Hoffmann trial: Man who supplied alleged gunman with 50 shotgun shells and a bowie knife denies giving him the alleged murder weapon
A man who lent Ben Hoffmann his white HiLux with 50 rounds of shotgun ammunition and a 30cm bowie knife in the back seat on the afternoon of his alleged killing spree has denied also supplying him with the shotgun that would later end four men’s lives.
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UPDATE, Thursday 1.15pm: A MAN who lent Ben Hoffmann his white HiLux with 50 rounds of shotgun ammunition and a 30cm bowie knife in the back seat on the afternoon of his alleged killing spree has denied also supplying him with the shotgun that would later end four men’s lives.
Michael “Pelican” Makrylos told the jury in Hoffmann’s trial he picked the alleged gunman up after he asked for a lift on June 4, 2019 and took him back to Mr Makrylos’s house where he gave him a change of clothes, including a high-vis work shirt.
After dropping Hoffmann back at his own car, Mr Makrylos said he later stopped at Coolalinga Guns and Ammo where he bought two boxes of shotgun cartridges for a hunting trip he had planned for that weekend.
Mr Makrylos said he also bought a 30cm bowie knife as a present for his 11-year-old daughter, who he believed was “old enough for such a knife” but wasn’t sure whether he had told his wife about the purchase.
Some time later, Mr Makrylos said Hoffmann called him again to ask to borrow the HiLux because “he just wanted to go see someone” but he didn’t ask why he couldn’t use his own car.
He said he knew the knife and ammunition was on the back seat when he lent Hoffmann his ute but denied intentionally supplying him with either or supplying him with a shotgun at all.
Under cross examination by Hoffmann’s barrister, Jon Tippet QC, Mr Makrylos agreed Hoffmann had been “talking gibberish” and “freaking out” about being poisoned earlier in the day but said he was “fine” again by the time he lent him the HiLux.
Mr Tippett asked Mr Makrylos if he was aware Hoffmann had provided a statement to the prosecution saying he did give him the gun but Mr Makrylos said he was not and did not.
“I’m instructed to put this to you, that if you hadn’t given him the shotgun, four people wouldn’t have been killed,” he said.
But trial judge Justice John Burns ruled the question “speculative” and Mr Makrylos was not required to answer.
His wife Christina Makrylos also took the stand on Thursday where she was questioned about whether she would have approved of her husband buying the knife for their 11-year-old daughter.
“I probably would have rolled my eyes about it but it wouldn’t have necessarily been hers to keep in her bedroom,” she said.
“It’s no secret that she loves to go hunting with her dad and is interested in fishing and stuff.”
Coolalinga Guns and Ammo employee Jim Dick was next to give evidence, saying Mr Makrylos had said he was buying the knife “as a present for a friend” or “a mate” and the shells to go pig hunting.
“I asked him if he wanted 18-shot or nine-shot and he said ‘What would do the most damage?’ and I said ‘Probably the nines’,” he said.
“Then he took two boxes of that.”
Hoffmann has pleaded not guilty to all charges and his trial continues.
UPDATE, Thursday 11.30am: The man prosecutors say Ben Hoffmann was looking for when he allegedly gunned down four men in Darwin in 2019 has taken the stand at his trial to deny being involved in “an illegal prostitution ring”.
Alexandros Deligiannis told the court he had previously lived at the addresses where Hassan Baydoun and Nigel Hellings were each killed on June 4 before moving to Stuart Park a few months earlier.
Mr Deligiannis said he lived in the Gardens Hill Cres unit Mr Hellings later moved into with his girlfriend who engaged in sex work from the flat but denied it was at his direction.
The former Palms Motel caretaker also said he had previously been in a sexual relationship with Hoffmann’s “girlfriend”, Kelly Collins, but the pair were just friends by the time of the shootings.
Under cross examination, Mr Deligiannis declined to answer a question about whether he had supplied methamphetamine to Ms Collins but denied ever “pimping her out”, holding her against her will or talking about “medicating” her with drugs.
Hoffmann has pleaded not guilty to all charges including four counts of murder. His trial continues.
UPDATE, Wednesday 5pm: TWO police officers who fined Ben Hoffmann for speeding on the morning of his alleged deadly shotgun rampage in 2019 have told a court he appeared “calm” and was “polite and respectful”.
In body-worn camera footage tendered at Hoffmann’s trial on Wednesday, Senior Constable Scott Aiken and Constable Ben Evans can be seen interacting with the alleged shooter shortly before 11am on June 4.
Mr Hoffmann appears relaxed as Sr Const Aiken approaches his vehicle and explains he’s been clocked travelling at 94km/h in an 80km/h zone on the Arnhem Hwy heading towards Humpty Doo.
“Oh f***, how fast was I going? Oh no,” he says.
“I just picked this up for a test drive, I’ll take it back eh.”
In court, Sr Const Aiken said there was no sign Hoffmann was drunk or on drugs and he noticed nothing out of the ordinary in issuing the silver Mitsubishi Proton driver a $190 fine.
His partner, Const Evans also said Hoffmann’s behaviour raised no red flags as the two other men discussed the car’s busted tail light and the out of date address on his driver’s licence.
“At the time of the traffic apprehension Mr Hoffmann appeared calm, compliant with what was requested at the time,” he said.
“He was actively engaging in conversation with Sr Const Aiken.”
Earlier, used car dealer Elliot Jonas told the court he’d never seen the silver Proton again after letting Hoffmann take it for a spin earlier that morning.
Crown prosecutor Lloyd Babb SC said Mr Jonas had later told police Hoffmann “told me he was on the glass pipe” and “at one stage he told me he had had too much” on the morning Hoffmann was pulled over in the Proton.
