About 11 a.m. Sunday 12 October 1902 Constable Johnston was off duty at his home at Elwood. He responded to a complaint that a man had tried to abduct a neighbour’s 8 year old daughter. Johnston immediately set off in pursuit and located the man in Milton Street Elwood. The suspect George Shaw had a lengthy criminal record. Unbeknown to Johnston Shaw was also the prime suspect for the murder of Constable Guilfoyle in Redfern New South Wales some months previously. When Johnston approached him Shaw produced a revolver and fired. Fatally wounded Johnston died within minutes. Shaw committed suicide at the intersection of Chapel Street and Rosamond Street a short time later.
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About 11am on 12 October, 1902 Constable Richard Johnston was off duty at his home at Elwood (Victoria) when a neighbour informed him that a man had attempted to abduct her eight year-old daughter. The constable quickly set off on his bicycle after the suspect and located him a short distance away. When the suspect saw the approaching policeman the offender drew a revolver and shot Constable Johnston, inflicting fatal wounds. The offender then left the scene, only to commit suicide a short time later when confronted by other police.
It was later found that the man who had murdered Constable Johnson was the same offender (Shaw) who had murdered Constable Guilfoyle at Redfern (NSW) three months earlier.
Constable Guilfoyle was shot by an offender named Shaw at Redfern whilst attempting to arrest him and another man for passing counterfeit coins. Following an incident involving a storekeeper, Constable Guilfoyle had sought the assistance of an off-duty member, Constable Michael Maher, and after checking several shops the offenders had been in they located them in Shepherd Street. As the two constables approached the offenders, one produced a revolver and shot Constable Maher three times. Shaw then also produced a pistol and shot Constable Guilfoyle twice. Constable Maher later recovered, however Constable Guilfoyle’s wounds proved to be fatal. Shaw then made good his escape, making his way to Victoria.
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A MURDERED CONSTABLE.
THE JOHNSTON MEMORIAL. “PAMPERED CRIMINALS” AND PENAL REFORM.
At the St. Kilda Cemetery on Sunday afternoon the Chief Commissioner of Police (Mr O’Callaghan) performed the ceremony of unveiling a marble monument erected by members of the police force over the grave of Constable Richard Johnston, who on 12th October last was shot dead by a notorious criminal named Shaw. The mayor of St. Kilda (Cr O’Donnell) presided, and amongst those present were Mr. McCutcheon, M.L.A. ; Inspector Hillard (officer in ohargd of the district), Inspector Crampton, Sergeant Davidson, the widow, with her children and her mother, many members of the force and a large gathering of the public.
Mr O’Callaghan retold the story of Constable Johnston’s death. On Sunday morning, when off duty, he was told that a ruffian had just been tampering with a child. He mounted his bicycle, and rode after the man who, when overtaken, turned and shot him through the heart. Remaining erect on his machine he rode nearly 100 yards, then his muscles relaxed, and he dropped dead. No more tragic occurrence saddened the records of the Victorian police force. Constable Johnston had upheld the best traditions of the force and taught a lesson that every member should lay to his heart. The event gave rise to the question why the State should go on feeding and pampering human tigers like the murderer of Constable Johnston, and letting them free again to prey upon the public. Why had a penal system been tolerated for so many years, under which such brutes, instead of being kept in confinement, were allowed to march at large to the detriment of all respectable people? In 1881 he had arrested the murderer of Constable Johnston. He was then known as a man who would “shoot at sight,” and though taken by surprise, had found time to grasp a pistol. A few years later he was set at large in the community. It was high time the public raised a protest against the liberation of such blood thirsty brutes. Drastic legislation should be introduced, and introduced quickly, to amend our penal system. Through the action of a generous public and a just Government the widow and children have had their material wants provided for.
Mr McCutcheon said he quite agreed with the remarks that had been made as to the manner in which criminals were pampered by the State. It was time some change was made in the law. The Government permitted criminals to multiply, and placed them in comfortable buildings, where they were well fed and well kept, and lacked only the company of their former friends to make them happy. He considered that every member of the force in both town and country should be armed with a revolver.
Inspector Hillard said that as far as he had been able to ascertain not a single instance could be recalled in which a member of the Victorian police force had played the part of a coward.
Several hymns, including one specially written for the occasion, were sung before and after the ceremony. – “Age”
Geelong Advertiser ( Vic. ) Tuesday 24 March 1903 page 4 of 4
Rank: Assistant management accountant – NSW Police Public Service
Stations: MA & R management accounting Corporate, Finance & Business services, Parramatta – H.Q.
Service: From ? ? 1997to 2 October 2015 = 17 years Service to NSW Police
Awards: ?
Born: 28 November 1956
Died on: Friday 2 October 2015
Cause: Shot – Murdered – Terrorist related
Event location: Outside of NSW Police HQ, Parramatta
Age: 58
Funeral date: Saturday 17 October 2015 @ 10am
Funeral location: St Mary’s Cathedral, College St, 2 St Marys Rd, Sydney City – opposite Hyde Park.
Buried at: Cremated
is NOT mentioned on the Wall of Remembrance* BUT SHOULD BE
CURTIS IS mentioned on the Wall of Remembrance as of 2016
Curtis CHENG with wife and adult children.
Funeral location:
Parramatta shooting: gunman a 15-year-old boy
Date Saturday
Eryk Bagshaw and Nick Ralston
NSW Police have confirmed that a 15-year-old boy was the lone gunman who shot dead a police employee outside the state’s headquarters in Sydney’s west.
The teenager shouted religious slogans before firing one shot in the back of the head of a police finance worker as the employee was heading home on Friday afternoon.
NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione (right) and NSW Premier Mike Baird front the media after shooting at Parramatta. Photo: AAP
NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione (right) and NSW Premier Mike Baird front the media after shooting at Parramatta. Photo: AAP
The police employee has been named as Curtis Cheng, a 17-year veteran of the police force. Police say the shooter is of Iraqi-Kurdish background and was born in Iran.
“We believe that his actions were politically motivated and therefore linked to terrorism,” NSW police Commissioner, Andrew Scipione told reporters in Sydney.
Mr Scipione said police had no information to suggest the gunman posed “this type of threat”.
A police employee was shot dead outside the headquarters in Parramatta.
A police employee was shot dead outside the headquarters in Parramatta. Photo: James Brickwood
“We’re a long way from establishing a full picture of this man, his exact motivations still remain a mystery to us,” he said
“We are exploring every avenue with regard to why he did what he did.”
Premier Mike Baird described the events as “chilling”.
Paramedics at the scene of the Parramatta shooting attending to one of the two bodies. Photo: Seven News
“The shock of this event will be felt everywhere,” he told reporters.
Mr Cheng was shot as he left work at the State Crime Command in Parramatta on Friday afternoon.
His killer was shot dead as officers returned fire.
A strike force has been established to investigate.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull described the terror-related shooting as a “cold-blooded murder”.
Mr Turnbull has urged Australians to go about their day normally despite the incident in Parramatta on Friday.
“This appears to have been an act of politically motivated violence so at this stage it appears to have been an act of terrorism. It is a shocking crime. It was a cold-blooded murder,” he told reporters in Melbourne.
Published: 17:29 EST, 4 October 2015 | Updated: 02:20 EST, 5 October 2015
The heartbroken family of the accountant gunned down by a ‘radicalised’ Muslim 15-year-old have paid tribute to the ‘kind, gentle, and loving’ father-of-two.
Curtis Cheng, 58, was shot in the back of the head by lone gunman Farhad Jabar Khalil Mohammad after the teenager stormed the police headquarters in Parramatta, Sydney.
His wife Selina and two children Alpha and Zilvia, both in their 20s, said their father was ‘generous of heart’ and ‘always put family first’.
They said: ‘We would like to thank all those who have expressed their well wishes and blessings upon us following the tragic passing of our most loved husband and father, Curtis Cheng.
Father-of-two Curtis Cheng, 58, (far left) was shot dead at point-blank range by a ‘radicalised’ 15-year-old, pictured with his wife Selina (second left) and two children Zilvia and Alpha (right)
Father-of-two Curtis Cheng, 58, (far left) was shot dead at point-blank range by a ‘radicalised’ 15-year-old, pictured with his wife Selina (second left) and two children Zilvia and Alpha (right)
Police are now probing why Farhad Jabar Khalil Mohammad (pictured) targeted the accountant
The two bodies were found just metres apart on the pavement outside the police station and children’s day care centre
Chilling footage has emerged showing the final moments of ‘radicalised’ 15-year-old Farhad Jabar Khalil Mohammad after he stormed a police headquarters, pictured in a shoot-out with police constables
Multiple shots can be heard and the video then shows Farhad lying on the ground in a pool of his own blood surrounded by officers
The gunman was killed after an exchange of gunfire with special constables who guard the entrance of the main station in Parramatta
Witnesses reported seeing two bodies lying on the ground covered in white sheets (pictured)
An ambulance NSW spokeswoman said paramedics were on the scene at Charles St, in the city’s CBD
An investigation is believed to be underway into whether the shooter had been recently charged by a detective from one of the State Crime Command squads
Detectives have not yet established the identity of the deceased, according to a spokesman
witness
bystander
Detectives launched a ‘critical incident investigation’ and confirmed two people were killed after a number of shots were fired
A civilian IT expert working for police was shot dead after a lone gunman opened fire outside a police headquarters in Sydney, pictured officers gather around a white sheet covering a body
The black-clad assailant fired a number of shots at special constables guarding the NSW Police station in Parramatta on Friday before he was gunned down and killed by one of the officers
Officers in body armour were seen patrolling the Parramatta CBD and guarding train stations, pictured is Charles Street
Several roads in Parramatta were blocked after the shooting and helicopters were seen circling overhead, pictured is Charles Street
On Friday night, Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione (pictured) refused to be drawn on whether the double shooting was terror-related and said detectives did not yet know the motive
Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione said the gunman, who was wearing dark trousers and a flowing top, shot the employee on his way home from work
When asked whether police were warned about a possible attack at the station, Commissioner Scipione revealed there had been a number of alerts in 2014 and 2015, pictured officers on the scene
Detectives believe the civilian worker was ‘deliberately targeted’ and said he was shot at almost point-blank range
Dozens of officers were seen searching the area where the double shooting took place
Both bodies (circled in red) were still on the scene at 11pm, draped in white sheets and just metres apart
Dozens of people were seen waiting outside their homes tonight after several buildings near the scene were evacuated
Floral tributes have been left to Mr Cheng outside the police headquarters in Parramatta, Sydney
His family have paid tribute to the ‘kind, gentle, and loving’ father-of-two, saying he was ‘generous of heart’
‘My father was a kind, gentle, and loving person. He was humourous, generous of heart and always put the family first. He has set a tremendous example for us as a family.
‘We are deeply saddened and heartbroken that he has been taken from us, but we are truly grateful for the fruitful and happy life he has shared with us.’
Mr Cheng, who worked in the Finance and Business Services department for 17 years, was shot dead as he was leaving work on Friday afternoon in an ‘act of terrorism’.
The ‘radicalised’ youth, who is reported to be a Sunni Muslim, was then killed in a shoot-out with three special constables guarding the station.
Mr Cheng’s family said they were ‘touched’ by a personal visit from NSW Premier Mike Baird and the Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione.
Police are now probing why Farhad Jabar Khalil Mohammad (pictured) targeted the accountant
‘This was a comforting reminder of the warm regard that was held for him, especially by the New South Wales police community,’ they said.
‘He will be missed by all of us. We will cherish our memory of him forever.’
Police are now probing why Mr Cheng, 58, who had never worn a uniform, was targeted by the lone gunman in a ‘brutal’ and ‘callous murder’ on Friday.
Detectives have described the shooting as a ‘targeted attack’, but they are unsure why Farhad chose the civilian officer ‘who never had a badge’.
Commissioner Scipione said: ‘We are not sure whether he was targeted because he came from a police facility — we may never know. But he was certainly targeted in terms of the shooting.
‘It was a direct shooting. Certainly it wasn’t a ricochet, it was a targeted shot that took his life.’
He confirmed the teenager’s actions were ‘politically motivated and therefore linked to terrorism’.
But he admitted they were still unsure of the schoolboy’s ‘exact motivations’.
‘We’re a long way from establishing a full picture of this man, his exact motivations still remain a mystery to us,’ he said.
‘There is nothing to suggest that he was doing anything but acting alone.’
Floral tributes and messages of support have been left at the site where Mr Cheng was gunned down just metres away from a children’s day care centre.
‘He was a much-loved man, [he had] been with us a long time. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone have a bad word about Curtis and he will be missed,’ Commissioner Scipione said.
‘Curtis was admired and respected by his colleagues. He was a gentle man in every sense.
‘What has occurred is shocking and it is a very sad time for those who worked closely with him and all our employees.’
Farhad visited Parramatta Mosque where he changed into a black robe in the hours before the killing, according to reports.
The ‘radicalised’ youth, who is reported to be a Sunni Muslim, was allegedly able to walk unchallenged into the police headquarters and choose his victim.
The 15-year-old first came across a plain clothes female detective who was not carrying a gun, according to reports.
But he then shot Mr Cheng in the back on the head as the veteran of the police finance department was leaving work.
Witnesses have described seeing the teenagers dancing joyously after shooting the ‘gentle’ public servant while shouting Allah Allah.
Chilling footage has show the teenager running down the street brandishing his gun in the air just seconds after killing the father-of-two Curtis Cheng, 58.
He could be heard screaming at officers before having a shoot-out with three special constables guarding the station.
The 15-year-old continued to fire his handgun outside the police building until he was killed.
Police said the teenager was not on their radar, but revealed that his relative was known to law enforcement or intelligence agencies.
‘[The relative] was a bit of a problem, he did come to the attention of police and counter-terrorism [authorities],’ a source told ABC .
It has also emerged that his sister Shadi may have been attempting to reach Iraq or Syria the day before the shooting as she flew out of Australia on a flight bound for Istanbul on Thursday.
She reportedly took all her belongings with her, according to the ABC.
Farhad, who is of Iraqi-Kurdish background, is understood to have been living with his family in an apartment block in North Parramatta.
Officers searched the teenager’s North Parramatta family home on Friday and took his computer equipment.
But they revealed they had not yet discovered any messages, religious writings or notes left by Farhad.
Police are also looking into whether Farhad may have been on the fringe of an extremist group that had already come to the notice of police.
Farhad was previously active on social media, voicing his support for Team Ricky on reality singing contest The Voice in April 2013.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the Australian Muslim community would be appalled and shocked by the attack.
