Cody Wright speaks after arrested, shot by police in Millstream
A 36-year-old Millstream learner motorbike rider has spoken about the moment a police weapon was “unintentionally” discharged next to him during his arrest.
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A 36-year-old Queensland learner motorbike rider has spoken about the moment he was “unintentionally” shot at by police.
Police arrested Cody Wright, 36, of Millstream, on March 7 at a carparking space along Ravenshoe’s busiest street, Gregg Street, near the Cornetts grocery store, about 120km south of Cairns.
A licenced holder of 11 guns and a pig hunter, Mr Wright said police raided his house last year and charged him with 21 offences.
Police again arrested him in March this year, charging him with two counts of possessing a dangerous drug and a weapon offence.
They have admitted the firearm was “unintentionally discharged” by police officers at the scene.
Mr Wright, a former Gordonvale resident, said he was getting in his car just after 9am with his doughnuts and a pie “when a series of Toyota LandCruisers drove right up to my car, blocking” his door.
“Next thing a man in plain clothes pointed a big AR15 rifle in my face and was screaming at me to get out of the door. They weren’t in uniform, they did not announce themselves as police, I did not know what was going on,” he said.
Mr Wright said two other men pulled him out of the passenger’s door with another seven waiting for him on the footpath of Ravenshoe’s main street.
It’s understood the police told him they were there on “suspicion of illegal drugs”.
Mr Wright said he was thrown to the ground, hit in the stomach repeatedly and with two different tasers.
“The pain was intense. It took my breath away,” he said.
“My body started convulsing and I lost control of my bowels – I felt so humiliating in the main street of a town where I know everybody.
“Then someone got a hold of my neck in a triangle choke hold and I started blacking out.”
Shortly after he heard a loud noise, and felt something graze his arm.
He assumed it was another taser, but it turned out to be a bullet accidentally discharged from an officer’s gun which dented into asphalt next to him.
“It very nearly killed me,” he said
Mr Wright said he asked police to call an ambulance. He said police then pulled the barbs out of his skin causing a gush of blood to come out.
He began to cry heavily.
The Millstream man was driven back to Cairns police station and charged with two counts of possessing dangerous drugs – one for a temazepam sleeping tablet he claims he has a prescription for and the other for a point of meth.
He was also charged with having a glass meth pipe and for a having 10cm knife in his car.
Millaa Millaa resident Marceena Burns, who witnessed the Ravenshoe incident, previously told the Townsville Bulletin the scene “just didn’t look right” as the man was calling out ‘please help me’, ‘someone help me’, didn’t appear to be intoxicated at all and noticed someone had a gun.
“I said someone should call the police and someone nearby said ‘I think they are the police’,”
Ms Burns said.
“I thought ‘bulls —t they are’.”
Police later raided his home and searched for several hours – but no items were seized and no further charges laid, he said.
It comes after police raided a house in Millstream on March 9, 2023 where they charged Mr Wright with 21 offences – including for “that two of the 11 firearms were loaded and not secured”, unlawfully possessing knives and a firearm, driving as a learner driver without L plate, not wearing a helmet and possessing cannabis.
Mr Wright said he was also observed riding a motorbike 30km/h over the limit at Barrine without a helmet and allegedly failed to stop in February 2023.
A Queensland Police spokeswoman said police charged Mr Wright on March 7 “following investigations into alleged drugs and weapons offences”.
“During the arrest a police service weapon was unintentionally discharged. This matter is being reviewed.”
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