3: in detective mode, thinking about the questions, thinking about the
Speaker 3: methodology behind what we're going to do. So then to
Speaker 3: see the glint of a knife butt in my forearm.
Speaker 3: It's the old hang on, what's going on here? So
Speaker 3: then newman pulls the knife back, goes for me again,
Speaker 3: which this is really close range for out here. So
Speaker 3: I throw the left arm on it and hits my
Speaker 3: wrist as I'm trying to move backwards to gain gain
Speaker 3: some distance away from him, and then with that I
Speaker 3: actually fall over onto the ground because again the brain
Speaker 3: and the body working at two different speeds, so I
Speaker 3: fall over. With my training from the early days of policing,
Speaker 3: if you're on the ground, if you're in a pub situation,
Speaker 3: you'd always try and cover your firearm. So that training
Speaker 3: kicked in where I thought, I'm going to have to
Speaker 3: cover my firearm to make sure he doesn't get it,
Speaker 3: incorrectly assessing we'll hang on. It's not trying to get
Speaker 3: my firearm. He's actually trying to kill me. As I'm
Speaker 3: rolled over onto my firearm, that's when he steps over
Speaker 3: me and walks straight over to Matt.
Speaker 1: So Matt pick it up from there. Is that how
Speaker 1: you how it's just been described by Nile? Is that
Speaker 1: how you witnessed what went on? Then?
Speaker 4: Yeah, So I was sort of around that driver's side
Speaker 4: looking in the car, because we knew he was with
Speaker 4: his mates that day, making sure there was no one
Speaker 4: in there that going to surprise us or see if
Speaker 4: there's anything anything in there. And I heard I heard
Speaker 4: Nile say, you know, I'm going to search you, and
Speaker 4: then new Hman say why. And then I sort of
Speaker 4: as I'm sort of looking in there, I've I've looked up,
Speaker 4: and then Nile wasn't there, and I was sort of,
Speaker 4: what's sort of I was a bit confused as to
Speaker 4: what was happening. But by this stage Newman had moved around.
Speaker 4: He was probably standing about level with the front driver's
Speaker 4: side tire, and he had this that that that folding
Speaker 4: knife just at his at his waistband and he had
Speaker 4: this and I remember this pretty clearly. He had this
Speaker 4: demonic look on his face and it was and I'm
Speaker 4: sort of going, hang on, what's going on?
Speaker 2: Yeah? What what is you know?
Speaker 4: And and what While I say, I'm thinking this process
Speaker 4: like this is happening, like you know, really really quickly.
Speaker 4: And at that as soon as I saw that knife,
Speaker 4: like I said before, I had auditory exclusion. I just
Speaker 4: went I just went deaf totally couldn't hear. I couldn't
Speaker 4: hear anything. And apparently I don't remember saying it, or
Speaker 4: I definitely didn't hear myself say it. I yelled knife
Speaker 4: and as you do in your training, and and then
Speaker 4: Newman started started to attack me. So we probably, I
Speaker 4: don't know, a meter and a half two meters away,
Speaker 4: and as we know in our training, you know, we're taught,
Speaker 4: you know, within you know, six meters with a knife,
Speaker 4: you don't have that much time. So I'm sort of
Speaker 4: fighting with him with my left arm, you know, push
Speaker 4: trying to push him away while I'm you know, trying
Speaker 4: to get my.
Speaker 1: You just had a playing close whole.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So it had a.
Speaker 4: It had a small button sort of down halfway down
Speaker 4: the holester that you'd push in and and then pull
Speaker 4: your firearm out. But lost fine motor skills. So I'm
Speaker 4: pushing the button or pulling pushing the button in all
Speaker 4: you know, and you know, while we're struggling. So I
Speaker 4: just couldn't get my firearm out. And then so he
Speaker 4: so Newman was was attacking me, and and I thought,
Speaker 4: you know, I need to create some distance here. You know,
Speaker 4: this is getting a little bit serious, but still in
Speaker 4: my mind, I didn't know at that stage that i'd
Speaker 4: been stabbed, but I sort of did, but it was
Speaker 4: this confusing time, but I knew how a knife, So
Speaker 4: I'm moving away. So I sort of moved back and
Speaker 4: thinking I've got to create more distance, so I went
Speaker 4: to ground.
Speaker 1: Had he stabbed you multiple times at that stage, Yes,
Speaker 1: you didn't. I didn't realize it didn't. Okay, so you're
Speaker 1: stepping back.
Speaker 4: So so, like I said, I don't know what order
Speaker 4: any of the stab wounds happened. But I moved back
Speaker 4: and thought, I've got to go to ground, create some distance,
Speaker 4: you know, so you can use the legs to keep
Speaker 4: them away, and this sort of thing on my feet.