‘We must not vilify or blame the entire Muslim community with the actions of what is in truth a very small percentage of violent extremist individuals.
‘The Muslim community are our absolutely necessary partners in combating this type of violent extremism.’
He said the issue of radicalisation – particularly in young people – was complex and it was hard to understand the speed at which it was occurring.
NSW premiere Mike Baird said it was an ‘unthinkable act’ that ended his life.
‘I want the family of Curtis and the members of his Police community to know that you don’t face this loss alone. We mourn with you and we are here for you.’
A strike force, Fellows, has been set up to investigate and police are working with Islamic communities, who have offered their support.
NSW Police Association president Pat Gooley said he has spoken to Commissioner Scipione directly about increasing security at stations since Friday’s shooting.
‘Our message is we’ll keep Police Association members safe and the police commissioner is helping us do that,’ Mr Gooley said.
‘What changed on Friday night is that this is the first time in NSW that the NSW Police have been directly targeted as part of a terror incident.’
The commissioner revealed a number of warnings had been sent round to police in the past two years reminding them to be ‘vigilant’ about attacks, but assured that the people of NSW were ‘safe’.
‘I have viewed a number of pieces of footage, I can tell you that this was a brutal crime. It was a terrible crime.
‘We’re attempting to identify a man who was seen to approach the victim and discharge one single shot. Subsequently the assailant remained in the street here in Charles Street before he fired several further shots at a special constable.
‘A number of special constables came out of the building and as they’ve emerged they’ve come under fire.
‘In the exchange that followed the gunman was shot and killed. An employee of the NSW police force has been callously murdered here today. This is a very sobering time for us.’
Commissioner Scipione said it was likely the gunman waited around after the murder in order to ‘commit suicide by cop’.
It was previously reported that there had been increased ‘chatter’ in the past week about a possible attack on the Parramatta headquarters.
Sources said the building had been ‘cased’ and that every officer had been ordered to wear their guns on them at all times this week, even while at their desks.
When questioned about whether police were aware on a possible attack at the station, Commissioner Scipione revealed there had been a number of alerts in 2014 and 2015.
‘There has been activity around a number of locations in NSW, they’re the things we communicate to our officers,’ Commissioner Scipione said.
‘We have drawn officers back to the special warnings which are contained within alert 2015.
‘We’ve refreshed that alert and yet again highlighted the importance of remaining vigilant and being ready to respond should they have to at any location but particularly around police stations. I want to ensure that we don’t jump to conclusions, as I’ve said.
‘I’ve indicated that but we’re keeping an open mind. At this stage we’ve got nothing to link this event to any terrorist-related activity but we could not say that that wasn’t the case. So clearly you would understand we have officers from within the counter-terrorism command.’
The NSW Police Force building is home to the State Crime Command, which includes the homicide, drug, Middle Eastern organised crime and gangs squads.
An investigation was believed to be underway into whether the shooter had been recently charged by a detective from one of the State Crime Command squads.
He was also quizzed about whether staff had allegedly been sent a number of emails warning about men who had been taking photographs of the building’s entrance.
This man was simply leaving work this afternoon and he was gunned down. He was murdered on this street, this very street,’ he said.
Detectives launched a level one critical incident, the highest order they can give, after the attack.
Witnesses reported seeing two bodies lying on the ground covered in white sheets just metres apart.
Dozens of police officers were seen combing the area where the shooting took place from around 10pm on Friday, searching for clues.
Investigators also aimed huge spotlights at neighbouring apartments during the operation.
Residents were evacuated from their homes in buildings nearby the police station and most were allowed to return just after 11pm.
Real estate agent Edwin Almeida said he saw a man with a gun screaming and pacing up and down outside the building on Charles Street.
He said he then saw the man lying on the ground with a police officer pointing a gun at him.
‘We looked out the window, saw security guards and what appeared to be a plain clothes police officer with gun drawn pointing at the person that was now lying on the floor surrounded by a pool of blood,’ he said.
He wrote on his Facebook page: ‘Four five shots fired by man outside our office and in front of NSW police head quarters. Man shot down by guards and detectives.’
A man called Nathan told 2GB Radio that he saw a man lying on the street surrounded by blood.
‘I saw the guy dressed in black on the pavement with blood everywhere,’ he said.
Shopkeeper Sammy Shak told The Daily Telegraph he saw two bodies on the ground after hearing ‘six shots at least’.
‘WE’RE KEEPING AN OPEN MIND’: COMMISSIONER’S COMMENTS ON MOTIVE
Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione refused to be drawn on whether the double shooting was terror-related and said detectives do not yet know the motive.
In his media briefing on Friday night, he said: ‘We don’t know the motive and we don’t yet know who the gunman is but he has committed an appalling act of brutality.
‘I want to ensure that we don’t jump to conclusions, as I’ve said, we’re keeping an open mind but there is an investigation that’s on foot.
‘At this stage we’ve got nothing to link this event to any terrorist-related activity but we could not say that that wasn’t the case.
‘So clearly you would understand we have officers from within the counter-terrorism command working alongside homicide but this is a homicide investigation led by homicide.’
‘My message to the people of NSW is that they are safe. There is no threat that we’re dealing with that at this stage we haven’t resolved here.
‘We will get to the bottom of this matter, the investigation will be conducted, it will be very thorough and we’ll do that as soon as we possibly can.’
‘When I went out there was two bodies on the floor and there was cops everywhere all around the area and they told me to go inside the shop straight away,’ he said.
Channel Seven helicopter pilot Andrew Millett said two bodies were visible about 200m from the police station.
Finance worker Rizwan Shaikh, who lives opposite the police headquarters, said he heard the shooting.
‘I finished work and was in the shower and I heard the gunshots,’ Mr Shaikh told The Daily Telegraph.
‘I heard six or seven gunshots and it was pretty loud. In two to three minutes there were cops everywhere.’
Miffy Hong, 33, said her mother called her just after 5pm to tell her she could see a body covered by a sheer near police headquarters.
‘She told me come back I don’t know what’s happening, she doesn’t speak English,’ she said.
The attack occurred outside a daycare centre used by police force families and the children were locked inside for four hours after the shooting with a dead body at their doorstep.
Parents of the children locked inside Goodstart Early Learning voiced fears about their welfare.
Dennis Entriken, whose three-year-old daughter was not allowed to leave for four hours, told Daily Mail Australia: ‘It’s very frustrating. One of the dead bodies is right out of the front of the chilcare centre.
‘What did they see, what did they hear? Is she scared? Is she OK?
‘They’ve told us she’s safe which is good… it’s the unknown which is the issue.
‘If she saw nothing and she’s blissfully unaware then that’s good,’ he said.
In his press conference on Friday night, Commissioner Scipione confirmed that all the children were safe.
‘Everyone’s safe, that’s the good news. There was certainly no suggestion of anyone being injured there. That’s certainly very pleasing to us.
NSW Police reveal shooter was a 15-year-old boy of an Iraqi-Kurdish background, urging anyone with information to call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. Vision courtesy ABC News.
The man shot by a 15-year-old gunman outside NSW police headquarters, accountant Curtis Cheng, was simply on his way home for the weekend when he died, NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione says.
Mr Cheng, 58, worked for the NSW Police finance and business services division and had been employed by the force for 17 years. He was married with two adult children.
Curtis Cheng, left, and his family.
“He was a much loved man, been with us a long time,” Mr Scipione said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone have a bad word about Curtis.”
Mr Scipione was to meet Mr Cheng’s family on Saturday. He said the entire NSW Police Force family was in mourning.
“Curtis was admired and respected by his colleagues. He was a gentle man in every sense,” he said. “What has occurred is shocking and it is a very sad time for those who worked closely with him and all our employees.”
NSW Premier Mike Baird paid tribute to Mr Cheng and gave his condolences to his family.
“He sounds a wonderful man, very much loved by family and friends and indeed the police community,” Mr Baird said.
“We can’t forget that the police community are deeply impacted by this.
“A colleague and friend – it is going to hurt and hurt very deeply.”
The boy then continued to fire his handgun before he was shot dead by one of three special constables who responded to the shooting.
Mr Scipione said that police had no warning of the attack and that the 15-year-old, of Iraqi-Kurdish background and born in Iran, had not been on the police radar, nor had he any criminal history.
TERROR experts are worried the recent fatal shooting in Sydney’s Parramatta that a civilian police force employee dead, may not be the last.
Investigations are continuing into what motivated 15-year-old Farhad Jabar Khali Mohammad to shoot police force veteran Curtis Cheng at close range outside the Parramatta police headquarters on Friday.
Police believe was politically motivated and linked to terrorism.
His grieving family, including wife Selina and children Zilvia and Alpha, said they were heartbroken by the loss of the loving, generous and gentle father who always put the family first.
“We are deeply saddened and heartbroken that he has been taken from us, but we are truly grateful for the fruitful and happy life he has shared with us,” they said in a statement.
“My father was a kind, gentle, and loving person. He was humorous, generous of heart and always put the family first. He has set a tremendous example for us as a family.
“To the many people who have offered their condolences and kind words about him, we are extremely moved by your thoughts and sympathies.,” they added.
Streets surrounding Parramatta headquarters were placed into lock-down after Mohammad fired shots into the building before he was killed by special constables.
Police have no information to tie the boy to a specific group.
The federal government, police and agencies are working with the Muslim community to combat extremism and prevent young people from being radicalised.
Beloved husband of Selina.
The love in my heart is everlasting.
Loving father of Alpha and Zilvia.
Relatives, friends of the family, colleagues and members of the community are warmly invited to attend the funeral service for Mr CURTIS CHENG, to be held in St Mary’s Cathedral, College Street Sydney, on Saturday, October 17, 2015 commencing at 10.00am.
Private cremation.
In lieu of floral tributes, we ask that you consider a donation to NSW Police Legacy Appeal.
Saturday, 10 October 2015
We will never forget you.
~
Gail Abbott
Saturday, 10 October 2015
Our deepest condolences and prayers for your comfort in your time of unspeakable loss. The whole of decentAustralia sends you love and support at this difficult time. May your love and strength as a family help you to regain your hapipiness and harmony.
UPDATE: POLICE have confirmed that they have arrested a second man in relation to the death of New South Wales police employee Curtis Cheng.
Police are in the process of charging an 18-year-old, believed to be the one responsible for obtaining the firearm from a Middle Eastern crime gang and passing it on to 15-year-old Farhad Jabar.
A 22-year-old man has now also been arrested.
EARLIER: A MAN taken into custody in last week’s counter terrorism raids in Sydney, is expected to be charged in relation to the death of police employee Curtis Cheng.
Reports suggest the 18-year-old was the one responsible for obtaining the firearm from a Middle Eastern crime gang and passing it on to 15-year-old Farhad Jabar.
Jabar shot dead Mr Cheng outside Parramatta police headquarters on October 2.
The man is expected to be charged this afternoon and will appear in court tomorrow.
VALEDICTORY
Mr Curtis Shu Kei Cheng (28 November 1956 to 2 October 2015)
A member of the New South Wales Police Force from 11 November 1997 to 2 October 2015
The 2nd of October 2015 was the Friday before a long weekend. Many people were getting away early, extending the time that they would have to spend with family and friends. And on most Fridays, Curtis Cheng would have done the same.
However, there had been the demands of preparing the current year’s budget, an enormous task, the last of it completed just a few weeks ago. And there was more to do for the Annual Report. So Curtis stayed back a little longer than usual.
Eventually satisfied he had done all that he could, Curtis left. In his customary, friendly way he said goodbye to his colleagues, wishing them well, and made his way towards the lifts to head home.
Improbable and unjust things happen. We read about them in newspapers and see them on television. We are shocked, often outraged, when they do. But when they happen, they invariably happen to someone else, somewhere else.
But Curtis was one of our own, one of our friends. His circumstances are our circumstances. And the pain and disorientation we feel at Curtis’s death is all the more acute as a result.
Curtis Shu Kei Cheng commenced with the NSW Police Force on the 11th of November 1997, Remembrance Day. And we will always remember Curtis.
His resume was impressive. A lecturer of Accounting at the Hang Seng School of Commerce in Hong Kong. And thereafter at the Open University of Hong Kong. A Management Accountant at the Bank of Bermuda. And later an Administration and Finance Consultant in Hong Kong private enterprise.
He studied in Hong Kong and his postgraduate qualifications, including a Master of Science in Business Administration, were mostly completed in England. He amassed an impressive list of research and publications in accounting, management and education, and on arriving in Australia put his education and skills to good effect in running his own business facilitating trade for companies in China.
Curtis worked in our Financial and Business Services Directorate and his earliest work was introducing business planning to the Force. Systematically measuring what worked well, and what worked less well, to ensure we achieved the best results for the people of New South Wales. At that time this type of work was new, but is now acknowledged as being vitally important to operational policing.
In that first role and in the promotions that deservedly followed Curtis took great pride in his performance, developing a reputation for producing work that could be trusted. In an accountant’s world he was gold.
Curtis continued to work in Financial and Business Services: in Corporate Performance, Finance Budget and Planning, Management Accounting, and as a Systems Accountant.
In recognition of his service with the NSW Police Force, Curtis received NSW Police Medallions recognising the milestones of 10 and 15 years service, the Commissioner’s Long Service Award for 15 years service, as well as the Commissioner’s Olympic and Sesquicentenary Citations.
And in between times, in 1998, the Australian Government recognised Curtis with Australian citizenship, an event he proudly announced to work mates.
Curtis was admired and respected by his colleagues, a gentle man in every sense. Hard working, measured, but unfailingly positive. As you would expect there has been a lot of reflecting over these past couple of weeks. Members of his team recounted Curtis’s familiar greeting, his hand on your shoulder as he asked you how your were. Genuinely interested in the answer.
He valued relationships and nurtured them over a coffee, or a shared meal. And if the topic turned to his beloved football, or his family, you knew you were in for a long chat.
One of his closest co-workers said:
“You know, we all get angry at things from time to time. There must have been things that made Curtis angry. But if there were, I never saw them. Not once. Not in all the years I knew him – he was nothing but positive.”
This year the NSW Police Force has been celebrating the centenary of women in policing. Just last month I attended a gala dinner – a highlight of those celebrations – close to a thousand people in attendance. And Curtis was there, showing his support. Resplendent in black tie, his NSW Police Force citations proudly pinned to his lapels. So proud to be part of the Force. So proud to help recognise a century of outstanding achievements by the women of the Force. It was a wonderful evening.
