A man who was hit by the same bullet that killed Rebels bikie Nick Martin has had his police statement read to court during the trial of the alleged mastermind of the public assassination.
Ricky Chapman was 31 years old and dating Martin’s stepdaughter Stacey Schoppe when he was invited to watch the races at Kwinana Motorplex by Schoppe’s mum Amanda Martin in 2020.
Ricky Chapman in hospital following the shooting at Perth Motorplex. Credit: Nine News
Chapman told police he had never been to the races before, and travelled there with Martin before taking up a seat behind him in the tiered stands.
“I was sitting next to the walkway,” he said in his statement, which was read out in court on Monday afternoon.
“Nick sat down in front of me … Stacey had a small child on her lap but I don’t know who it was.
“During one race I felt a burning in my left leg and left arm. I didn’t know what happened. I thought the piston blew out of the engine from one of the cars and hit me. I didn’t know that I was shot until Stacey told me. I saw Nick getting CPR.”
The statement described “confusion” at what had happened before Chapman was taken to Royal Perth Hospital.
“I was told by the doctors I had been shot. I was in shock. I still had the bullet in my arm,” it read.
Chapman described how he also had a deep cut on his leg which he believed was as a result of the bullet grazing him as it exited Martin and hit his arm.
He gave permission for police to keep the bullet after he had surgery to have it removed.
Chapman died 16 months later, having suffered a medical episode while working away as a FIFO rigger.
A court sketch of bikie David Pye, who is accused of paying a former soldier to shoot Martin.Credit: Anne Barnetson
His evidence came after the court heard that the former soldier who fired the bullet lied to his girlfriend that he had carried out the killing because he worked as a secret government spy.
The 39-year-old, whose identity has been suppressed by the courts since his arrest in 2021, continued being cross-examined on Monday in the trial of David Pye, who is accused of ordering the killing.
Defence barrister David Hallowes, SC, repeatedly called the man out on multiple lies in an attempt to discredit him on the stand.
Pye – a former Rebels bikie who defected to the Comancheros and is now a member of the Mongols – denies the prosecution’s accusations he agreed to pay the man $150,000 to shoot Martin at Kwinana Motorplex in December 2020, as well as allegations he requested similar hits on an ex-girlfriend and another bikie in exile in Thailand.
The former soldier pleaded guilty to his role in the killing, where he shot Martin with a high-powered rifle from 365 metres away, and is serving a reduced sentence in return for testifying against Pye.
However, as day four of the trial got under way in the WA Supreme Court, the court heard the man had told a series lies, including telling his former fiance he had been hired by the government to kill Martin.
The man testified that he had told the woman of his “own volition” that he was the person who had shot Martin, but denied he said he had done so because he was “a spook for the Australian government”.
Hallowes told the court the man’s fiance questioned why there was such a big public investigation by police into Martin’s death if it was a government kill, suggesting the man told her: “It needed to look like a gang killing.”
“After she worked out you had shot Nick Martin and you admitted to her that you were saying these things, that you were a spook, that you were doing top secret government missions to her, to try and suggest that the killing of Nick Martin was part of this?” Hallowes asked the former soldier.
“Yes, I misled her. I let her assume it was in relation to things going on overseas,” he replied.
You told deliberate lies. – Yes, to protect her.
Was it after that you proposed to her? – Yes.
You proposed to this woman you’d been telling a series of lies to? She bought your lies? – Yes. It was a shit thing to do, but yes.
The man also claimed a series of lies he told Pye during a recorded conversation played to the court where he bragged about his credentials and experience as a soldier were to “big note” himself to the bikie.
Alleged mastermind behind bikie’s killing released on bail for duration of trial
On Friday, Justice Joseph McGrath released previously suppressed information about Pye being released on bail for the duration of his trial.
In documents the judge made publicly available, McGrath stated Pye had been diagnosed with mental health issues that he needed medication for that was not available to him in prison.
“The consequence is that there is real prospect that the accused will be unable to properly engage in his own trial with the result that an issue of the fitness to stand trial will arise,” the statement read.
“If the trial was to proceed, the consequence is that the trial will be adjourned or aborted. That is because expert evidence would be required to consider the question as to whether, the accused, in the absence of the prescribed medication, is fit to stand trial.”
Pye is instead being escorted to and from a Perth suburb by police for the expected three to four weeks the trial will run.
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