Speaker 4: So I've gone back, gone to ground. Thought I'd give
Speaker 4: himself some time to get the firearm out. But anyway,
Speaker 4: he has then sort of moved between me and the
Speaker 4: daycare center that we were sort of parked outside, or
Speaker 4: we were speaking to him outside of it was closed
Speaker 4: because it was seven thirty. But so he's come down
Speaker 4: the left hand side and around behind me as I'm
Speaker 4: on the ground and I'm trying to get my firearm out,
Speaker 4: and then I could sense him leaning over me and
Speaker 4: I thought, this is.
Speaker 2: This is going to be it.
Speaker 4: And I knew, you know, sort of from CT and
Speaker 4: seeing ICE's videos and what the what their what their
Speaker 4: aims were, and you know, this is his goal here
Speaker 4: is to kill me and then behead me. So that
Speaker 4: was going through my mind, trying to get my gun
Speaker 4: out and everything's still deathly silent, and then the next
Speaker 4: thing I heard was a gunshot, and then Newman just
Speaker 4: fell dead beside me, and I next thing was Nile said,
Speaker 4: are you all right? Because I'm not sure if you
Speaker 4: think he shot Newman or he shot me so we
Speaker 4: I said, yep, I'm all good, and he said, go
Speaker 4: and get some ambulances. So I got up and sort
Speaker 4: of trod into the the police station.
Speaker 2: And this is when I realized that I had blood sort.
Speaker 4: Of streaming down my face and my chest hurt. Anyway,
Speaker 4: got into the police station, there's a few people in
Speaker 4: the in the watchhouse, you know, that had come in
Speaker 4: to report stuff or whatever. They were a bit freaked
Speaker 4: out by Copper running in, blood gushing out of their
Speaker 4: face and said, when he gets some ambulances. There's a
Speaker 4: lady in there. She got on the phone sight away
Speaker 4: ordered some ambulances. I would then went back outside just
Speaker 4: to make sure everything was all right with Nile, and
Speaker 4: then I went back in and got some arm and
Speaker 4: got some first aid, and then the ambulances arrived, and.
Speaker 1: Did you realize the extent of your injuries? And like,
Speaker 1: it's a pretty savage scar right beside your left eye
Speaker 1: there and the chest injury.
Speaker 4: Not at the not at the time, I knew like
Speaker 4: my chest hurt and there was a blood, a little
Speaker 4: bit of blood, but most of the blood was on
Speaker 4: the inside because the knife went into the liver. Livers
Speaker 4: is like a plastic bag full of blood.
Speaker 2: So that was that was the serious issue.
Speaker 4: But I didn't know. I knew that I'd been stabbed
Speaker 4: there and this one was probably the most A lot
Speaker 4: of blood in your face, so that was continually streaming
Speaker 4: and there's a small sort of artery up here, so
Speaker 4: that was burning a little bit of blood and stuff
Speaker 4: like that. My shoulder that and after I went back in,
Speaker 4: that's when I knew that something had happened to my
Speaker 4: shoulder because that's when the pain started from that. So yeah,
Speaker 4: then the ambulancers came and put on the on the
Speaker 4: trolley and then you know, the green whistle and off
Speaker 4: into the Alfred Hospital.
Speaker 1: Okay, well getting back to back to you. Now you've
Speaker 1: been stabbed, you're on the on the deck, then Matt's
Speaker 1: you're hearing what's going on there or getting a sense
Speaker 1: of what's going on there, and Matt's on the ground.
Speaker 1: Take us from what was going through your mind?
Speaker 3: Yeah, Match is saying it. Then, well back, I remember
Speaker 3: just before Newman stabbed me, I saw his eyes as well,
Speaker 3: and were demonic. I think he's the correct They were fiery,
Speaker 3: bright red. Essentially, you could see the anger. You would
Speaker 3: see that there was significant harm you wanted to do
Speaker 3: with us. So when I heard Matt yell out knife,
Speaker 3: that for me prove I had an absolute clarity in
Speaker 3: regard to what my actions needed to be from here.
Speaker 3: Without operational safety and tactics training or ost knife means gone.
Speaker 3: There's no other way in policing that that can be interpreted.
Speaker 3: So I was hearing Matt and Newman struggling as I
Speaker 3: roll off my firearm, knowing that Matt's being attacked here,
Speaker 3: I look over and I can see it and Matt
Speaker 3: is now on the ground and Newman is bent over
Speaker 3: him and stabbing him. I believe around the shoulder area
Speaker 3: at that stage, and it is ferocious.
Speaker 1: You're seeing this, this is yeah.
