Mother recounts moment she found out her son had been shot in the face

A mother has recounted the moment her son phoned to say he had been shot in the face with a shotgun on his way home from the shops, with the gunman leaving him injured in the driveway.

The mother of a man shot in the face outside his Logan home on Saturday night has recounted the moment her son called to tell her he had been shot.

Geoffrey Menz, aged in his 30s, had been returning to his Cowper Ave home at Eagleby from the shops about 9pm when he was shot by persons unknown. His mother, Lorraine Castner, said her son had only told her half an hour earlier that he was headed out to buy some cigarettes.

She said her son had seen a car – believed to be either a white or silver Mitsubishi Lancer – parked outside his house and was shot with a shotgun when he asked the people in the car to move.

Most of the shotgun pellets lodged in the front gate of the Cowper Ave home. Picture: Lachie Millard

The car then drove away, leaving Mr Menz in his driveway with wounds to his cheek, chin and chest. Thankfully, most of the shotgun pellets had missed him and lodged in his six foot wooden fence, which Ms Castner said she had built to protect her son.

She said there had not been any incidents that indicated a risk to Mr Menz, but that she feared for him because he lived alone.

Ms Castner was at home on Saturday night when, minutes after the shooting, her son called from a neighbour’s house to tell her he had been shot.

Lorraine Castner said her son, Geoffrey Menz, had been shot in the face with a shotgun and had pellets lodged in his cheek and chin. Picture Lachie Millard

“He’d said he was going to buy cigarettes so when he called back half an hour later and said he’d been shot I couldn’t believe it,” she said.

“I couldn’t actually comprehend at that point in time what had happened to him, but he said he’d been shot.”

“He’d gone to the lovely lady next door who had taken a look at him and he told me he’d been shot in the face.

“There was a group of people outside in a car and when he asked them to move on, they pulled out a gun and shot him.”

Scene of the Eagleby shooting. Picture: Lachie Millard

Ms Castner said she did not believe her son knew the group in the car.

“It all happened very quickly and the ambulance came and took him to hospital, and I kept getting texts: ‘Please mum, get my dog, look after my dog, he’s never been alone before’ so it was all about the dog,” she said.

She described the call from her son as “unbelievable” and “something no mother would ever expect to hear”.

“I wasn’t sure what he’d been shot with, whether it was an air rifle or what,” she said.

Ms Castner said seeing the damage to the fence “makes it real.”

“It could have been life threatening, something could have happened to him and I wouldn’t be speaking to you today, I’d be attending a much more serious matter,” Ms Castner said.

“When I see the fence I think oh my god, it actually happened.”

Bullet hole in a front gate at Eagleby. Picture: Lachie Millard

In a plea directed at the people responsible for shooting her son, Ms Castner asked a simple question.

“Why? What’s it for?

“It’s an extremely dangerous thing and other people could have been injured.”

“Why are you roaming the street armed with weapons? This is supposed to be a nice, local street, not a place of warfare.”

Police are appealing for anyone with information about the shooting, or people with CCTV or dashcam footage that may have captured the white or silver Mitsubishi Lancer moving about the area, to contact police.

It came just hours after another shooting rocked a small cul-de-sac 15 minutes away at Crestmead that left a 58-year-old woman in hospital, also with a gunshot wound to the face.

The victim's mother said her son was shot - and left in a driveway - after asking people in a car to move.