Killer John Edwards’ guns revealed after execution
THE guns a father used to murder his two children in Sydney’s northwest were a 357 magnum and a high powered semi-automatic pistol, The Daily Telegraph can reveal. It comes as chilling details have surfaced of what happened that night.
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THE guns a father used to murder his two children in Sydney’s northwest were a 357 magnum and a high powered semi-automatic pistol, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.
Police believe John Edwards, 67, meticulously planned the execution of his teenage son and daughter who he gunned down while they huddled together in a bedroom of their home in West Pennant Hills on Thursday evening.
Their mother Olga Edwards arrived home soon after her children Jack, 15, and 13-year-old Jennifer, were slain to find police converged at her house.
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Her ex-husband drove to his home in Normanhurst and shot himself.
Police are understood to have seized CCTV of Mr Edwards from the St Mary’s Indoor Shooting Centre where he was a member.
He collected his two guns from this centre in the 24 hours before he killed his children.
Yesterday at St Stephens Normanhurst Anglican Church, just two kilometres from where Mr Edwards died, rector Colin Watson spoke of the tragedy saying the “community is hurting greatly”.
“We pray for our community. We know that our community is hurting greatly. We know that different people would have known the children, perhaps the parents and we know that they’re struggling,” he told the congregation.
“We need to be praying for Mrs Olga Edwards and her tragedy as we understand that we can’t understand.
“We have been in shock this week with the news of this terrible tragedy. We know that poor lady Mrs Edwards would be struggling in so many ways.”
“As a church I want to make sure we’re supporting and praying with those associated with this tragedy.
Yesterday Labor leader Luke Foley said the murders meant it was “time for the community to pause and reflect our system of gun laws”.
“I think are very effective, we’re a far better society than America. But what happened last week should cause us to examine whether there is improvements that can be made,” he said.
“For example regarding the storage of weapons at sport clubs and the like, what ability, what rights does a person have to take their weapon off site away from that club, should a partner or ex partner have a right to a say when somebody makes an application for a gun license, I think these are the sorts of things we should discuss at the moment.”
In the lead up to the cowardly shooting Mr Edwards, a former financial adviser, had been attending St Mary’s Indoor Shooting Centre.
In the years leading up to the shooting Mr Edwards had requested to join at least three other gun clubs but was knocked back, partially because he had been denied a firearm licence in the past.
A representative of the Ku-ring-gai Pistol Club said Mr Edwards had approached the club in December 2016 but was turned away because the group held serious concerns about him.
Other clubs within the Hornsby rifle range complex also knocked Mr Edwards back.
Mrs and Mr Edwards had been involved in divorce and custody proceedings over the past two years with a settlement reached in February.