And more than a few of us were surprised, and we smiled, when Curtis hit the dance floor. This quiet, unassuming man from Finance, this man of numbers and spread-sheets, well he certainly knew how to move. He was a revelation. And he was soon surrounded by many others, up, relaxing, enjoying themselves. It was a night of celebration, a night to be positive, and Curtis led the way.
It is never easy to say goodbye to someone who meant so much to so many. The NSW Police Force has lost a respected and much loved member of its family, Selina, a devoted husband, Alpha and Zilvia, a loving and devoted father.
I can’t describe the devastation inside Police Headquarters and right across the NSW Police Force. The gentlest of friends lost to an act of terror. A man, the manner of whose death, stands in the starkest contrast to the gentle, honourable way he led his life.
But in the aftermath of this tragedy, my officers and I have been struck by the strength and unity of the Cheng family. Not an ounce of hate despite this senseless crime. At a time when they deserved our shoulders for support, they have shown a strength and grace of their own, an example to the rest of us, showing the way.
There cannot be any one of us, least of all Selina, Zilvia and Alpha, for whom Curtis’s death is not painful and incomprehensible. We meet it with grief and tears, shock and despair, hurt and anger. It makes no sense. Perhaps time will provide some answers. Perhaps it will dull the pain. But what cannot be allowed to be dulled is the contribution Curtis made.
I was leafing through Curtis’s Personnel File late one evening last week, reflecting on the man and his contribution. His most recent successful application for a promotion was there, and a couple of statements in particular struck me.
Discussing his data and information technology skills he said:
“One of my hobbies is to create forms and templates to make things organized no matter at work or at home”. And I smiled at the thought of Alpha, Zilvia, and Selina being gently organised on weekends or some other routine task by way of an Excel spread-sheet.
But Curtis also said this:
“Over the past years, I have enjoyed every minute working in the NSW Police Force. And if I am given the honour of becoming a system accountant, I have the confidence to maintain and enhance a harmonious and constructive team spirit.”
That was Curtis.
A man who loved his family, relished his work and held dear the opportunities and pleasures life in Australia afforded him. A man who didn’t take his good fortune for granted or keep it to himself, but who shared it with others through his positive spirit and generosity. At least while it lasted.
Curtis’s fate reminds us that life is fragile. It also reminds us that we are together responsible for the type of community we create. If a positive is to be taken from recent events, it is our collective realisation that our way of life, the freedoms and protections we enjoy, are not unassailable. They need to built, maintained and defended.
We owe it to Curtis to do that.
It is my honour today to posthumously confer a Commissioner’s Commendation for Service on Mr Curtis Cheng. In part the commendation reads:
For outstanding and meritorious performance of duty as a member of the New South Wales Police Force between 1997 and 2015.
Mr Cheng was a long serving member of Financial and Business Services, where he served with diligence and distinction, providing exemplary financial services to the New South Wales Police Force.
Mr Cheng was killed in a callous act of violence outside Police Headquarters in Parramatta on Friday 2 October 2015.
Mr Cheng displayed integrity, loyalty, commitment, professionalism and devotion to duty as a member of the New South Wales Police Force, and thus is highly commended for his service.
– – –
I am deeply honoured and, indeed, privileged to be able to represent every member of the New South Wales Police Force here today to farewell Curtis Cheng.
A man who served the people of New South Wales with honour, and with a caring and gentle heart.
A loving husband and father.
A cherished colleague.
Our friend.
We are grateful to have known you Curtis and to have worked alongside you.
Our prayers travel with you. May your loved ones be comforted. May you rest in peace.
A P Scipione APM
Commissioner of Police
17 October 2015
Lyncon Robert Dix WILLIAMS
| 23/10/2015
Lyncon Robert Dix WILLIAMS
aka Lync
( late of Medindie Gardens )
South Australia Police Force
Regd. # ?
Rank: Constable 1st Class
Stations: ?, Region B, Holden Hill Police Station
Service: From ? to ?
Awards: ?
Born: ?
Died on: 29 August 1985
Cause: Murdered in his police car
Event location: Ross Ave, Blair Athol, S.A.
Event location:
Age: 30
Funeral date: 3 September 1985
Funeral location: ?
Buried at: Centennial Park Cemetery, 760 Goodwood Rd, Pasadena, S.A.
August 29th, 1985, Police Officer Lyncon Robert Dix Williams from Holden Hill police was murdered at Blair Athol. First Class Constable Lyncon (Lync.) Williams Aged 30 years, of Holden Hill Patrol Base, died in his patrol car after he responded with his junior partner to reports of gunfire at Ross Avenue Blair Athol. A 17-year-old shot him as he arrived on the scene. He had not even had the chance to step out of his car ahead of the fatal shot.
Police arrested and charged the shooter with murder. He was convicted and sentenced to imprisonment at the Governor’s pleasure. A non-parole period was later fixed at 13-and-a-half years.
Police Association President Peter Alexander reflected on William’s death as he laid a wreath at a Police Remembrance Day memorial service. “I didn’t know Lync Williams personally but, I’ll always remember the circumstances of that murder”, he said.
’I remember the shock of it and the grief for his family and workmates. It was a tragedy that was reflected right across the job.’
Valour Award & bar – VA for act performed in February 1999
Born: 20 November1961, Bridgetown, W.A.
Died on: 3 August 2000
Cause: Murdered – shot
Location: Stuart Hwy & Old Bynoe Rd, Livingstone, N.T.
Age: 37
Funeral date: Saturday 7 August 1999
Funeral location: St Mary’s Cathedral, Darwin
Buried at: Cremated. Ashes scattered at Daly River Crossing, N.T.
Memorial Service: Saturday 3 August 2019 ( 20th Anniversary ) 10.30am –
Glen Huitson Memorial, cnr Stuart Hwy & Old Bynoe Rd, Livingstone, N.T.
Brevet Sergeant Glen HUITSON
[alert_green]GLENIS mentioned on the Police Wall of Remembrance[/alert_green]
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Brevet Sergeant Glen Huitson memorial, 3 August 2015
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????GLEN HUITSON MEMORIAL????
TWENTY YEAR REMEMBRANCE SERVICE
Saturday 3rd August 2019 will mark the 20th anniversary of the death of Brevet Sergeant Glen Huitson who was killed in the line of duty in 1999 whilst stationed at Adelaide River.
We will honour Glen with a gathering on Saturday 3rd August 2019 from 10.30am at the Glen Huitson Memorial, located at the corner of the Stuart Highway and Old Bynoe Road, Livingstone, N.T.
All current and former members are invited to join Glen’s family in remembering a husband, father, son, and workmate who was tragically taken from his family 20 years ago.
Glen HUITSON joined the Northern Territory in January 1987. He served in both Southern and Northern districts of the Northern Territory.
During his service in the Northern Territory Police, Glen Huitson received a Commendation from the Commissioner of Police on 17 March 1994 when he attended a disturbance at a Community near Alice Springs. He disarmed a drunken person who was armed with a knife star picket and was threatening another person with a billy of boiling water.
In February of 1999 in Litchfield Park, Glen Huitson disarmed an armed man who was threatening the driver and passengers of a bus. He received a Valour Award over this incident.
On 3 August 1999 Glen Huitson was on duty at a road block on the Stuart Highway, 60 kms south of Darwin, in bushland.
There were on watch for an armed offender who had already shot and wounded two other persons several kilometres away during the previous night.
The armed offender had managed to come through bush on one side of the road block where he opened fire with a .30/30 calibre rifle. He fired the first round into the back of a civilian then a second shot at Huitson which struck him and was fatal.
For this incident he received the Australian Bravery Medal and a bar to his Valour Medal.
This park was named in memory of the late Sgt. Glen Anthony Huitson BM, VA, Service No. 1520 on 3 August 2000.
Sgt. Huitson was the officer in charge of the Adelaide River Police Station. He died on 3rd August 1999 as a result of gun shot wounds received in the execution of his duties whilst manning a roadblock on the corner of the Stuart Highway and Old Bynoe Road.
Twice Decorated as a serving Police Officer, Glen Huitson lived his personal life with the same intensity, and was an integral part of community life in Adelaide River. His untimely death has left a gap in this community which will never be filled. Glen is survived by his Widow Lisa and children Joey & Ruby.
Citizens of the Coomalie Region joined with serving Members of the Northern Territory Police Force at this site on 3rd August 2001 to dedicate this memorial stone on the occasion of the second anniversary of Sgt. Huitson’s death.
We honour the life and the achievements of a remarkable citizen.
“On 3rd August 1999, at about 10:45 am, there was a shooting incident on the Stuart Highway at the corner of Old Bynoe Road in the Darwin rural district. In the course of the incident, two persons were shot dead. One, Glen Anthony Huitson, was a Sergeant of police on duty at the time he was killed.” (Coroner’s Findings)
Glen was performing duties on a roadblock with his partner in Livingstone at the Old Bynoe Road Turn off on the Stuart Highway, 55 Kilometres south of Darwin. They were stopping traffic entering the police cordon following a shooting incident the previous evening when the offender Rodney Ansell ambushed the roadblock shooting Huitson fataly and wounding a civilian in the back with his 30/30 rifle. For this incident he received the Australia Bravery Medal and a bar to his Valour Medal posthumously.
On the night of the 2nd of August 1999 Rodney William Ansell and Cherrie Ann Hewson went to a property on Kentish Road. Ansell fired 6 shots at a caravan occupied by Stephen Robertson and Lee-Anne Musgrave who were minding the property. A neighbour, David Hobden, drove his truck over to see what was happening and Ansell fired through the windscreen blinding him. He ran to his residence and another occupant, Brian Williams, ran over to stop Ansell who was trying to steal Hobden’s truck. Ansell shot Williams in the hand. He lost an index finger and shots were fired at his house. Ansell appeared to be yelling about child abduction which was a delusion that had manifested itself during his amphetamine addiction. He fled into scrubland with a 30/30 rifle and Hobden’s shotgun.
Police responded and set up a forward command post in the area. Roadblocks were set up on the Stuart Highway and other roads. Sergeant Glen Huitson and Senior Constable James O’Brien manned the roadblock on the corner of Old Bynoe Road and the Stuart Highway armed with their Glock Pistols a shotgun and a .308 rifle. It appears that during the night Ansell had escaped the cordon but for some reason chose to sneak up on the roadblock at Old Bynoe Road. Hewson had left the area.
At about 10.45 am on the 3rd of August 1999 the roadblock at Old Bynoe Road was still in place. A local man had approached the road block to talk to the police members and was leaning on the police vehicle when suddenly he was shot in the pelvis from behind a large water pipe in nearby scrub. Huitson used the shotgun from the police car and O’Brien returned fire with his Glock pistol. Huitson was hit by a 30/30 round and fell to the ground. O’Brien reloaded the shotgun and returned fire. He called on Ansell to put his weapons down but he called back “Your all dead”.
In response to the gun battle two Territory Response Group vehicles raced to the scene. Just prior to the roadblock the first vehicle swerved and braked and was struck by the second vehicle causing it to roll over. As police exited both vehicles and began to take up positions Ansell got up on one knee to position himself to fire at the arriving police members. This left him exposed to fire from O’Brien and the shotgun fire finally stopped him. As the Coroner, Mr Wallace, said “There is little doubt his (O’Brien’s) bravery prevented further loss of life”.
It was later determined that there were seven entry wounds on his body from return fire from Huitson and O’Brien and numerous grazes. His covered position behind the water pipe and a small tree had protected Ansell from more serious injury until he was forced to change position.
Background – Glen Huitson
Glen Huitson joined the Northern Territory Police in January 1987, served in both Southern and Northern districts and was stationed at Adelaide River Police Station.
He received a Commendation from the Commissioner of Police on 17 March 1944 when he attended a disturbance at a Community near Alice Springs. He disarmed a drunken person who was armed with a knife star picket and was threatening another person with a billy of boiling water.
In February of 1999 in Litchfield Park Glen Huitson disarmed an armed man who was threatening the driver and passengers of a bus. He received a Valour Award over this incident.
Glen was survived by his wife Lisa and young children Joseph (2) and Ruby (6 months).
Roadside memorial alongside Stuart Highway where Sgt Huitson was killed
Huitson was honoured with a full police funeral in Darwin. About 30 officers formed a guard of honour while six others carried Huitson’s coffin.
Huitsons widow Lisa receiving her husband’s police cap and National Medal Award from the police commissioner
Constable 1st Class Glen Huitson
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HUITSON, Glen
This page only contains a eulogy. If you have material that can be added contact the webmaster.
FUNERAL SERVICE FOR SERGEANT GLEN ANTHONY HUITSON
ST MARY’S CATHEDRAL, DARWIN, NORTHERN TERRITORY SATURDAY 7 AUGUST 1999EULOGY GIVEN BY COMMISSIONER BRIAN BATESSERGEANT GLEN HUITSON WAS A DEVOTED AND LOVING HUSBAND AND FATHER OF LISA, JOSEPH AND RUBY. I CAN ONLY CONVEY THE HEARTFELT CONDOLENCES AND SYMPATHY OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORY POLICE FORCE AND INDEED THE COMMUNITY OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORY TO GLEN’S WIFE, CHILDREN AND BOTH THEIR FAMILIES. WE WILL DO EVERYTHING WE CAN TO HELP THEM, NOT ONLY THROUGH THIS TIME BUT IN THE TIME TO COME.IN HIS LETTER OF APPLICATION TO JOIN THE NORTHERN TERRITORY POLICE FORCE, SERGEANT GLEN HUITSON SAID, AND I QUOTE:“I WAS BORN ON 20 NOVEMBER 1961 IN BRIDGETOWN, WESTERN AUSTRALIA, THE OLDEST SON IN A FAMILY OF THREE. MY PARENTS OWNED AND OPERATED A SMALL TIN MINE ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF GREENBUSHES WHERE I LIVED FOR 12 YEARS. GREEN BUSHES WAS A GREAT ENVIRONMENT IN WHICH TO GROW UP AS A CHILD, BEING A SMALL TOWN SURROUNDED BY BUSH. WE SPENT MANY HOURS EXPLORING AND DISCOVERING NATURE.LOOKING BACK ON MY CHILDHOOD I AM GRATEFUL TO MY PARENTS FOR THE STRICT BUT FAIR METHOD OF INSTILLING IN ME A SET OF MORAL STANDARDS AND PRINCIPLES IN KEEPING WITH COMMUNITY IDEALS. THIS GUIDANCE WAS TO BENEFIT ME LATER IN LIFE.”
