Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
Speaker 1: It's Wednesday, April thirty, twenty twenty five. The trial of
Speaker 1: accused mushroom murderer Aaron Patterson gets underway in Victoria today.
Speaker 1: Patterson will defend three counts of murder and one count
Speaker 1: of attempted murder relating to a twenty twenty three lunch
Speaker 1: at her Lee and Gatha home. Voters returned the Canadian
Speaker 1: Liberal Party to government on Tuesday, and PM Mark Carney
Speaker 1: vowed to stand up to Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: We are over the shark of the American betrayal, but
Speaker 2: we should never forget the lessons. We will chart a
Speaker 2: new path forward because this is Canada and we decide
Speaker 2: what happens here.
Speaker 1: Inspector Amy Scott entered the Bondi Junction Westfield mass stabbing
Speaker 1: incident with the expectations she would die trying.
Speaker 3: To take down a murderer.
Speaker 1: That's the evidence from the veteran New South Wales police
Speaker 1: officer at a coronial inquest into the deaths of six
Speaker 1: victims and assailant Joel Couci. Today, Amy Scott's untold story.
Speaker 4: In my head, I'd resigned myself to the fact that
Speaker 4: I was probably gonna die.
Speaker 3: It's the story.
Speaker 1: Inspector Amy Scott has never told in public the moment
Speaker 1: she shot dead a mass murderer. The New South Wales
Speaker 1: police commander has been hailed as a heroine for the
Speaker 1: day in April twenty twenty four when a Queensland man,
Speaker 1: forty year old Joel Couchy, walked into a Westfield shopping
Speaker 1: mall and started stabbing people.
Speaker 3: Scott has rejected scores.
Speaker 1: Of requests for interviews and comments since that day. She's
Speaker 1: said nothing in public, and you get the feeling she'd
Speaker 1: never have spoken at all if not for a coronial
Speaker 1: inquest where she on Tuesday gave evidence about her actions.
Speaker 1: Scott told the inquest she was driving through the area
Speaker 1: when she heard an alert on the scanner. We've used
Speaker 1: voice actors throughout this episode to bring you the words
Speaker 1: spoken in court.
Speaker 3: Amy Scott.
Speaker 4: We're getting multiple calls, multiple stabbings, multiple locations at Bondi Westfield, and.
Speaker 3: I knew right then it was very real.
Speaker 1: One minute and twenty five seconds later, Scott was at
Speaker 1: the mall where shoppers rushed to tell her a man
Speaker 1: with a knife was on the rampage. She recalled them, saying.
Speaker 4: He's in there with a knife. He's stabbing people, he's
Speaker 4: killing people. You've got to help us get in there.
Speaker 4: I considered it to be an active armed offender. I
Speaker 4: also knew I couldn't wait anymore for my colleagues to arrive,
Speaker 4: and I just had to go in.
Speaker 3: She radioed her colleagues. I'm pretty sure, I said on the.
Speaker 4: Radio, just so you know they're active, I'm going in.
Speaker 4: I gave the location I went in at. My intention
Speaker 4: was to try and find the threat.
Speaker 1: Two of the most famous civilians from that day were
Speaker 1: Frenchmen Silas despro and Damian Guerreau. Wuerreo was famously captured
Speaker 1: on video wielding a bollard to shepherd Couchy down on
Speaker 1: escalator to shield civilians on the floor above. It became known,
Speaker 1: of course, as bollard man. Scott recalled one of the
Speaker 1: men tapping her on the back and saying.
Speaker 3: You're on your own.
Speaker 4: We are coming with you, and I said, that's great,
Speaker 4: but can you stay behind me the whole time.
Speaker 1: When she reached the upper floors of the mall, guided
Speaker 1: by shoppers towards the assailant, Scott saw Couchie about twenty
Speaker 1: meters away. The frenchman behind Scott were shouting shoot him,
Speaker 1: shoot him. She shouted at Couchi to stop. He started
Speaker 1: running away and she sped after him. Couchie stopped again,
Speaker 1: and Scott saw people hiding behind a pot plan.
