‘Our lost dreams’: Wieambilla massacre widow’s most raw, uncensored interview yet
The widow of Wieambilla police massacre victim Alan Dare has given her most heartwrenching interview yet, describing their lost dreams and unique relationship she has with the children of his killers. WATCH THE EXTENDED, UNCUT VIDEO
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The widow of Wieambilla police massacre victim Alan Dare has given her most candid, raw and heartbreaking interview yet on the eve of the one year anniversary of his death.
The Courier Mail’s crime reporter Samantha Scott first met Kerry Dare in the days after the massacre and has built a trusting relationship with her over the past 12 months.
Here she revisits Mrs Dare at her home and gives a personal account of the real - and brave - Kerry Dare, who spoke about her lost dreams, unique relationship with the children of her husband’s killers, how she’s seen video of him being murdered and her plans for the future.
Watch Kerry’s extended and uncut interview with Samantha in the player above.
When I first interviewed Kerry Dare - the widow of Alan Dare - who was gunned down in Queensland’s deadliest police shooting - she was devastated beyond words.
Al was shot dead after going to investigate a fire at the Wains Rd property at Wieambilla, where Nathaniel Train, Gareth Train and his wife Stacey Train had ambushed four police officers, killing constables Rachel McCrow and Matthew Arnold.
In the aftermath of the Wieambilla shootings, Mrs Dare was wary of media as she believed the initial coverage “focused” on the murdered police.
But Kerry trusted The Courier-Mail and personally invited me to cover Al’s funeral and posthumous bravery medal presentation.
Kerry was just 10 years old when she first met ‘Al’, her best friend, Robynne Dare’s brother - they lived just four blocks away from each other at Leichhardt in Ipswich.
“I didn’t get Al until he was thirty,” Kerry said.
“After I had my children we ran into each other again and just collided I suppose...it wasn’t a big love story.”
Through broken tears she would go on to tell me that she was the “bulldog” of their relationship.
But when I returned to the Wains Rd property earlier this month, Kerry’s demeanour seemed reminiscent of the woman she once described.
“Al made me strong and independent before this. I just had to find it again…I’m back…but I’m always going to be sad,” she said.
Despite unimaginable tragedy, Kerry never wants to leave the home she built with Al, less than a kilometre from where the 58-year-old took his last breath.
She said the couple worked on the north side of Brisbane for 20 years so they could be in Wieambilla “for the next 30”.
But almost a year after Queensland’s deadliest police shooting, the site of the massacre at Wieambilla in the Western Downs remains a crime scene - evidence of the December 12 tragedy preserved on the dilapidated block.
The white weatherboard home of conspiracy theorists and killers Nathaniel, Stacey and Gareth Train sits empty.
By the front gate, the charred remnants of a police car – set alight by Nathaniel, Stacey and Gareth – remains, melted rubber from the vehicle’s tyres embedded in the dirt.
Broken garden statues litter the ground beyond the chained front fence.
Aerial footage of the 43ha Wains Rd property gives a rare insight into the off-grid lives of conspiracy theorists Nathaniel, Stacey and Gareth Train, including an abandoned vegetable patch, solar panels and several water tanks.
In the last 12 months Wieambilla and nearby Tara have been rocked by Queensland’s deadliest police shooting, suspected arson and the ongoing threat of bushfires.
Asked whether she felt targeted, Mrs Dare said: “If I am, it’s just making me stronger.”
“(Wieambilla) is home...this was my dream... (Al) built this for me and then he got murdered,” she said.
“I know I can do it all now. I will run a little bit sooner.”