GLEN GOES ON TO TALK ABOUT HIS GROWING UP YEARS AND HIS EARLY EMPLOYMENT, PARTICULARLY WHEN THE FAMILY MOVED IN 1978 TO BUSSLETON WHERE HE WAS INVOLVED IN THE LOCAL FOOTBALL CLUB AS A PLAYER AND AN ADMINISTRATOR, AS A COACH AND UMPIRE AND FOR THREE YEARS AS A FIREMAN IN THE VOLUNTEER FIRE BRIGADE AND WITH THE LOCAL ROSTRUM CLUB. TOWARDS THE END OF THIS LETTER OF APPLICATION GLEN SAYS, AND I AGAIN QUOTE:
“APPROXIMATELY FIVE YEARS AGO I DECIDED THAT IF AT THE AGE OF 25 I WAS STILL DISAPPOINTED WITH THE WAY MY CAREER WAS HEADING, THIS WOULD BE THE TIME TO MAKE A START IN A POSITION IN LIFE THAT I WOULD ENJOY. THE MOST HONEST WAY I FOUND TO FIND A CAREER I WANTED WAS TO SIT DOWN WITH A PEN AND PAPER AND WRITE DOWN JOBS IN WHICH I WOULD WORK FOR NO FINANCIAL REWARD. MY LIST CONTAINED THE FOLLOWING: FISHERIES INSPECTOR, CUSTOMS OFFICER, AMBULANCE OFFICER, WELFARE WORKER AND A POLICE OFFICER.
SINCE WRITING DOWN THAT LIST I HAVE WORKED TOWARDS EQUIPPING MYSELF FOR ONE OF THOSE POSITIONS. THIS HAS INCLUDED THE FOLLOWING: BEING A FIREMAN WITH OUR LOCAL VOLUNTEER FIRE BRIGADE, ACHIEVING A FIRST AID CERTIFICATE WITH A ST JOHN AMBULANCE BRIGADE, INVOLVING MYSELF HEAVILY IN COMMUNITY AFFAIRS, MAINLY THROUGH SPORT, AND INVOLVING MYSELF IN PUBLIC SPEAKING. AFTER READING ABOUT THE POSITION OF POLICE OFFICER FOR THE NORTHERN TERRITORY I DECIDED THAT THIS WOULD INDEED OFFER ME THE CAREER I HAVE BEEN LOOKING FOR. AS A POLICE OFFICER IN THE NORTHERN TERRITORY I WOULD BE ABLE TO MAKE A SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTION IN MAKING THE NORTHERN TERRITORY A GREAT PLACE TO LIVE IN, THEREBY ACHIEVING MY GOAL OF JOB SATISFACTION.”
ALL OF US WITHIN THE POLICE FORCE AND INDEED THE DEPARTMENT OF POLICE, FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES, ARE EXTREMELY SHOCKED BY THE DEATH OF SERGEANT GLEN HUITSON. HIS LOSS IS A TRAGEDY FOR THE POLICE SERVICE AND THERE ARE SIMPLY NO WORDS TO DESCRIBE THAT SENSE OF LOSS, THE WASTE AND THE TRAGEDY THAT THE WHOLE POLICE FAMILY FEELS TODAY.
I WOULD ALSO ACKNOWLEDGE THE PRESENCE HERE TODAY OF SERVING POLICE OFFICERS FROM ALL STATES AND TERRITORIES OF AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND.
IT IS TRITE TO SAY THAT ALL POLICE FAMILIES KNOW THE DANGERS OF POLICE WORK, BUT NOTHING CAN EVER PREPARE US FOR SOMETHING LIKE GLEN’S DEATH.
NO POLICE FORCE COULD BE MORE PROUD THAN TO HAVE IN ITS RANKS AN OFFICER OF THE CALIBRE OF GLEN HUITSON. HE TOUCHED AND AFFECTED SO MANY PEOPLE’S LIVES, NOT ONLY WITHIN THE POLICE FORCE BUT WITHIN THE COMMUNITY OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORY THAT HE SWORE TO SERVE AND PROTECT.
AND HE DID MORE THAN THAT – BECAUSE ON NO LESS THAN THREE OCCASIONS, THE THIRD TRAGICALLY RESULTING IN HIS DEATH, HE WAS CONFRONTED WITH LIFE-THREATENING SITUATIONS.
GLEN RECEIVED MY COMMENDATION FOR AN INCIDENT ON 17 MARCH 1994 WHEN HE ATTENDED A DISTURBANCE AT A COMMUNITY NEAR ALICE SPRINGS.
HE DISARMED A DRUNKEN PERSON WHO WAS ARMED WITH A KNIFE, STEEL BAR, NULLA NULLA AND A STAR PICKET. THE PERSON WAS THREATENING ANOTHER COMMUNITY MEMBER WITH A BILLY OF BOILING WATER. WITHOUT REGARD FOR HIS OWN SAFETY SERGEANT HUITSON PREVENTED THIS PERSON THROWING THE BOILING WATER BUT IN FACT WAS STRUCK AND COVERED IN BOILING WATER HIMSELF OVER HIS UPPER BACK, RIGHT UPPER ARM AND LEFT FOREARM. HIS QUICK ACTIONS ALLOWED OTHER POLICE OFFICERS TO RESTRAIN THE OFFENDER AND REMOVE HIM AS A THREAT TO THE COMMUNITY. THE BURNS GLEN RECEIVED CAUSED HIM CONSIDERABLE PAIN AND SUFFERING AND HE REQUIRED HOSPITAL TREATMENT.
AND THEN THERE WAS THE INCIDENT IN FEBRUARY THIS YEAR WHEN SERGEANT HUITSON DISARMED AN ARMED MAN WHO HAD JUMPED ON THE BULLBAR OF A TOURIST BUS IN LITCHFIELD PARK.
THE MAN WAS UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF DRUGS AND ARMED WITH A LOADED .22 RIFLE AND WAS THREATENING THE DRIVER AND PASSENGERS OF THE BUS ON BATCHELOR ROAD.
GLEN KNEW THAT HELP WAS ABOUT 15 MINUTES AWAY AND WAS DEEPLY CONCERNED FOR THE SAFETY OF THE DRIVER, PASSENGERS AND PASSING MOTORISTS. HE SINGLE-HANDEDLY ATTEMPTED TO DIRECT TRAFFIC, ENGAGE THE MAN IN CONVERSATION AND KEEP POLICE COMMUNICATIONS ADVISED OF THE SITUATION. HE THEN APPROACHED THE MAN TO DISTRACT HIS ATTENTION FROM THE BUS AND PASSENGERS, PLACING HIMSELF AT CONSIDERABLE RISK.
GLEN ENGAGED THE MAN IN CONVERSATION FOR ABOUT 15 MINUTES AND EVENTUALLY CONVINCED HIM TO PLACE THE FIREARM ON THE BULLBAR OF THE BUS AND WALK A SHORT DISTANCE AWAY WHERE GLEN TACKLED HIM TO THE GROUND AND WAS THEN HELPED BY OTHER POLICE WHO HAD JUST ARRIVED. THIS WAS WITHOUT DOUBT AN OUTSTANDING EXAMPLE OF PERSONAL COURAGE, AND SERGEANT HUITSON WAS IN FACT DUE TO RECEIVE A VALOUR AWARD OVER THAT INCIDENT.
IN SERGEANT GLEN HUITSON THE NORTHERN TERRITORY POLICE HAD A TRUE BUSH COPPER AND AN IDEAL ROLE MODEL FOR OTHER POLICE.
HE WAS A TOTAL PROFESSIONAL WHO GOT ALONG WITH COLLEAGUES AND THE PUBLIC ALIKE AND WAS EXTREMELY POPULAR WITH ABORIGINAL PEOPLE HE WORKED WITH, IN THE COMMUNITIES ACROSS THE TERRITORY. WHAT A TREMENDOUS LOSS HE IS, NOT ONLY TO THIS POLICE FORCE BUT TO THE TERRITORY.
IN CLOSING THERE IS PERHAPS NO BETTER WAY TO TALK ABOUT THIS OUTSTANDING AND COMPASSIONATE POLICE OFFICER THAN BY TELLING YOU ABOUT A REPORT HE RECENTLY SUBMITTED, AND I THINK IT IS IMPORTANT I SHARE THIS WITH YOU ALL.
GLEN HAD RESEARCHED THE HISTORY OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORY POLICE SERVICE AND HE FOUND MANY EXAMPLES OF UNRECOGNISED SERVICE TO THE COMMUNITY BY FORMER MEMBERS, AND PARTICULARLY POLICE TRACKERS. HE SAID IN HIS MEMO THAT THIS UNRECOGNISED WORK WAS, AT THE TIME, NO DOUBT CONSIDERED TO BE JUST PART OF THE JOB, AND UNLESS YOU HAPPENED TO DIE ON DUTY OR REACHED A HIGH RANK, VERY LITTLE WAS DONE TO PRESERVE THE MEMORY OF THOSE MANY FORMER MEMBERS.
GLEN APPRECIATED THE SERENITY AND BEAUTY OF THE ADELAIDE RIVER WAR CEMETERY WHERE HE ALSO NOTICED SEVERAL PLAQUES DEDICATED TO MILITARY MEMBERS. HE HAD SEVERAL IDEAS TO HONOUR THE MEMORY OF POLICE MEMBERS, INCLUDING PLANTING TREES WITH PLAQUES DEDICATED TO MEMBERS AND THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A MEMORIAL AVENUE IN OUR POLICE COMPLEX, THE PETER McAULAY CENTRE. HE SUGGESTED NEW PLAQUES COULD BE DEDICATED ANNUALLY ON A SIGNIFICANT DAY, FOR EXAMPLE, POLICE REMEMBRANCE DAY. THERE TOO, HE EMPHASISED THE WHOLE COMMUNITY SHOULD BE INVITED AND INVOLVED.
IT IS MY INTENTION TO HONOUR GLEN’S SUGGESTIONS IN THAT REPORT, AND ALSO PAY TRIBUTE TO HIM, IN A WAY I FEEL SURE HE AND YOU WOULD APPROVE OF.
FINALLY, IN THE WORDS OF THE 13TH CHAPTER OF CORINTHIANS:
“THERE REMAINS THEN, FAITH, HOPE, LOVE, THESE THREE; BUT THE GREATEST OF THESE IS LOVE.”
ABC News: Aboriginal communities to send reps to police officer’s funeral
Trudy and Rod BrayFri, 6 Aug 1999 00:26:27 -0700
Fri, 6 Aug 1999 11:41 AEST
Aboriginal communities to send reps to police officer's
funeral.
The Gurindji Aboriginal people, from two communities south-west of Darwin, are sending
representatives to the funeral of a Northern Territory police officer.
Sergeant Glen Huitson was killed by Rodney William Ansell on Tuesday.
The sergeant's partner, Constable Jamie O'Brien, returned the fire, killing Ansell.
A Gurindji representative, Roslyn Frith, says the sergeant was given the skin name, Japalyi,
because of the community's respect and love for him.
She says he will be missed greatly.
"To the community he wasn't just a policeman, he was just another person who belonged to
the community," Ms Frith said.
"He got involved - like if there were ceremonies he'd go down and make sure everything was
alright.
"With the younger generation, he took them out. Like he was with the emergency services out
here, he went out fishing and hunting with them," she said.
� 1999 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
https://www.mail-archive.com/recoznet2@paradigm4.com.au/msg01295.html
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NT: Aborigines planning funeral for Ansell in Arnhem Land
AAP General News (Australia) 08-09-1999
NT: Aborigines planning funeral for Ansell in Arnhem Land
By Catharine Munro
DARWIN, Aug 9 AAP – Rod Ansell, the original Crocodile Dundee who shot dead a policeman last week, is expected be given an Aboriginal funeral in Arnhem Land.
Ansell, 44, was killed in a shootout with police after fatally wounding Sergeant Glen Huitson, 37, about 50km south of Darwin last Tuesday.
The violent deaths followed a 12-hour search for Ansell, who had shot at two houses in the area the previous night.
His motives remain a mystery and the case is being investigated by the coroner.
The events shocked Darwin, where Ansell was known as a buffalo hunter and a bushman who had been living on an Aboriginal-owned property in Arnhem Land, about 600km south-east of Darwin.
Ansell’s two sons, Shaun and Callum, are believed to have requested that an Aboriginal community at Mt Catt, near Bulman in central Arnhem Land, allow a funeral to be held on their grounds.
“The two boys said they want to have the funeral at Mt Catt,” said Lorna Martin, who works at the clinic at Bulman.
Ansell spent some time in the area in the 1980s as a buffalo catcher and continued to make frequent visits.
The service will interrupt an important ceremony being held at Mt Catt but arrangements were being made for the proceedings to be halted for one day for the funeral on Thursday, Mrs Martin said.
“Everybody said it’s okay,” she said.
Ansell’s parents, George and Eva, both in their 70s, are understood to have journeyed to the Northern Territory from their home in Murgon, 260km north-west of Brisbane, to say goodbye to their son.
Meanwhile, the widow of the slain policeman, Lisa, said she had just returned from Daly River Crossing, where she had scattered her husband’s ashes.
Mrs Huitson told reporters she had spent three happy years there with Sgt Huitson and they had taken their son, Joseph, two and Ruby, six months, back there to be baptised.
“It was just a special place for us,” Mrs Huitson said.
Sgt Huitson‘s brother Bevan, sister Julie and parents Carole and John attended a press conference to thank the police and the people of the NT for their support.
Rod Ansell – The inspiration behind Crocodile Dundee
The day the real Crocodile Dundee Rod Ansell was shot dead
ELLIE TURNER
Herald Sun
January 05, 201412:00AM
Rod Ansell in the Outback in 1987.
ROD Ansell’s amazing story of Outback survival is one many Australians know – although they’ve probably never heard of his name.
As strong as an ox and as brave as a lion, the blond haired, barefoot bushman survived for more than seven weeks on a small island at the mouth of a crocodile-infested river in the remote Northern Territory, sleeping up a tree with a brown snake at night to avoid the salties lurking below.
His story was the inspiration for the 1986 film Crocodile Dundee. But the film only tells part of the story of Ansell’s wild life.
More than a decade after his tale of survival brought fame and fortune to actor Paul Hogan, the real Crocodile Dundee was shot dead by police after a drug-crazed rampage that saw a police officer killed and three other men wounded.
***
STRONG men in uniform broke down on the side of the Stuart Highway the day Territory police officer Glen Huitson was shot dead in a gun battle with Rod Ansell.
It was like a scene from a cops and robbers movie.
But nobody won.
