The Queensland state coroner will review the diaries, online activities and six years’ of phone data relating to Wieambilla shooters Gareth, Nathaniel and Stacey Train in a bid to understand how they became radicalised and identify any potential associates.
A pre-inquest conference into the December 2022 deaths of police officers Matthew Arnold and Rachel McCrow, and neighbour Alan Dare, was told on Thursday they were each shot dead in circumstances where they had “no interactions” with anyone at the Wieambilla property.
The inquest is also looking into the deaths of Gareth Train, his brother Nathaniel and Stacey, who were shot by tactical police during a subsequent operation. Stacey was Gareth’s wife and was previously married to Nathaniel.
Ruth O’Gorman KC, the counsel assisting the inquest, provided an update on the scale and progress of the investigation into the shootings, which is not expected to be complete until the end of the year. Inquest hearings will not take place until 2024.
O’Gorman said Gareth, Nathaniel and Stacey Train were recorded on police footage shooting firearms at tactical officers, but that it remained unclear which of the trio had fired fatal shots at McCrow, Arnold and Dare. The inquest will attempt to determine this.
O’Gorman said the process would also investigate the circumstances in which Nathaniel Train, a former school principal, unlawfully entered Queensland during Covid border closures, discarded firearms, and later had his weapons licence suspended.
The investigation by the Queensland police ethical standards command remains ongoing. O’Gorman said evidence is expected to contain interviews, walk-throughs, statements from 152 witnesses and forensic examinations.
Police had seized memory cards, cameras, items of clothing, computer equipment, tools, bags, knives and weapons, including firearms and ammunition.
Officers were reviewing the phone data of Stacey, Gareth and Nathaniel Train, over a period of six years, and would compile a timeline to understand their recent actions and backgrounds.
“[Investigators are] reviewing the online presence of Gareth, Stacey and Nathaniel Train, including to identify where possible associates of theirs who may have influenced their actions,” O’Gorman said.
The inquest will explore the circumstances that required four police officers to attend the scene to conduct a welfare check, after a missing persons report had been lodged in NSW relating to Nathaniel Train.
Police said earlier this year they believed the Trains were Christian extremists who “acted as an autonomous cell and executed a religiously motivated terrorist attack”.