Speaker 3: That's right, absolutely, all while I'm drawing my firearm. So
Speaker 3: to the credit of the training, I actually did run
Speaker 3: through in my mind about baton spray not effective, close range,
Speaker 3: too far or.
Speaker 1: That.
Speaker 3: So, yes, this is a firearm. Intern I'm going to
Speaker 3: have to discharge it. I caught out to Newman who
Speaker 3: instead of the police challenge, it was actually get off him.
Speaker 3: I yelled out that obviously no impact. So from about
Speaker 3: four and a half meters away, seeing that he's stabbing
Speaker 3: into Matt, all I have to shoot at is It
Speaker 3: was a really tough target.
Speaker 2: I'm not a.
Speaker 3: Not i'd say extremely proficient with a firearm. It had
Speaker 3: been five months and three weeks since I'd last done
Speaker 3: the firearms training, so a little bit rusty when you're
Speaker 3: nearly out of cycle. So I know all I've got
Speaker 3: to shoot at is either the legs or the head.
Speaker 3: I don't have a torso to shoot at because he's
Speaker 3: bent over Matt. Now, of course, without training, it's the
Speaker 3: center of mass that we're trying to shoot at. The
Speaker 3: legs they're close to Matt, where Matt's lying down. If
Speaker 3: I shoot too low, there's a chance I could shoot
Speaker 3: or kill Matt. So the head at this stage is
Speaker 3: the object for me to shoot at. It's a moving target,
Speaker 3: it's low light, it's four and a half meters away.
Speaker 3: I've got blood coming out of my left arm. I
Speaker 3: managed to get the firearm out one handed, steadied it
Speaker 3: with my left arm, and then a reactive shot. I
Speaker 3: had the sights lined up with human's head, pulled the
Speaker 3: trigger and impacted him in the head, killing him instantly.
Speaker 3: Now for me, the relief when the body fell beside Matt,
Speaker 3: and as Matt said, I asked if he was aka
Speaker 3: and he said yes. For me, that was thank god,
Speaker 3: Matt's okay. Again, not realizing how many injuries Matt had
Speaker 3: actually received, and at that stage, I asked Matt to
Speaker 3: go inside and get some assistance. At that stage, my
Speaker 3: detective training really kicked in. You'd remember when you did
Speaker 3: your detective training. There's a crime scene prack. You've got witnesses, offenders,
Speaker 3: the media, everyone turning up, and you're the detective in
Speaker 3: charge and directing it. Now, a week before i'd been
Speaker 3: involved in that shooting. I'm a regular blood data every
Speaker 3: three months. The person who took my blood actually made
Speaker 3: the comment to me that.
Speaker 2: If I was to.
Speaker 3: Lose ever to lose blood quickly, I wouldn't go into
Speaker 3: shock as quick as others because my body's used to
Speaker 3: losing four or five hundred miles of it's interesting blood.
Speaker 3: So at that stage, then after the shooting, it was okay,
Speaker 3: he's clearly died as a result of the shooting. Now
Speaker 3: it's about the preservation of the crime scene, because, as
Speaker 3: you know, within policing transparencies the number one thing about.
Speaker 2: What we do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I look just on what you guys have told
Speaker 1: that happens so quick and the thing that you're up
Speaker 1: against in policing, and I think you guys have articulated
Speaker 1: very well in the way that you've explained the situation.
Speaker 1: You're coming up at a level of an awareness. You're cautious,
Speaker 1: but you've got someone that's coming with a malicious intent
Speaker 1: to go at you in a frenzied attack like you
Speaker 1: did what you just described. It's like time slows down
Speaker 1: all the things that you're trying to process, and then yeah,
Speaker 1: you've switched. I think this I want to unpack this
Speaker 1: a little bit you'll switch straight into police made straight
Speaker 1: after an instant. As I said in the introduction, police
Speaker 1: you put on the uniform, carry the badge or whatever,
Speaker 1: you're still human for God's sake. You guys have been
Speaker 1: stabbed and someone's been trying to kill you. You've shot someone,
Speaker 1: and you're thinking about preserving the crime scene. I reckon
Speaker 1: we take a break at this stage. When we get back,
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about the aftermath of it physically
Speaker 1: and emotionally, and just on your views on all things policing.
Speaker 1: But I also want to say, guys, thanks for sharing
Speaker 1: the story. Like I'm sitting here thinking is this the
Speaker 1: right thing to make you guys read live it? But
Speaker 1: if one thing it does, it sends an important message
Speaker 1: out that you know, please get put up on pedestals
Speaker 1: and sometimes deservedly, sometimes undeservedly, but there is a sharp end.
Speaker 1: The police and then you guys found that. The found
Speaker 1: it in a big way. So how about we take
Speaker 1: a break and come back for our part to thanks.
Speaker 2: Thanks, great cheers.