Sergeant Huitson was gunned down at a roadblock in bushland 60km south of Darwin by Ansell, who had been on the run from police.
Ansell was shot in the chest as Senior Constable James O’Brien returned fire.
“The only verbal communication I had with the gunman was when I was reloading the shotgun for the first time,” the surviving officer, who has never spoken openly about the ordeal, said in a statement almost 15 years ago.
“I called out to him to put his weapons down. He called back, ‘You’re all dead‘.”
Ansell was deranged and wired on speed, more than 20 years after he emerged from the wild, a handsome young hunter armed only with a knife, a gun and a story to tell, his boat having capsized on the remote Victoria River.
His crazed life came to an end on August 3, 1999, but not before he had gunned down a police officer, leaving two young children to grow up without a father.
Northern Territory police say they lost “an all-round good bloke” that day.
Sgt Huitson’s family was robbed of much more.
In 1994, Sgt Huitson had been commended for bravery after arresting a knife-wielding drunk man – who was also armed with a star picket and a billy of boiling water in a bid to harm another person – at a community near Alice Springs.
He received a Valour Award after he talked delusional man Wayne Costan – who had tried to hijack a tourist coach with a sawn-off .22 rifle – into dropping the weapon, before tackling him to the ground at Litchfield Park in February 1999.
Six months later Sgt Huitson was killed, aged 37.
His then-infant daughter, Ruby, and five-year-old son, Joseph, grew up without their dad.
His widow, Lisa, took home her husband’s posthumous Australia Bravery Medal and a broken heart.
Former NT Police assistant commissioner John Daulby was among those who raced out to the double killing.
“Everyone was stunned,” he said. “It was just a tragedy.”
Darwin police officer Glen Huitson was one of two policemen shot by gunman Rod Ansell.
“The grief at the scene is something that sticks with me – grown men in tears.”
Ansell had wounded two men on a shooting spree in Darwin and fled into the bush, raving mad, on the night of August 2, 1999.
He was convinced members of the Freemasons had kidnapped his sons – Callum, then aged 20, and Shawn, 18.
His girlfriend, Cherie Ann Hewson, had told him that as a child she had witnessed the sacrifice of young girls that her family – members of the secret medieval fraternity – “brought out of the woods”. They were bound, raped and slaughtered, she said.
The shared paranoia came to a head when Ms Hewson claimed she spotted three bow hunters, dressed in camouflage with night vision goggles, near their bush camp.
NT Coroner Dick Wallace would later say the “wretched drivel” was at the root of Ansell‘s madness, after the couple visited mates Steven Robinson and his partner, Lee-Anne Musgrave, on a property at Noonamah, about 50km south of Darwin.
Ansell fired six shots at their caravan on Kentish Rd.
Resident David Hobden jumped in his truck, armed with his double-barrel shotty, and went to investigate the shootings. He lost an eye when Ansell put a bullet through the windscreen of his truck.
He ran to alert his neighbour, Brian Williams, who “waxed wrath” at the state of his mate’s face and grabbed a baseball bat.
He charged at Ansell, who was trying to steal Mr Hobden’s truck.
“I smacked him straight down the forehead, and that’s when he blew my hand off,” Mr Williams told police.
“He was going on about stealing his children, and Freemasons, and being a baby killer … oh, just, he was mad, mate.”
Ansell fired shots at the Williams‘ house.
Then he ran away, his rifle in one hand and Mr Hobden‘s shotgun in the other.
Ms Hewson disappeared before the police shootout. Some feared she had committed suicide.
About 11pm, Territory Response Group sent two troop carriers with six cops in each to set up a command post. They manned the north roadblock.
Adelaide River police station boss Sgt Huitson and his second-in-charge, Sen-Const O’Brien, guarded the south cordon – at the corner of Old Bynoe Rd – with a pistol each, a 12-gauge shotgun and standard police issue .308 rifle.
About 10.30am the next day, a removals worker named Jonathan Anthonysz was leaning on the cop car, chatting to the officers when a bullet blew a hole “the size of a baseball” in his pelvis.
He was flung forward, screaming, on to the ground.
Mr Anthonysz’s colleague – David Hobden‘s brother, Anthony – dragged him out of view as Snr-Const. O’Brien covered them.
The shots were coming from light scrub behind a roadside water pipe.
The cunning fugitive had sneaked through the bush and was hidden by dappled tree shadows.
In his statement, Snr-Const O’Brien said: “I heard Glen shout out, ‘Get on the ground’.
I swung round to look over the boot of the car with my Glock drawn …
“I saw my shots hit the ground close to where (Ansell) was,” he said.
Sgt Huitson called TRG for help and grabbed a 12-gauge shotgun.
He fired a shot through the windows of the police car and two shots over the roof.
But a bullet from Ansell‘s .30-30 lever-action rifle ricocheted off the top of the metal door and struck him in the abdomen.
His bulletproof vest hadn’t been properly fastened. The bullet tore through a velcro strap that should have been covered by a Kevlar panel.
Sgt Huitson fell, landing on top of the shotgun.
Snr-Const O’Brien, who wasn’t wearing a vest, dodged a bullet and rolled his bleeding colleague off the shotgun, reloaded it and returned fire.
“I realised unless TRG arrived I could run out of ammunition, in which case I would have to retreat with the others,” he said.
“I loaded two more rounds, looked up and saw the gunman wriggling forward.
“I heard a sound like a match being struck just past the right side of my head.”
Then the TRG troop carriers came hurtling down the highway.
The first driver hit the brakes and swerved as he heard gun fire – the 4WD rolled when the second car crashed into it, unable to stop in time.
Ansell got up on one knee and began lining up the cops, who were crawling out of the vehicle.
Snr-Const O’Brien got a clear shot.
The autopsy showed 33 bullet wounds and grazes to Ansell‘s body.
Two were fatal. One shot had ripped through his aorta.
He fell face down in the dirt.
Sgt Huitson was declared dead after being rushed to Royal Darwin Hospital.
Snr-Const O’Brien was scrutinised and cleared of any wrongdoing after a rigorous police investigation.
His actions were praised as “simply outstanding” when Magistrate Wallace handed down his coronial findings in September 2000.
“If he felt any fear, it seems to have been submerged by his concern for his wounded colleague and others,” he said. “There can be little doubt his bravery prevented further loss of life.”
Ms Hewson handed herself in to Queensland police four days later.
Evidence that Ansell clung to the back of a road train and escaped the roadblocks fuelled a question that would never be answered – why would a skilled bushman give up his ticket to freedom and return to gun down police when he could have slipped away?
IT was no secret the 44-year-old buffalo hunter and grazier was bitter.
Writer Robert Milliken, who spent time with Ansell while working on projects in the NT, said Ansell never saw a penny for the myth surrounding his tangled life, despite being the inspiration for the main character in Crocodile Dundee, which propelled actor Paul Hogan to fame in 1986.
Ansell blamed his troubles on a Federal Government program to wipe out wild buffalo, his livelihood, to eradicate tuberculosis from the cattle industry. He had told reporters he was living on unemployment benefits and “bush tucker”.
Magistrate Wallace heard Ansell believed police and the government were against him.
He had moved to the Territory aged 15 from the small town of Murgon, 270km north of Brisbane, in country Queensland.
The ordeal that brought him fame happened when he took a fishing trip in a motorboat on the Victoria River in May 1977.
When the boat sank, he jumped in a dinghy and salvaged his two eight-week-old bull terriers, a rifle, a knife, some canned food and bedding. The tinny drifted out to sea, washing up on a small island at the mouth of the Fitzmaurice River.
He slept in the fork of a tree, out of reach of crocodiles, at night, but shared the branches with a brown tree snake.
Ansell never counted on being rescued. He roamed for seven weeks before stumbling on two Aboriginal stockmen and their boss.
But he kept the adventure under his hat – fearing his recklessness would upset his mother – until media got hold of the yarn.
Dubbed the “modern day Robinson Crusoe”, Ansell said: “I think if you come through in one piece, then nothing else really matters.
“It’s like going out to shoot a kangaroo.
“You don’t come back and say you missed by half an inch – you either got him or you didn’t.”
Mr Milliken described Ansell as “strikingly handsome with blond hair, blue eyes and bare feet” when he met him in 1988. It was the year Ansell was named Territorian of the Year for his role in putting the Top End on the map.
At the time, he lived with his wife, Joanne van Os, and their two small sons on their buffalo farm at Melaleuca, between Darwin and Kakadu.
“He was charming,” Mr Milliken said.
“He seems never to have worn shoes, even when travelling on aircraft and staying in city hotels at the height of his fame.
“The press went mad over his story and no one seemed to mind if the details grew ever more incredible.
“A hero had been born.”
He said Ansell once told British TV personality Michael Parkinson he preferred to sleep on the floor of his five-star Sydney hotel in his swag rather than in the kingsize bed.
Ansell’s Parkinson interview sparked the interest of Hogan and led to the creation of Mick “Crocodile” Dundee.
But the fame took its toll on Ansell’s personal life. His marriage disintegrated.
In 1992, he was convicted of cattle rustling and assaulting the owner of a cattle station in Arnhem Land.
Police raided Melaleuca. He eventually lost the property.
For more than a year before his death, Ansell had been living with Ms Hewson, a former tour guide, on a billabong at the Aboriginal outstation Urapunga, on the Roper River, about 480km south of Darwin.
He was initiated as a white member of local Aboriginal clan and got on well with the Ngukkur community. But the spiral into a drug-induced psychosis continued as Ansell smoked cannabis and injected amphetamineswith vengeance.
“I didn’t know Ansell really well, but I’d met him a few times,” long-time Territorian and former reporter Chips Mackinolty said.
“He was tough as nails, the sort of person that could do what he said he did, and did do it when he was working as a stockman, as a wrangler and that stuff.
“He was an extraordinary person at that level, but it ended up in tears.”
Mr Mackinolty was heading to Katherine and had been allowed through the roadblock earlier on the day the killing happened.
“It was one of those ‘goose steps on your own grave’ sort of feelings – you were very close to what ended up being a very awful thing.
“It’s always sad when the threat of poverty and frustrated ambition get mixed up and send people off the edge, big time,” Mr Mackinolty said.
“I was completely shocked, as were a lot of people who knew him in the earlier years.”
In his coronial ruling, Magistrate Wallace said the contrast between the “original Crocodile Dundee who appeared on television” and the emaciated drug addict – who weighed just 53kg when he opened fire on police – could hardly be more marked.
“His drug abuse rendered his mind so addled he believed fantasies that a child would dismiss with contempt,” he said.
“His pointless and destructive actions caused immediate agony and suffering to the men he wounded.”
The infamous rampage means Ansell is remembered in Darwin not as a knockabout bushman, but as the man who murdered a heroic cop.
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Sergeant Glen Huitson
Posted on
Along the side of the Stuart Highway, heading to Batchelor and points south, there’s a turnoff at Old Bynoe Road. On this corner there’s a simple cross like far too many you see on Australian roads. This one is the same in that it marks the point where a loved one lost his or her life. The ever-present, neatly-arrayed booze bottles testify to the fact that his friends have not forgotten him.
However this site is also different. It doesn’t mark a road fatality, but rather the death of a police officer on duty, Sergeant Glen Anthony Huitson, killed protecting the community from a man who had gone on an overnight shooting spree. The further tragedy is that this death, left a young widow and two little children who will never know their father: the risks that police face daily in doing their duty.
The Policeman from the bush
By all accounts Glen Huitson was a quietly impressive young man and an excellent policeman who was soon to receive the Police Valour medal, given posthumously to his wife, Lisa. Huitson had worked out bush and was well respected by the communities he’d worked in. Stationed at Adelaide River at the time of the shooting, Huitson is also remembered by a memorial there.
Across the new railway track on the Old Bynoe Road, there’s a different kind of memorial from the simple cross with beer bottles. It’s the official memorial in Glen Huitson Park. It has an impressively large stone brought from a distance and plaques to honour the man and the police officer.
Roadside memorial stone
I recognise that another family lost a person they’d loved that day. No doubt as they pass Huitson’s memorial they think of their own loved one. However for me this is about the loss of a man doing his duty. As you go about your routines today, please remember all those police officers who daily risk their lives to protect us.
I leave you with Glen Huitson’s eulogy, testifying to his concern for others and his true community spirit. Rest in Peace, Sergeant Glen Huitson, you did your duty well.
On the Darwin Esplanade, near the Cenotaph, there’s is a memorial to all Northern Territory Police and Emergency Services workers who gave their lives in service to the community.
4 thoughts on “Sergeant Glen Huitson”
What a wonderful tribute …thank you for bringing us this introduction to a man without whom the world is a poorer place.
Thanks Chris. It happened a couple of years after we got here and was a great tragedy. I really feel for his family and the loss of a good man.
I stumbled across this post today… For some reason Glen came to my mind, and I did a search. Maybe this all came about as I saw a photo of his gorgeous sister and his 2 beautiful children.
Glen was a friend and I know his family well. He was a great man and it was an extremely sad day the day he left this life.
hi Vicki, sorry I hadn’t realised I’d omitted to reply. Thanks for sharing…it was indeed a tragic day for all concerned…we have a connection through the other officer that day though we didn’t know him at the time.
IT was 15 years on Sunday since one of NT Police’s darkest days.
On August 3, 1999 Brevet Sergeant Glen Anthony Huitson was manning a roadblock on the Stuart Highway at Livingstone when he was shot and killed by “Crocodile Dundee” Rod Ansell.
Ansell was then hit with fatal return fire by Sgt Huitson’s partner, Senior Constable Jamie O’Brien.
He was the first policeman to be murdered on duty in the Territory for 47 years, and to this date he remains the last.
Sgt Huitson’s wife Lisa said the anniversary was always emotional.
“But he’s always with us and it’s good to see his colleagues and friends return,” she said.
“It’s nice to come back.”
The couple’s children Joe and Ruby were just 2 and 10 months old when their father was killed.
Police Commissioner John McRoberts said the memorial was a sobering reminder of the dangers of policing.
“It’s really good to pay our respects to a man who died doing what he loved and wanted to do – which was serve and protect,” he said.
Sgt Huitson joined the NT Police in January 1987. He served in both Southern and Northern districts.
During his service, he received a Commendation from the Commissioner of Police in March 1994 when he attended a disturbance at a community near Alice Springs. He disarmed a drunk armed with a knife and star picket, and was threatening another person with a billy of boiling water.
Then in February of 1999 in Litchfield Park, he disarmed an armed man who was threatening the driver and passengers of a bus. He received a Valour Award over this incident.