Speaker 4: I saw a lady and a pram, two ladies and
Speaker 4: a pram. One had run away, but the other had
Speaker 4: hidden behind a large pot plant about fifteen meters on
Speaker 4: the other side of Joel. I mouthed at her to run.
Speaker 3: Then Couci turned in the woman's direction.
Speaker 4: I yelled out mate to get his attention back to me,
Speaker 4: and he just sprinted downhill at me with the knife out.
Speaker 4: He was going to kill me. It was very fast,
Speaker 4: but in my mind it was extremely slow. I knew
Speaker 4: the first shot had to hit him, but that was
Speaker 4: because of a jolt in his body. But he continued
Speaker 4: to come towards me, and I also was simultaneously saying stop,
Speaker 4: drop it.
Speaker 3: She fired two more shorts.
Speaker 4: I had not been able to stop the threat with
Speaker 4: the first one.
Speaker 1: Scott's third bullet missed Couchy and landed in the pot
Speaker 1: plant where a woman had been hiding.
Speaker 3: After she'd shot Coucy.
Speaker 1: Scott lent over him, flicked the knife away, turned him
Speaker 1: into the recovery position and began CPR.
Speaker 3: She knew he was dead.
Speaker 4: I want to acknowledge the courage and the bravery. Some
Speaker 4: of them have been unable to return, and they have
Speaker 4: my whole hearted support, love and care. I hope that
Speaker 4: the public understands that they were absolutely extraordinary. They saved
Speaker 4: lives on that day and they put themselves at risk.
Speaker 1: Scott has been hailed for her courage, but in an
Speaker 1: emotional moment of testimony, she praised the young officers working
Speaker 1: under her in the Eastern Suburbs Police Local Area Command.
Speaker 4: We want to think that police don't feel feared, don't
Speaker 4: feel the burden and pressure of what everyday humans do.
Speaker 4: I can assure you that they do. I can assure
Speaker 4: you on that day that they were the people running
Speaker 4: in and whilst I was the person that faced Joel,
Speaker 4: those young officers ran in with the exact same intentions.
Speaker 1: She said her police training taught her to run towards
Speaker 1: danger and that an officer has a sixty to seventy
Speaker 1: percent chance of survival with an armed defender if the
Speaker 1: officer accompanied by another cop and wearing a stab proof.
Speaker 3: Vest I was neither of those.
Speaker 4: I actually felt nauseous in my head. I resigned myself
Speaker 4: to the fact that I was probably going to die.
Speaker 1: At the beginning of her evidence, Scott made a short statement.
Speaker 4: I offer my sincere condolences to the family and the
Speaker 4: friends of the victims. I cannot and I don't even
Speaker 4: begin to imagine what every day since April thirteen, twenty
Speaker 4: twenty four has been like for you all.
Speaker 1: Some of the first responders who worked on that day
Speaker 1: have been too traumatized to return to work. That day,
Speaker 1: as tragic as it was, it gave me faith in humanity,
Speaker 1: restored some faith in humanity and the goodness of people.
Speaker 1: After the break how Joel Couci became a killer. State
Speaker 1: Coroner Teresa O. Sullivan explained on day one of the
Speaker 1: inquest Monday this week. The purpose of the hearing was
Speaker 1: to provide families in the community with answers about how
Speaker 1: the massacre occurred and how such events might be prevented
Speaker 1: in future. That means digging into what drove Joel Couci
Speaker 1: to stab six strangers to death. His victims were shoppers,
Speaker 1: Dawn Singleton, Jade young Yeshwan Cheng, Ashley Good and Picrea Dacia.
Speaker 1: Couchi also killed a security guard for ours to hear,
Speaker 1: who was on his first shift at Westfield Bondi Junction.
