What happened?
Police say a man has been shot dead in their search for Dezi Freeman after seven months on the run in regional Victoria.
More than three police sources confirmed to this masthead that Dezi Freeman, who was born Desmond Filby, was killed by armed police on Monday morning at about 8.30am.
It is believed they were negotiating with him for several hours.
Where was Dezi Freeman found?
Police were tipped off that he was believed to be hiding in a container on a regional property after 216 days on the run, according to unconfirmed reports.
Sources confirmed to this masthead that he was gunned down in Walwa, a quiet, scenic town in northeast Victoria located on the Murray River Road, offering direct access to the upper Murray River, roughly 45 minutes from Corryong.
Freeman was last seen in the Mount Buffalo area more than seven months ago after the shooting deaths of Senior Constable Vadim de Waart-Hottart, 35, and Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson, 59, at a rural property in Porepunkah on August 26, 2025.
It is about a two-hour drive from Porepunkah to Walwa.
What did Dezi Freeman do?
Freeman was accused of shooting dead de Waart-Hottart and Thompson after they attempted to execute a search warrant at a vast property on the outskirts of the small township of Porepunkah on August 26 last year.
The sudden violence instantly triggered a massive police manhunt, one that began in the dense mountain bushland and has since tracked 100 kilometres west to an isolated hamlet near Benalla.
De Waart-Hottart’s parents, who live in Belgium, are currently in Melbourne after attending a ceremony last week which marked the 40th anniversary of the 1986 Russell Street bombing, in which policewoman Angela Taylor was killed.
Specialist police units conducted a number of unsuccessful searches, including with cadaver dogs, in the months since Freeman’s disappearance, but were unable to locate him.
What have the police said?
In a brief statement, police confirmed they had fatally shot a man after at a rural property in north-east Victoria as part of the operation to locate Freeman.
The statement did not directly name Freeman.
“No police officers were injured during the incident,” the statement read.
“The state coroner will attend the scene and the investigation will be oversighted by Professional Standards Command, as per standard process for a police shooting.”
The Police Association of Victoria, the union which represents police officers, has reacted to the news that Dezi Freeman has been killed.
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Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: www.smh.com.au