For the incident which cost him his life, he was awarded the Australia Bravery Medal, and a bar to his Valour Medal.
Served: From 24 April 1929 to 3 January 1931 = 1+ years Service
Awards: No find on It’s An Honour
Born: ? ? 1908
Died: 3 January 1931
Age: 23
Cause: Shot – Murdered at Bondi Junction
Funeral date: 5 January 1931
Funeral location: Rookwood Cemetery
Buried: Buried in Rookwood Cemetery ( side by side with Norman Thomas ALLEN )
Zone: C Section: 09 Grave 4211
DOUBLE POLICE MURDER
Memorial location:
Ernest ANDREWS touch plate at the National Police Wall of Remembrance, Canberra
Ernest IS mentioned on the Police Wall of Remembrance
Constable Norman Thomas Allen ( 1931 )
Constable Ernest Andrews ( 1931 )
Constable Allen was shot in the street at Bondi Junction while attempting to detain an armed, deranged man named Kennedy who had earlier had an altercation with a local shopkeeper. The constable had been directing traffic and when informed of the dispute he found and confronted the offender. As he approached Kennedy from behind, the man spun around and shot Constable Allenin the chest at point blank range. He then shot the constable twice more in the heart. At this time Constable Andrews – unarmed, off duty and heading for the beach – passed by in a tram and saw a crowd gathered around the body of Constable Allen. Alighting from the tram he joined in the pursuit of Kennedy who managed to reach his home in nearby Lawson Street.
On arriving and finding the front door locked Constable Andrews went to the rear of the dwelling and burst through the back door. Unfortunately Kennedy was waiting with rifle raised and as Andrews lunged at him he shot him twice in the chest. He then took a knife and stabbed the constable in the throat. Sergeant Seery and Constable Johnson from Waverley Police then arrived and began to smash their way in through the front door. Although fired at by Kennedy, Constable Johnson returned fire, hitting Kennedy in the chest. Seery and Johnson then smashed their way in and found the offender in a bedroom bleeding to death. He died that night.
In the aftermath of the murders, the Brisbane Courier dated 5 January, 1931 published a complete account of the entire incident, and concluded with the following.
COMMISSIONER PRAISES MURDERED POLICE.
Both murdered constables were highly efficient and popular officers. Allen leaves a widow and young child. He lived in New Street, Bondi. Constable Andrews was single, his only relative in Australia being a sister, Mrs Clark. The men will be buried tomorrow with full police honours. The Commissioner of Police Mr. Childs, in an appreciation, said “I wish to pay a tribute to the manner in which both these young men carried out their duty according to the best traditions of the service. They saw their duty before them, and did not hesitate a moment in the execution of it. Although I would not make any distinction between them I cannot help referring to the action of Constable Andrews, who, though unarmed, rushed in to effect the arrest of a man who had already shot Constable Allen. “
Constable Norman Thomas ALLEN was born in 1901, joined the New South Wales Police Force on 14 May, 1926 and shortly thereafter resigned. He rejoined on 26 September, 1928. At the time of his death he was stationed at Waverley.
Constable Ernest ANDREWS was born in 1908 and joined the New South Wales Police Force on 24 April, 1929. At the time of his death he was stationed at George Street North Police Station.
Funeral procession through Railway Square in 5 January 1931 for two police constables, Allen and Andrews, killed in the line of duty. Source: Sydney Mail newspaper 7 January 1931
The Sydney Morning Herald
Tuesday 6 January 1931 page 10 of 14
DEAD POLICEMEN.
Impressive Scenes at Funeral.
THOUSANDS PAY TRIBUTE.
The State paid homage yesterday to the two policemen, Constable Norman Thomas Allen and Constable Ernest Andrews who met their death at the hands of a madman at Bondi Junction on Saturday. There were mourners from almost every part of New South Wales.
Many thousands lined the route as the funeral cortege moved from Wood Coffill’s funeral parlours George-street to the mortuary station; the mortuary platform was thronged when the funeral train moved off to Rookwood and thousands had assembled in the cemetery.
The scene in the vicinity of Wood Coffill’s funeral parlours is likely to be remembered by the thousands of people who thronged the streets leading into Railway-square. Early in the morning bearers of wreaths and floral tributes passed through the doors to deposit their tokens of sympathy. At the approach of noon people began to assemble on the footpath and many entered the chapel to view the coffins. The near relatives arrived at 1 o’clock and the chapel was cleared while Constable Allen’s widow and her mother approached the silver mounted caskets which rested on trestles side by side. An affecting scene followed. Then the simple Church of England burial service was conducted by the Rev Frederick Riley and the coffins were borne to the waiting hearses.
MUFFLED DRUMS
The scene was unforgettable. A solid mass of people crowded the thoroughfares. Presently the mounted troopers urged their restive horses forward and with the deep roll of muffled drums the cortege moved off. Thousands of hats were removed.
Handel’s Dead March in “Saul” was played by the Police Band. Behind the band came a contingent of foot police under the direction of Superintendent Leary. Two hundred men drawn from the various stations, marched behind. Then came the hearses, the wreath-laden carriages, and the chief mourners, Firemen, the sun glinting on brightly-polished helmets, were represented by over 40 uniformed officers and men. At the end of the slow-moving procession came numbers of retired men, friends of the dead officers, and business people from the eastern suburbs.
Along the route to the mortuary thousands stood bareheaded as the cortege passed. At the mortuary gates another huge crowd paid tribute to the dead men.
Among those who marched in addition to the police and firemen, were employees of motor bus companies in the eastern suburbs.
“THEY SAW THEIR DUTY.”
A most affecting scene at the graveside in the Church of England section of the Rookwood Cemetery was the playing by the police band of the hymns “Lead Kindly Light” and “Abide With Me.” The remains were buried side by side.
“Let men’s opinions be what they may,” said the Rev. Frederick Riley in an address at the graveside, ” we should be doing violence to the most sacred emotions of human life if we were to allow our brethren to depart without a word of farewell. We are met here today to pay honour to the memory of two men who were comrades of yours men whom we all respected and loved. Let us remember that these two men died in the carrying out of their duty. They served their King and country as men and soldiers who fall for their King on the battlefield. They saw their duty and the fear of death could not deter them. They have not created a new tradition for the traditions of the police force of New South Wales are amongst the highest in the world already, but these two men have added a new lustre to the traditions of your past. These two young men Norman Thomas Allen and Ernest Andrews, died in the execution of their duty. There is no higher glory to which a man can aspire. We pray to God that those who have been so suddenly bereaved may share the comfort which we know these two brave men are experiencing in the nearer presence of God.”
MAGISTRATE’S TRIBUTE
At the Burwood Police Court yesterday Mr. G. R. Williams, S.M. commented on the bravery of the two constables. They acted nobly and upheld the traditions of the force,” he said.
PALL BEARERS AND MOURNERS.
The pall bearers were.- For late Constable Allen: Constables Tomkins, Martin, Moore, Hudson, Steele and White. For late Constable Andrews: Constables Booth, Kimber, Fraser, O’Neill, Morgan, and Wright.
The principal mourners were Relatives of the late Constable Allen: Mrs Allen (widow), Mrs Prankish (mother-in-law), Mr and Mrs N. Frankish (brother In law and sister in law), Mr and Mrs Sutcliffe (uncle and aunt) Mrs Lamb, Mrs Hourigan, and Mrs Cummings (aunts) and Mr Rowland Allen (cousin).
Relatives of the late Constable Andrews: Mr and Mrs Edward Clarke (sister and brother in law).
The Government was represented by Mr Gosling (Chief Secretary) and Mr McKell (Minister for local Government). Police representatives in addition to the non commissioned officers and men who marched were Mr W H Childs (Commissioner) Superintendents Leary, Mackay and Linegar, Inspectors Winter, Weir, Bennetts, McCauley, Woodrow, Lynch, Duffell, Roberts, McMaster, O’Brien, Chaseling, Anderson, White, Long, Roser, Scott, Michaelis, Robson, Allen, Farley and Fowler.
Retired members of the police force who attended were ex-Commissioner James Mitchell, ex-Superintendents Roche, Cook, McIntosh, Sinclair, Thom, Drew and Park, ex Inspectors Fullerton, W J Jones (also representing the Navy and Army Veterans Association) Fraser, Tracey, Bolton, Smith, Fewster, Doran, Mankletow, Stutchbury, Briggs, Ewen, Dunn, O’Dea and Robertson, ex-Sergeants McDonald, T. Dobson, Payne, A. Smith, Taylor, J. Salmon, J. Loomes, R. C. Harper, Bath and Butcher, ex-Constables Swan and Dixon.
The Board of Fire Commissioners of New South Wales was represented by Mr T J Smith, M.L.C. (president) Mr J McNamara (Commissioner), and Mr H M Webb (secretary and executive officer).
Mr Nance chief officer New South Wales Fire Brigades was present and 38 men marched under Mr Grimmond (deputy chief officer). Inspector Neeve, District Officer McLachlan, and Station Officers Arthur, Neville, Parkes, McCarthy, Rust, Currier and Sclater.
Others who attended were:- Judge Sheridan, Mir George Cann, ex M.L.A., Mr J Herlihy ( Under-Secretary for Lands) representatives of the Prisons Department including Mr Seery (superintendent of the Long Bay Penitentiary) Mr T.W. Irish (Assistant Under Secretary for Lands) Mr H. B. Mathews, (Surveyor General Department of Lands).
Mr N. W. Bond (representing the head office Bank, of New South Wales) representatives of ambulance divisions, Mr. and Mrs. C. R. Law, Mr. A. L. Parker (representing Superintendent O. H. Parker, of Goulburn) Mr Foster Doolan (vice president Police Association), Mr B Fortescue (secretary Police Association), Mr C T Thackeray (Police Association staff), Mr F M Jackson (representing Mr F C Hackett of Merriwa), Mr W T Missingham,
M.L.A., Mr A J Pollack, M.L.A., Mr W P Monaghan (Waverley Cemetery bus service), Mr W M Niland Mrs A Shuttleworth, Mr H L Harnett (representing Mr F M Burke, Speaker of the Legislative Assembly), Mr W E Clapin (representing Sir John Peden, President of the Legislative Council), Alderman David Hunter (Mayor of Waverley), Mr T J Thompson (Deputy Town Clerk of Waverley), Mr and Mrs A Williams, Miss Williams, Miss Beryl Williams, Miss Brady, Mr and Mrs McMorland, ex Warder Charles Stone, ex Warder Little and a number of eastern suburbs business people.
The wreaths Included those from the mother and other relatives of the late Constable Allen, relatives of the late Constable Andrews, the New South Wales Police Commissioned Officers Association, comrades of No 2 Division, Redfern Police, New South Wales Police Association, members of the Railway Detective Office, officers, detectives, and staff of the C.I.B., No 3 Police, comrades of No. 10 Division, cyclists and drivers of police headquarters, officers and men of Circular Quay Fire Station, comrades at No. 4 Station, police at No 7 Station, “police pals at Bondi Junction.” end eastern suburbs bus drivers and conductors.
Awards: Meritorious Unit Citation for work in East Timor.
Commendation for efforts in disarming a male carrying a replica pistol in Honiara Court.
Born: ?
Died on: Wednesday 22 December 2004
Cause: Shot – Murdered
whilst deployed on official duties at Honiara, Solomon Islands
Age: 26
Funeral date: Thursday 30 December 2004
Funeral location: ANZAC Memorial Chapel,
Royal Military College, Duntroon, ACT
Buried at: Cremated
Memorial: The main street of a new AFP training village in Canberra was named Adam Dunning Drive in his memory.
Adam DUNNING
Adam IS mentioned on the Police Wall of Remembrance
Tears for the fallen as Adam comes home
By Craig Skehan and Aban Contractor December 24, 2004
AFP officers farewell their mate Adam Dunning after loading his coffin into a RAAF jet at Honiara Domestic Airport. Photo: Andy Zakeli
They had slow-marched their comrade’s casket to the plane that would take him home.
Their backs were straight, but the emotions were too much: tears tumbled down the cheeks of the Australian Federal Police pallbearers as they did Adam Dunning this last honour.
Then, once his body was stowed in the hold of the RAAF jet on the tarmac in Honiara, his mates made a last gesture of solidarity with the colleague they were farewelling forever – forming a circle, heads bowed, arms locked around each other’s shoulders.
Adam Dunning, the 26-year-old AFP protective service officer who was killed by a sniper in the early hours of Wednesday morning, was accompanied home by the Minister for Justice, Chris Ellison, and the Opposition’s home affairs spokesman, Robert McClelland, but at Fairbairn air base in Canberra, where the RAAF 737 touched down just before 6pm, it was Mr Dunning’s family and friends – his parents, Michael and Christine, his sisters, Sarah and Emma, and his girlfriend, Elise Wiscombe – who formed the guard of honour.
Standing in two straight lines, they faced the plane.
With the Australian Federal Police Commissioner, Mick Keelty, standing watch nearby, Mr Dunning’s parents held their heads high, and his sisters and Ms Wiscombe quietly sobbed as eight AFP pallbearers bore his flag-draped casket from the plane. His parents held hands and seemed to stand even straighter as their only son was placed in the hearse that would take him to the mortuary.
In the Solomons, police are questioning a taxi driver about several suspects in the murder. A Solomon Islands police source told the Herald that the taxi – seen near the murder scene with several passengers before the shooting – had been seized.
On a narrow, potholed road on the outskirts of the Solomons capital, Honiara, locals offered heartfelt apologies for the shooting.
“I am so very sorry,” said one young man. “He came here to help us.”
By the roadside at Zion Junction, investigating officers had cut the long grass to help search for clues to the identity of the person who, in darkness shortly after 3am on Wednesday, shot Mr Dunning while he was on patrol in a Toyota Land Cruiser.
Zion Junction does not have a particularly dangerous reputation. Rather, locals said, other settlements further along the same ridge were known for trouble, ranging from extortion to payback shootings.
Moffat Suiga, a community elder who was awakened by the shots that killed Mr Dunning, said he and others were at a loss to explain the murder.
A middle-aged businessman said the overwhelming majority of Solomon Islanders wanted to see those responsible put in jail. He said it would be a good thing if the Australian-led intervention force remained for the next 40 years.
At a commemoration service earlier in Honiara, Mr Keelty said Mr Dunning had “died for peace”.
The Solomon Islands Prime Minister, Sir Allan Kemakeza, said the young man had been helping the country overcome ethnic strife and crime. “We will not forget him,” he said.
