Markets 
It was the same courtroom, same day and same coroner, but there were huge differences between the twin coronial hearings for murdered police officers Neal Thompson and Vadim de Waart-Hottart and, later, that of their killer Dezi Freeman.
Some of those differences were reassuring, respectful and even heartening.
But one is baffling, and it will be forever difficult to comprehend.
When Coroner Liberty Sanger opened the first hearing on Monday, to examine the deaths of Thompson and de Waart-Hottart, there was barely a spare seat in room one of the Coroners Court.
Thompson’s sisters, Lois Kirk and Dianne Thompson, sat in the left of the gallery among a dozen of the veteran officer’s wider family and friends. They sat calmly and respectfully, focusing on proceedings without giving any sign of the heartbreak forced upon them.
De Waart-Hottart’s family also attended, though they watched via a video link from their native Belgium.
What they heard was distressing.
Lindsay Spence, the counsel assisting the coroner, stepped through agonising detail not only of how Freeman had killed the officers, but how he then stood over their bodies and taunted them: “F—ing scum. Die in hell.”
Spence told the coroner that Freeman also said much worse but, out of respect to the families gathered, he spared those details.
It was beyond painful but, with so many months focused on Freeman and his whereabouts, it was important to finally hear what Thompson, de Waart-Hottart and their colleagues had endured while trying to serve and protect us, delivering a warrant on Freeman for child sex offences.
When the courtroom reopened in the afternoon, to begin examining the death of Freeman, the mood changed.
There were no obvious Freeman family members or supporters present and, although the number of suit-wearing detectives had increased, many seats in the gallery were empty.
A friend of Thompson’s returned and sat at the back, though most of those close to the fallen officers stayed away, refusing to acknowledge Freeman’s time in the spotlight.
What time and attention Freeman did receive was limited. His hearing lasted just 16 minutes – half that afforded to the officers in the morning – and lacked detail.
The time taken to forensically explain in the morning hearing the exact placement, timing and direction of people’s movements and shots fired were replaced instead with vague descriptions of “numerous gas canisters”, “numerous SOG [special operations group] operatives”, and “numerous things” in the afternoon.
The lack of detail may have been practical – a much shorter time to gather evidence, and investigations continuing into who aided Freeman while he was on the run – but it was also reassuring.
Freeman has had more than his fair share of attention over the past seven months, and it was important that the families of Thompson and de Waart-Hottart could take heart in knowing the lion’s share of the coroner’s attention was focused on finding out what happened to them.
But there was another obvious difference between the cases. And it’s one that is baffling, if not scary for the legacy it may create.
During the hearing into the officers’ deaths, we heard that four of the eight police at the scene had body-worn cameras on and activated while Freeman murdered and taunted their colleagues.
Even an officer tasked with staying at the police cars – parked outside the property and well away from the shooting – had a body-worn camera recording.
The coroner will also have access to mobile phone footage shot by one of Freeman’s family members and his landlord, Andrew Swift, in seeing the evil he undertook.
As Spence summed up: “Your honour will have the benefit of that extensive volume of recorded evidence throughout the coronial investigation, which will greatly assist in ascertaining the circumstances of the deaths of Leading Senior Constable Thompson and Senior Constable de Waart-Hottart.”
But when it comes to Freeman’s death the story was different.
“Your honour will not have the benefit of any body-worn camera footage to assist your honour’s investigation,” Spence told the coroner.
“None of the SOG members involved in the operation to apprehend the deceased [Freeman] … were outfitted with any body-worn camera or similar recording device.”
The coroner was told she would have access to footage from the police helicopter (aside from a missing 53 minutes while the helicopter refuelled) including the “final interaction” when Freeman was shot dead.
Freeman had also turned on the voice memo of his phone to record his final 23 minutes from inside his shipping container hideout, which will help the coroner in the absence of officer-worn cameras – despite police surveilling Freeman for days while they planned their Thologolong operation.
There may not have been many supporters present in court to listen to the coronial hearings, but it’s impossible to think the differences in the two stories are not already echoing through the High Country.
Within hours of Freeman’s death in March, conspiracies were already being spread – from a dead body substitution to Freeman being killed and frozen months earlier, then presented in Thologolong when it suited authorities. The discrepancy in video footage will understandably raise more than just the eyebrows of sovereign citizens.
The deaths of Thompson, de Waart-Hottart and Freeman will always be linked – that fact surely sits uneasily with their respective families, though from very different perspectives.
That they are at least afforded the right of separate coronial hearings, so the officers’ stories can attract the attention they deserve is heartening.
But those stories need to match, which is why holding them at the same time is equally vital.
From our partners
Read the full article here