Speaker 1: Counsel assisting the inquest is doctor Peggy Dwyer sc We've
Speaker 1: used a voice actor to bring you Dwyer's words.
Speaker 5: Mister Couchi wounded ten others before being fatally shot by
Speaker 5: New South Wales Police. Of those ten people, two were
Speaker 5: men and both of those men were very seriously injured.
Speaker 1: Dwyer said Couci, who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, was
Speaker 1: effectively without treatment or adequate supervision for nearly five years
Speaker 1: before his death. She said Couch's medication was reduced and
Speaker 1: then ceased in late twenty nineteen, but that very shortly
Speaker 1: after that there were early warning signs that he was relapsing.
Speaker 5: We know from the evidence in the brief that mister
Speaker 5: Cauchi had several interactions with Queensland Police officers, including most
Speaker 5: notably in January twenty twenty three, when Queensland Police were
Speaker 5: called to mister Couchi's family home following an incident where
Speaker 5: his father had confiscated a number of knives that were
Speaker 5: a similar style to that used by mister Couci on
Speaker 5: thirteen April twenty twenty four. Mister Couchi's father was worried
Speaker 5: about him having those knives, and the court will explore
Speaker 5: whether that was an opportunity missed for intervention by police,
Speaker 5: which may have resulted in mister Couchi being re engaged
Speaker 5: with the mental health system at that time.
Speaker 3: She said, by thirteen April twenty twenty four, Cauci.
Speaker 5: Was floridly psychotic.
Speaker 1: Expert toxicology evidence suggests that Cauci had been using cannabis
Speaker 1: or marijuana in the days preceding his death. She noted
Speaker 1: Cauchi had also been a marijuana user when he was
Speaker 1: first diagnosed with schizophrenia as a young teenager.
Speaker 5: I expect the court will hear expert psychiatric evidence that
Speaker 5: use of cannabis would likely have exacerbated the psychotic symptoms
Speaker 5: that mister Couchi was experiencing around thirteen April. But conversely,
Speaker 5: expert evidence is also likely to shed light on the
Speaker 5: fact that the use of cannabis may be a symptom
Speaker 5: of schizophrenia or psychosis.
Speaker 1: Dwyer said it was hard to discern a specific motive
Speaker 1: for Couchi's actions, except that he was planning an attack.
Speaker 1: No on his phone showed active preparations for violence.
Speaker 3: On twenty five January twenty twenty four, Couchy.
Speaker 5: Wrote call knife sharpener and confirm it doesn't need sharpening
Speaker 5: for more use.
Speaker 3: On February twelve, check out Maul's and also where to run.
Speaker 1: Dwyer said none of that explained why he wanted to
Speaker 1: kill strangers, but that he did have an obsession with
Speaker 1: death and murder. His browsing history showed bookmarked pages on
Speaker 1: serial killers and searches about mass stabbing incidents. On the
Speaker 1: day of the Bondi Junction massacre, he had searched for
Speaker 1: information concerning the two young men who massacred school children
Speaker 1: at Columbine High in Colorado in nineteen ninety nine. Couchi
Speaker 1: had spent the night before the massacre sleeping either in
Speaker 1: or near the public toilets at Marubra Beach before going
Speaker 1: to a storage facility to retrieve his bag containing a
Speaker 1: large knife.
Speaker 5: What those records unequivocally show is a man who was
Speaker 5: seriously unwell, who was far from home and far from
Speaker 5: the watchful eye of his parents, who had previously been
Speaker 5: able to keep him linked in with mental health services
Speaker 5: over such a long period, from the time that he
Speaker 5: was a teenager to when he was about thirty six
Speaker 5: years of age. His parents had been able to keep
Speaker 5: him linked in with services while he was living with them,
Speaker 5: but by twenty twenty four, mister Couci was forty years old,
Speaker 5: homeless in Sydney, completely detached from the mental health system.
Speaker 1: You can follow this ongoing inquest at Vaustralian dot com
Speaker 1: dot au