A police funeral will be held for Mr Dunning on a day to be announced.
AFP officers farewell their mate Adam Dunning after loading his coffin into a RAAF jet at Honiara Domestic Airport.
Photo: Andy Zakeli
Australian Protective Services officers salute the coffin in a guard of honour at Honiara Domestic Airport before Adam Dunning’s coffin was flown back to Australia.
Photo: Andy Zakeli
Australian Protective Services officer Robert Turnbull sheds a tear at the official wake in the compund before Adam Dunning’s coffin flew back to Australia.
Photo: Andy Zakeli
The RAAF jet carrying Adam Dunning’s body touches down.
Photo: Andrew Taylor
Adam Dunning’s coffin is loaded from the aircraft to a hearse at the RAAF Base at Fairbairn.
Photo: Andrew Tayl
Senior officers and other dignatories, along with family members, watch Adam Dunning’s coffin being loaded from the aircraft to a hearse at the RAAF Base at Fairbairn in Canberra.
Photo: Andrew Taylor
The girlfriend of Adam Dunning, Elise Wiscombe (far left), cries as police salute the farewell of the coffin.
Photo: Andrew Taylor
Friends of Adam Dunning after the hearse had left the tarmac.
Photo: Andrew Taylor
Memorial Tribute to Adam DUNNING, 10 years on. 22 December 2014, National Police Wall of Remembrance, Canberra.
Excellent turnout at NPM this morning for Adam and his family. RIP and we remember.
Peacekeeper killed ADG’s funeral brings Air Force and police together
By FLGOFF Fiona Peacock
The funeral of LAC Adam Dunning, a member of the PAF and Air Force Active Reserve.
LAC Adam Dunning.
LEADING Aircraftman Adam Dunning, an ADG with No. 28 (City of Canberra) Squadron and former member of No. 2 Air Field Defence Squadron, was killed in December last year while on operational duty with the Australian Federal Police as part of the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands (RAMSI).
In the early hours of December 22, LAC Dunning and an Australian Protective Service colleague were on a routine vehicle patrol in Honiara, protecting the Prime Minister’s and Governor General’s residences.
A concealed gunman shot at the vehicle, fatally wounding LAC Dunning, who was 26.
He deployed to the Solomons in October and, after only six weeks there, was awarded a commendation for disarming a man in front of the Magistrates Court.
At LAC Dunning’s funeral, members of 28SQN played a part in recognising his Air Force service. The squadron’s honorary air commodore, Air Commodore Justice Terence Higgins, represented 28SQN among the official party of Service chiefs.
Members of the Air Field Defence Wing provided the firing party and the guard of honour for receiving VIPs. The RAAF Ensign was carried by Pilot Officer Shane McGaughey and was escorted by Flight Sergeant John Forth.
Two close friends of LAC Dunning, Leading Aircraftmen Tim Gresham and David Pauli, were members of the bearer party. The President of 28SQN Association, Steve Williams, represented former 28SQN members. 28SQN members joined AFP personnel to form a guard of honour.
AFP Commissioner Mick Keelty praised No. 34 Squadron for the way it handled bringing LAC Dunning’s body back to Australia.
By Misha Schubert
Political correspondent
Canberra December 31, 2004
They stood side by side. Two long lines of blue uniforms facing each other along the tree-lined road. Like a slow Mexican wave, each snapped to attention and saluted as the body of one of their own passed by.
Adam Dunning, murdered by a sniper while on patrol in the Solomons early last week, had begun the last leg of his journey home.
Earlier, these men and women of the Australian Federal Police and the Royal Australian Air Force had wept openly as Mr Dunning was farewelled with full police and military honours in the Duntroon chapel. “He was a great man,” said his federal police mate Pat Castle.
The nation’s military chiefs turned out to pay tribute, as did Prime Minister John Howard, Governor-General Michael Jeffery and senior cabinet ministers.
But this ritual belonged to those who knew and loved Adam Dunning.
His mother, Christine, read from a tribute that she and her husband, Mike, had written to their son in February. They had praised his courage, sensitivity and mettle.
His partner, Elise, who had brought red roses for the man she had loved, said he was her greatest friend. “He was my strength, my inspiration, my love.”
Peacekeeper Beau Tennant, who was with Mr Dunning the night before he died, broke down as he recalled his friend’s generosity.
“Before he left me, his last words were: ‘Are you right for money mate?’ That was the kind of bloke he was,” he said.
Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty said Mr Dunning would live on in the memories of grateful Solomon Islanders.
“Adam Dunning died for peace and law and order. His work and his death will always be remembered by his colleagues,” he told mourners.
The federal police hope to build a memorial to Mr Dunning at their new training centre for overseas police peacekeepers.
Mr Dunning also served with RAAF in Timor before joining the AFP.
Police believe his murder and another attack on police on October 21 were carried out by three former members of the Malaitan Eagle Force militia.
They have charged two men – John Ome and Philip Kwaimani – over the attacks and are hunting James Tatau, who Mr Keelty said was present at both events and had access to a cache of weapons.
Police believe the trio were working on their own, with no sign of any broader uprising against the peacekeeping effort.
It fell to Emma, who had adored her older brother, to claim his service medals and caps from the flag-shrouded coffin and hand them to her grieving parents.
As his police mates carried Mr Dunning’s coffin from the chapel into the sunlight, drummers and bagpipers ushered him on his way. A police motorcade led the cortege through Canberra’s streets to a private service and cremation.
A plane carrying the body of murdered Australian peacekeeper Adam Dunning has landed in his home town of Canberra.
The 26-year-old Australian Protective Services officer was shot twice in the back by a sniper while serving as part of a peacekeeping mission in the Solomon Islands yesterday morning.
Members of Mr Dunning’s family, and his colleagues were on hand to formally receive his body.
Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty returned from the Solomon Islands about half an hour before the plane bearing Officer Dunning’s body landed.
He was among those waiting for Justice Minister Chris Ellison and Labor’s homeland security spokesman Robert McClelland, who accompanied the body on the flight back to Canberra.
Commissioner Keelty, Senator Ellison, Mr McClelland and AFP officers formed a guard of honour before the coffin was removed from the plane.
Family members, including Officer Dunning’s parents Mike and Christine, and girlfriend Elise Wiscombe, stood arm in arm watching proceedings.
A guard of honour, carrying Officer Dunning’s hat, led the flag-draped coffin to the hearse.
Eight pall bearers stood tall under the weight, as Officer Dunning’s police colleagues watched on.
A cavalcade of AFP motorcycles is waiting to lead the hearse to Canberra’s mortuary.
A full police funeral will be held for Officer Dunning on a day to be announced.
Officer Dunning’s parents took the time to thank those who attended the short ceremony before the hearse headed for Kingston mortuary under police escort.
Senator Ellison later said the Solomons people were behind RAMSI and Australia’s efforts to bring law and order to the country.
He said some adjustments might be made to the conduct of night patrols but any final decision would depend on recommendations from the AFP.
He denied the Government had too quickly reduced the AFP’s military support in the Solomons.
“We’ve made fantastic progress in the Solomons and we never underestimated the danger that our people faced,” he told ABC television
By Craig Skehan and Cynthia Banham December 23, 2004
Australia is rushing 100 extra troops to the Solomon Islands in defiant reaction to the sniper murder of Adam Dunning, the nation’s first peacekeeper to be killed by hostile fire.
The murder highlights the perils of the new interventionist role in the Pacific islands, but the Prime Minister, John Howard, vowed the mission to the Solomons would go on “undeterred, unrestrained, unaffected by what’s happened”.
“We won’t be cowed by this,” the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, added.
Mr Dunning, a 26-year-old Australian Protective Service officer from Canberra who had dodged bullets while serving in East Timor, was shot twice in the back while on a patrol in a four-wheel drives Toyota Land Cruiser in the capital, Honiara, at 3.10am on Wednesday. The bullets were among six shots fired rapidly from a high-powered military rifle.
“It looks as though the person who fired it had training in the use of such firearms,” a Solomon Islands official said.
Members of former ethnic militias – who had formed gangs and reduced the country to anarchy – are now being questioned. Australian investigators say the involvement of former Solomon Islands police officers, or an individual officer, cannot be ruled out.
At his Canberra home, Mr Dunning’s father, Michael, was distraught as he spoke of his son’s honourable death.
“It is sad as he cared for the [Solomons] people so much and was doing something really good on their behalf,” Mr Dunning told the Herald. “He always has been a decent person, tough and soft-hearted at the same time. He was totally honourable and very stubborn – nobody could make him do anything that he did not think was right. He was a credit to us.”
Adam Dunning had been planning a future with his 22-year-old girlfriend, Elise Wiscombe, on his return home next month. “I’m very, very proud of what he’s done over there,” she said. “He’s one of the greatest people I’ve ever met.”
Mr Dunning was part of the regional intervention force which has been seeking to stem ethnic and criminal violence in the Solomons since July last year.
A rapid-response, 100-member infantry company from the First Royal Australian Regiment was to leave Townsville on Thursday for the Solomons, just a day after the murder. The Defence Minister, Robert Hill, said: “This is to send a clear message to the thugs … that we will not tolerate the murder of our police officers.”
A meeting of departmental secretaries in Canberra recommended extra forces to support the 160 defence force personnel already there. Those troops are backing the 147 Australian Federal Police members who are serving in the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands (RAMSI) – about 95 of them from the Australian Protective Service, which comes under the federal police. The Justice Minister, Chris Ellison, and the Federal Police Commissioner, Mick Keelty, flew to Honiara on Wednesday night. Australian forensic experts also flew in.
Mr Keelty said: “Over 4000 arrests have been made and over 3700 weapons have been seized [since the intervention began]. Clearly this indicates that there are some in the community in the Solomon Islands who are not happy about RAMSI’s presence.”
He said the hot tropical climate – and the large number of weapons already recovered – were among the reasons body armour had not been used for regular patrols. However, this is now under review.
Mr Keelty called Mr Dunning “a brave and courageous young Australian” and said his killing emphasised “the danger that our people face”.
The Solomons Prime Minister, Sir Allan Kemakeza, described the killing as barbaric and cowardly.
Mr Dunning’s partner on patrol, who had been driving, tried to resuscitate him.
The murder scene, on the outskirts of Honiara, was close to two settlements which are known to be frequented by former ethnic militiaman who formed criminal gangs.
The Australian police contingent has been at the forefront of efforts to clean up local police and officers have been charged with offences from corruption to assault and robbery. A number of local politicians are either under investigation or already facing various charges.
Mr Keelty said the ammunition used indicated the murder weapon was an SLR or possibly an AK-47. This was consistent with some of the weapons used before the arrival of the intervention force. The looting of many SLRs and other military-style weapons from Solomons police armouries had fuelled the five years of unrest that prompted the intervention of the Australian-led force.
There was a major riot at the Central Prison in Honiara this year, when inmates threw rocks at Australian personnel and painted anti-Australian slogans. Two months ago, an intervention force vehicle patrol was fired on.
Protective Service Officers were deployed along with other Australian law enforcement officers in the Solomon Islands as part of RAMSI. The peacekeeping force suffered their first casualty on 22 December 2004 when PSO1 Adam Dunning was shot and killed while deployed on official duties in the Solomon Islands. Two former members of a local militia were charged but acquitted of Dunning’s murder.[5] Officer Dunning was buried with full police honours.
The main street of a new AFP training village in Canberra was named Adam Dunning Drive in his memory.[6] The $2.8 million training facility at Mount Majura just outside Canberra, has been designed to replicate situations in regional countries to which personnel might be assigned.
The main street of a new training village for Australian Federal Police and other personnel being sent overseas has been named after murdered peacekeeper Adam Dunning.
The $2.8 million training facility at Majura, just outside Canberra, has been designed to replicate situations in regional countries to which personnel might be assigned.
Prime Minister John Howard officially opened the facility on Thursday in the presence of police chiefs from across the country as well as from several regional nations.
Australian Protective Service officer Mr Dunning, 26, was fatally shot twice in the back while on night patrol in the Solomon Islands capital of Honiara in December.
He was serving as part of the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomons.
His parents attended the opening of the village, through the centre of which runs a road now named Adam Dunning Drive.
“The loss of Adam Dunning signified that this is very dangerous work,” Justice Minister Senator Chris Ellison said.
“That was the ultimate sacrifice paid in the course of his duties.”
Mr Howard said the new facility reflected the new security reality for Australia and its region.
“Events of the last five years have totally transformed both the demands and the expectations of the Australian community on the Australian Federal Police,” he told the gathering.
“In that five-year period we have seen the threatening arrival of international terrorism.
“We’ve (also) seen the emergence of an ongoing need on the part of this country, in cooperation with our friends in the Pacific region, to involve ourselves in the restoration of conditions of law and order and cooperation with police services and governments of those countries.”
The training village, to be used by a range of emergency services personnel as well as police, recreates the environment that police experience when on overseas missions.
Designed to reflect the streetscape of a small overseas township, it enables true-to-life scenario training which helps to prepare police for unknown and sometimes dangerous challenges.
It includes 18 buildings and structures including a corner store, a town hall, a police station, a school, a pub, a marketplace and even a cemetery, reflecting the fact that police are sometimes required to perform exhumations in the course of their work.
The spokesman said 124 personnel had already trained at the complex which was completed in March.
[alert_red]Stephen is NOT mentioned on the Police Wall of Remembrance[/alert_red]
Richard Baxter, FB – Support Aussie Cops, on 23 December 2011, recalls a work mate by the name of Stephen NAYLOR being attached to Burwood ( NSW ) being murdered about 1979.
Richard John HAZEL
| 23/10/2015
Richard John HAZEL
aka Rick
New South Wales Police Force
Regd. # ?
Rank: Detective
Stations: Redfern ( about 1985 ), Kings Cross
Awards: ?
Service: From ? to ?
Born: ?
Age: ?
Died: September 2002
Cause: Suicide at Caringbah. Knife in the chest, but also a suspected murder.
Funeral date: ?
Funeral location: ?
Grave site: ?
FURTHER INFORMATION IS NEEDED ON THIS PERSON
[alert_yellow]HAZEL is NOT mentioned on the Police Wall of Remembrance[/alert_yellow]
It should be noted that there was a suicide of a former Police officer by the name of Hazell who killed himself allegedly surrounded by news articles of the 1996 Royal Commission, in which he had been summonsed as a witness at the time.
It shows the long lasting and continued effects of the Royal Commission on those involved.
