Off-duty cop caught on camera outside Ricky Maddison’s home days before Brett Forte execution
An off-duty police officer was photographed outside cop killer Ricky Maddison’s home just days before the execution of Senior Constable Brett Forte.
Police & Courts
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This is the moment a police officer involved in the manhunt for criminal Ricky Maddison was photographed on an isolated country road just metres from where the dangerous fugitive was hiding.
The never-before-seen image, which was discussed at length during the inquest into the killing of Senior Constable Brett Forte, shows off-duty Senior Constable Andre Thaler walking along Wallers Rd in the Lockyer Valley – the same road where Maddison would shoot dead Sen Const Thaler’s colleague in an ambush 11 days later.
Sen Const Thaler, who was clutching his police-issue iPad when he was confronted and photographed by property owner Adam Byatt, told the inquest he had decided to go bushwalking and birdwatching on his day off.
As Thaler went for his walk, Maddison was hiding in a shed on a large rural property just metres away.
The inquest heard Sen Const Thaler would later tell investigators it was just a coincidence he was on Wallers Rd – he wasn’t looking for Maddison, who his squad had been searching for as a priority.
Sen Const Thaler’s evidence would be key in the inquest as it sought to determine what investigators knew about Maddison’s whereabouts in the lead up to the ambush.
Sen Const Thaler also wasn’t aware Gatton police had a separate investigation into reports of automatic gunfire on the same road and had placed a camera outside a property there, one day earlier.
The walk was just 11 days before his tactical crime squad colleague was gunned down by Maddison who lured police to the road in a low-speed chase before he ambushed them and sprayed their vehicle with automatic gunfire.
As Sen Const Thaler walked up the road, which was too steep and only accessible by 4WD, he heard a car idling and went and spoke to a man sitting inside.
Sen Const Thaler told the inquest the man told him there was “hillbillies on these hills” and warned him to stay off his property.
He said he was suspicious so took note of the man’s number plate.
He went and made an intelligence report on his day off.
Later, he would determine the man was Adam Byatt, Maddison’s best friend.
Mr Byatt also wasn’t sure who Thaler was and told the inquest he took a photo of him and his car and sent it to Maddison.
Eerily, the conversation took place just outside Byatt’s family property – where Maddison was hiding from authorities who were searching for him.
Mr Byatt told the inquest he did not realise until later that the man on the road near his property was a police officer.
Speaking of his interaction with Mr Byatt, Sen Const Thaler told the inquest he walked 300m from his car and could hear a car idling and heard a chain being removed from a gate and turned around to see a man watching him.
“We sort of looked at each other,” Sen Const Thaler said.
“He was intently watching me.”
The car then pulled up next to him and he said the man was immediately confrontational.
“Words to the effect of, what are you doing?” Sen Const Thaler said.
“I just looked at him and said, ‘What do you mean?’ ”
Sen Const Thaler said the man responded: “Do you see this land on the left here? Make sure you don’t go on it.”
He told the inquest the man referred to the land again and he asked why the man was following him.
Sen Const Thaler said the man changed his demeanour and said: “That’s my land, make sure you don’t go on it.”
As the police officer was walking back to his car he said the man warned him to be careful and said there were “hillbillies on these hills mate”.
“I wouldn’t want to see anything happen to you, they’ve got guns, similar to that,” he said of the conversation.
Sen Const Thaler said the man was “really suspicious of me” and during the interaction he thought there was “more going on here than meets the eye”.
However he said prior to going there he had no intelligence. He told the inquest he was suspicious of the man and the property after the encounter and filed an intelligence report that night.
When questioned at the inquest if he was there for “purpose of gathering intelligence of the layout of a property suspected of being related in any way to Ricky Maddison” Sen Const Thaler answered: “No.”
Mr Byatt told the inquest that during the conversation he did not threaten the officer.
He said it was a friendly conversation but found Sen Const Thaler “quite odd”.
“I did warn him that on the other side of the hill as you walked up on the right hand side there is a private property ... (and) they are not too friendly,” he told the inquest.
“I certainly didn’t threaten anybody with being shot.
“I never threatened the man.
“I certainly warned him of what the property boundaries were.”
Outside court Mr Byatt said he had never seen anyone bushwalking around the area.
“There’s a reason I stopped and asked him what the f*ck he was doing,” he said.
“Have you tried to find information on bushwalking in that national park? Because it’s not what it is.
“By and large it’s mostly closed off. People are up four-wheel-driving up there.”
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