Glen McNamara – who was set up in the police force by corrupt officers he investigated, then was cleared, then pensioned off – is presented here as the archetypal honest cop who flew in the face of a corrupt system and was savaged by it. Even though he is writing about himself, it has a ring of authenticity. A former investigator with the National Crime Authority and with the NSW Police, where he was a detective stationed in Kings Cross and Sydney’s south, he gave evidence to the NSW Police Royal Commission about alleged police protection of paedophiles.
With Savage Obsessions: True Crime from the Streets of Kings Cross, McNamara has joined other former police, such as former assistant commissioner Clive Small, in writing about crime, capitalising on its popularity – as exemplified by the success of the Underbelly TV series – and drawing on the vast volume of inside information available to police.
His chapters are fairly short and each tells a different story. But the linking theme, about criminal obsession (”The criminal mind is self-obsessed and determined, and I realised that this trait knows no boundaries, professional or otherwise”) seems to work.
What amounts to a series of snapshots of police work does give some revealing insights, including into the corruption and brutality once prevalent in Kings Cross, seen from the inside.
Savage Obsessions by Glen McNamara. New Holland, $29.95.
Some insights are new, such as the horrific sexual abuse paedophile ”Dolly” Dunn committed while on the staff of Catholic schools – an aspect of Dunn’s life hinted at but never disclosed. It does raise the question of how he continued so long.
McNamara confirms what was suggested as a defence in the Schapelle Corby case, that there has been a corrupt ring of airport baggage handlers dealing in illicit drugs, and mentions the case of an unnamed couple who got right through the international barriers and then found drugs in their bag.
He goes in detail into the wretched tangle surrounding drug dealer Warren Lanfranchi and his supposed girlfriend Sally Ann Huckstepp. Also, he deals with the wretchedness of Rick Hazell, who was drawn into paedophile protection, gave evidence to the Police Royal Commission and died in circumstances a coroner found were an accident but which McNamara believes was murder.
Like any account by a former cop, the presentation is all black and white, with no attempt at interpretation on sociological lines. People are either law abiders or rotters.
There could be no compassion for sex offender Bruce Synold who, according to McNamara, boasted that he would crawl naked into people’s bedrooms, slither across the floor like a snake and touch the sleeping couple lightly ”to see if they would stir”. Or cat burglar John Harvey Rider, who sneaked into the bedrooms of sleeping children. There is no doubt that a ”homicidal maniac”, Mark Hampson, with his Rasputin-like beard and his penchant for swords, was a bad man. And so were rapist Bilal Skaf and adoptive parent-killer Heidi McGarvie.
But the selection of cases rather glosses over, by omission, the vast array of other stories that could be told about people who have committed offences. Qualifications can be written into some accounts of crime to explain how these dreadful things happened. And, from time to time, how people are wrongly convicted.
SAVAGE OBSESSIONS Glen McNamara New Holland, 147pp, $29.95
Stations Gordonvale, Cairns, Thursday Island & Brisbane
Born: 1928 – Shepparton, Victoria
Joined QPol in 1951 aged 22
Died 27 October 1964 at Little Mulgrave, FNQ
Funeral
Buried Gordonvale Cemetery, FNQ
Plot 10408, Site 181 Division SR Sect. Mon, Row RC
On Sunday October 26 it will be 50 years since Des Trannore (pictured) was shot and killed by John Thomas Verney. (Queensland Police Media)
24 October, 2014 12:07PM AEST
Remembering a hero: Senior Constable Des Trannore
By Isaac Egan and Phil Staley
Desmond Trannore is more than just a name on a far north Queensland bridge or the name of a Gordonvale police officer; it is the name of a hero who lost his life in the line of duty and saved the lives of two children in the process.
Sergeant Steve Webb has spent a lot of his life researching what happened on that fateful day and descibed the experience to the ABC’s Phil Staley.
Born in Shepparton, Victoria, Senior Constable Trannore came to Queensland to work in the cane fields before deciding he wanted to be a police officer.
“Des couldn’t swim a stroke before deciding to join the police force, so he actually used to jump off the old bridge to teach himself to swim,” said Sgt Webb.
After being sworn in he served at Gordonvale, Cairns, Thursday Island and Brisbane, before coming back to serve in Gordonvale in 1956.
Sgt Webb describes it as a time where in the small farming town of Gordonvale police officers were well known local figures in the community and some like Senior Constable Trannore were something more.
“He was a bit of a knock about bloke, he played Aussie rules and he taught boxing and he was well known to give a few of the young blokes a fair kick up the backside if they played up,” he said.
“He was well respected in that town amongst the young people and the older people, and he still is to this day.”
A dark day for FNQ
On the evening of October 27, 1964 Senior Constable Trannore was on the 4pm to midnight shift alone.
At 5:45pm he received a call saying there was a domestic disturbance on a property at Little Mulgrave.
“Des wrote a note that said ‘5:45pm, domestic brawl, Little’s place, Little Mulgrave’ and left it on the typewriter so that the officer-in-charge would know what was going on if anything happened,” said Sgt Webb.
“You’ve got to bear in mind that in those days radios were pretty well non-existent and there was no such thing as mobile phones.”
Mr Verney had assaulted one of his stepsons and was assaulting his wife.
“Verney had caught Clifford and his sister Karen playing in the creek down the road and he attempted to drown Clifford and he smashed Clifford’s head against the side of his utility,” said Sgt Webb.
“Mrs Little came down and tried to intervene and told Clifford to go to the neighbours and get them to call the police.
“Des arrived at the neighbour’s house where he saw young Clifford and he told him to get into the police car.”
Senior Constable Trannore then drove to the farmhouse and asked Mrs Verney and her daughter to get in the police car.
Mr Verney confronted Senior Constable Trannore, threatened him and repeatedly ordered him off the property before disappearing into the house.
He came back out with a .310 rifle and aimed it at Senior Constable Trannore.
“Desmond turned around, approached Verney with no fear and said ‘that’s it, I’ve had enough, give me the bloody rifle’,” said Sgt Webb.
“And with that Verney pointed the rifle and fired from the hip through Des Trannore’s chest – piercing his heart.
“Des turned and ran 20 metres towards the children and said to them ‘run for your life’ before collapsing to the ground.”
Clifford ran towards the cane fields as Mr Verney lifted his rifle to shoot at him.
“He didn’t get a shot out because Clifford disappeared into the cane,” said Sgt Webb.
Mrs Verney heard the shot and ran outside to where Senior Constable Trannore was lying dying.
She attempted to resuscitate him, but he died at the scene. Mr Verney, meanwhile ,fled in his ute.
When word got back to Gordonvale, one of the largest manhunts in far north Queensland history began.
Around 300 on and off-duty police joined the hunt for Mr Verney as well as a large group of Gordonvale residents.
The following day Mr Verney presented himself at the Cairns police station.
“It is thought that Verney got word of the lynch mob at Gordonvale and surrendered for his own safety,” said Sgt Webb.
John Thomas Verney was charged and later convicted of the wilful murder of Senior Constable Trannore and sentenced to life in prison.
Remembering Desmond Trannore
A quote from an unknown Gordonvale resident in the Cairns Post on Tuesday October 27, 1964 reads:
“[Senior Constable Desmond Trannore] was a terrific man and one of the most popular police officers we have ever had, if they ever brought the killer here I would not give much for his chances.”
A letter by Clifford Little describes the event and praises Senior Constable Trannore as a hero and a man unlike any other.
Here is an excerpt from that letter:
“He died with dignity and kept that dignity to his last breath. Desmond Trannore was a humanitarian. His actions that day went beyond that of a serving police officer. Concern for fellow human beings is the most honourable emotion. It becomes even more commendable when the courage of one’s convictions is carried out. I knew a man that other men could only hope to be.”
Researching the case became a passion of Sergeant Webb and in 2009 he suggested the new bridge over the Mulgrave River be named after Senior Constable Desmond Trannore.
“People should remember who he was and the fact that he gave his life to save a family and he did save that family,” he said.
Minister for Main Roads
The Honourable Craig Wallace
Monday, December 07, 2009
Local officer honoured in naming of Mulgrave River bridge
Main Roads Minister Craig Wallace today announced the new bridge over the Mulgrave River at Gordonvale will be officially named ‘Desmond Trannore Bridge’ as part of Queensland’s 150th birthday celebrations.
“This name is chosen in honour of Senior Constable Desmond Trannore, whose bravery and dedication to both the community and his profession is held in high regard by many Gordonvale locals,” Mr Wallace said.
“Mr Trannore was a well respected police officer and member of the Gordonvale community, where he was stationed throughout most of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
“He was heavily involved in community activities – teaching boxing at the local youth club and running the Gordonvale Pony Club, Aussie Rules, tennis and cricket clubs.
“Mr Trannore was tragically killed in the line of duty in 1964 while attending a domestic dispute at Little Mulgrave, north of Gordonvale, and this bridge naming is a community tribute to his bravery.”
Mr Wallace said the bridge name was chosen from more than 50 nominations received across the community.
“It is wonderful to see the Gordonvale and greater Cairns community getting behind this Q150 initiative,” he said.
Mr Wallace said members of the Trannore family will join local members and representatives of the Cairns community in celebrations to officially commission and name the $48 million bridge on Thursday, 17 December.
Jim Turnour, Federal Member for Leichhardt, will join Curtis Pitt, State Member for Mulgrave, on the banks of the Mulgrave River to officially commission the $48 million bridge and unveil the new name sign for the bridge.
“The new bridge is a valuable and vital piece of road infrastructure for Far North Queensland,” Mr Turnour said.
“It will reduce the duration of closures due to wet season flooding and better serve to stabilise the local economy by keeping communities connected all year round.”
The new bridge is part of the Rudd Government’s commitment to improving flood immunity and accessibility between Cairns and Townsville.
“The new 480-metre-long bridge, which opened to traffic in April this year, ahead of time and under budget, is providing significant benefits for far north Queensland.
“Standing five metres higher than the existing bridge and located on a better road alignment, this bridge will limit disruptions to residents and motorists during the wet season by minimising delays caused by wet season flooding.”
The bridge was just one component of the Australian Government’s $347 million Accelerated Bruce Highway Upgrade Package, delivered by the state government.
The majority of works have been delivered, with remaining projects to be completed in early 2010.
Mr Wallace said naming the new bridge over the Mulgrave River after Desmond Trannore recognised the integral role people have in building a community.
“We have chosen a name that recognises an important local identify and also reflects community spirit and local history,” he said.
“This is what the Q150 bridge naming celebrations are all about – Queenslanders having their say on what makes our state unique and being able to recognise these things through the naming of significant road structures.”
A memorial ceremony will be held at the Gordonvale Police Station this week:
WHEN: 10.30am Friday 24 October 2014
WHERE: Police Station, Cannon Street, Gordonvale
Gordonvale Police and members of the Trannore family would like to extend an invitation to members of the community, to help commemorate and honour the memory of Senior Constable Desmond Trannore, who so bravely gave his life in service to the community.
A 8.25 metre glass reinforced epoxy resin planing catamaran powered by twin 225 h.p. Outboard motors.
Qld Police Vessel “D.TRANNORE III” – Brisbane
“D. Trannore III”
The “D. TRANNORE III” was launched on the 9th April 2009 by Senior Constable Trannore’s widow (see photo right) in the presence of the Police Minister Neil Roberts, Deputy Commissioner Kathy Rynders and invited guest.
Capable of speeds in excess of 45 knots the “D. TRANNORE II” was built by Swift Marine of the Gold Coast and is a rigid hull inflatable speedboat capable of carrying up to 12 people. The “D. TRANNORE II” was purpose built for use by the Redland Bay Water Police to patrol the waterways and islands of Moreton Bay.
Widow of the late Constable Desmond Trannore launches the D Trannore III
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Queensland Police Service remembers fallen colleagues during Cairns march
Rebecca Elliott
The Cairns Post
September 30, 201412:00AM
RESPECT: Cairns police march down the Esplanade and towards St John’s Anglican church to mark National Police Remembrance Day. The Federal Police canine squad participated in the march. Picture: Brendan Radke.
KATELIN and Kieren Trannore never got to meet their grandfather, but yesterday the Queensland Police Service showed them just how exceptional his sacrifice was.
As the rain came down, the 16-year-old and 14-year-old marched with their dad, Shane Trannore, Aunty Karen Trannore, and Cairns police as part of National Police Remembrance Day.
The Trannores’ father and grandfather was recognised at this year’s Cairns service for the 50th anniversary of his death.
“I didn’t know much about my grandfather except that he died in the force and just being here is really nice, I am really proud,” Katelin said.
Katelin said it was overwhelming to be part of the day which honoured her grandfather.
“It was, just being part of the march and walking down the street,” she said.
“It was amazing, I really enjoyed it.”
Senior Constable Desmond Trannore was stationed at Gordonvale in 1964 when he attended a domestic disturbance and was gunned down while he was trying to get the mother and the children medical attention.
Senior Constable Trannore’s daughter, Karen, who was only a child when her father was killed, said it was a great honour to be there.
“It was very important and quite emotional to march with the officers,” she said.
“It’s such a hard job to do and I respect each and every one of them and they always have our support.”
RESPECT: Cairns police march down the Esplanade and towards St John’s Anglican church to mark National Police Remembrance Day. Picture: Brendan Radke.
Just under 80 Queensland Police and Australian Federal Police officers marched in the parade.
Acting Chief Superintendent, Brett Schafferius said the dangers involved in policing were always in the back of officers’ minds.
“Today is the most important day on the policing calendar, it is the day we get to recognise and remember the sacrifice police women and men have made over the past 150 years of policing in Queensland,” he said.
“We acknowledge our job at times can be inherently dangerous, that’s why we are here, we are here for the community and to attend those matters on their behalf.”
The names of the 140 fallen police officers were read out during the service.
There are about 850 sworn officers in the Far North district and about 1050 employees overall.
Over the past 150 years, 25 fallen Queensland officers have been from the Far North district.
Curtis Cheng, left, and his family.
What a wonderful tribute …thank you for bringing us this introduction to a man without whom the world is a poorer place.
Thanks Chris. It happened a couple of years after we got here and was a great tragedy. I really feel for his family and the loss of a good man.
I stumbled across this post today… For some reason Glen came to my mind, and I did a search. Maybe this all came about as I saw a photo of his gorgeous sister and his 2 beautiful children.
Glen was a friend and I know his family well. He was a great man and it was an extremely sad day the day he left this life.
hi Vicki, sorry I hadn’t realised I’d omitted to reply. Thanks for sharing…it was indeed a tragic day for all concerned…we have a connection through the other officer that day though we didn’t know him at the time.