But Mr Jonas said he had no memory of any of his conversations with the alleged killer on that morning after having suffered a head injury and memory troubles.
Hoffmann had swapped out his red Commodore for the hatchback and would also be seen driving a white HiLux that afternoon before prosecutors allege he murdered four men less than eight hours after the traffic stop.
He has pleaded not guilty to all charges and his trial continues on Thursday.
UPDATE, Wednesday 1.15pm: Alleged Darwin shooter Ben Hoffmann instructed a friend that if police started asking questions to “tell them I’m delusional” on the morning of his alleged killing spree, a court has heard.
Mihalis Makrylos told jurors in Hoffmann’s trial he was at home asleep in the early hours of June 4, 2019 when he was woken by someone “vigorously knocking on the door”.
Mr Makrylos said the man at the door was Ben Hoffmann who then claimed he had been poisoned and asked him to accompany him to the hospital.
He said he initially declined before agreeing to go with Hoffmann, who drove them both to Royal Darwin Hospital where he produced a bag of the drug ice.
“He gave me a bag with ice in it and he told me to hold onto it and he told me to get out of the vehicle,” he said.
The jury was told that Hoffmann then went into the hospital and Mr Makrylos started walking back home but was stopped a few minutes later when Hoffmann pulled up beside him and told him to get back in the car.
“Once we drove past my house … I asked him (to) please take me home and he said ‘No, we’re going to go for a drive’,” he said.
Mr Makrylos said the pair then made a brief stop in Malak before continuing on to a service station in Pinelands where Hoffmann instructed him to buy some bottled water, which he did.
“We started driving out towards Humpty Doo and then he asked me if I still had that bag on me, of ice and he told me to pour some into one of the water bottles,” he said.
“I gave him that water bottle and he drank from it while he was driving.
“The highest speed he hit up to was 180km/h and I was asking him to slow down but he wouldn’t listen to me, I feared for my life just in that.”
Mr Makrylos said after visiting an address in the Rural Area, Hoffmann drove back to Pinelands where he declared he was “too f***ed to continue driving” and Mr Makrylos took over.
“Meanwhile he was hitting 180km/h again so that’s where we swapped, I drove and I stayed on the speed limit, I drove so far and then he was unhappy on the way I was driving and then he aggressively told me ‘Get out, I’m driving’,” he said.
“Then he jumped on the driver’s side and he was hitting speeds up to 180km/h again on the way back to (the) United petrol station in Casuarina, that was our next stop.”
Mr Makrylos said Hoffmann this time asked him to buy orange juice and he again complied before Hoffmann drove them back to the hospital.
“Once the nurse had called him in, he called me over,” he said.
“He called me back and he said to me ‘If police or anyone say anything, tell them I’m delusional.”
Also on Wednesday, another friend of Hoffmann’s, John Rorvik, told the court the alleged killer had asked him to help him “get a gun” in the weeks prior to the shootings.
“I said I’d try but I didn’t have any intention of doing it,” he said.
But under cross examination by defence barrister Jon Tippett QC, Mr Rorvik agreed the request had been made at around the same time Hoffmann had also complained of someone being on his roof and “trying to get in to kill him”.
“He seemed to be in significant fear for his own safety, is that right? In fact he was terrified, wasn’t he?” Mr Tippett asked.
“Yes,” Mr Rorvik replied.
Hoffmann has pleaded not guilty to all charges including four counts of murder. His trial continues.
TUESDAY: A “terrified” Ben Hoffmann arrived at a Darwin service station worried people were “going to get him” on the evening before his alleged killing spree in June 2019, a court has heard.
Edith Reidy was working behind the counter at the Puma servo in Coolalinga and told jurors in Hoffmann’s trial he showed up shortly before 6pm on June 3 saying “he was in a lot of trouble”.
Ms Reidy said Hoffmann “looked terrified” and said “this is not my fault this is how it’s going to go down, this is her fault, they’re after me”.
On CCTV footage played to the jury, Ms Reidy can be heard telling a colleague Hoffmann “just left this phone with me and (said) if anything happens ring the cops”.
“He just passed it to me and he said he was on the phone there talking to somebody going off. I don’t know what’s going on,” she says on the tape.
“Then he walked over and he goes ‘something’s gonna happen to me, here’s my phone, ring the cops if something goes down’ and I’m like — I couldn’t even — I’m like ‘What’s going down?’ and he jumps in the car and he went.
“I don’t know what’s happening, what’s going on. It’s like he’s gonna get murdered.”
Ms Reidy said she then lied to Hoffmann about having to shut the shop early because she was scared.
“I wasn’t scared of him, I was scared of the people coming for him going to come to me,” she said.
“So I lied to him to say I’m shutting up shop but I shut the shop, I still had two hours before I finished.”
Also on Tuesday, former Royal Darwin Hospital emergency room doctor Ross Dryden told the court Hoffmann had come to hospital in the early hours of the following morning complaining about being “poisoned”.
But Dr Dryden said there was no evidence of any poisoning or any symptoms requiring medical intervention or anything else out of the ordinary aside from “slight” agitation.
“He’d earlier been pacing up and down a little bit in the waiting room, it’s hard to describe, he was just, he seemed a bit unsettled but he was perfectly compos mentis,” he said.
“I could hold a coherent conversation with him, he didn’t seem intoxicated, he was making sense.
“I’ve written underneath ‘Benjamin is requesting an antidote but I’ve advised him this is neither necessary nor possible, advised to go home and see how he goes, advised to return if still unwell this PM’.”
Dr Dryden said he didn’t take any blood or refer Hoffmann to a mental health specialist as everything about him appeared “completely normal”.
But in cross examination, Hoffmann’s barrister Jon Tippett QC, suggested there was “one thing that appears, is there not, to be quite abnormal”.
“Here he is, apparently a normal person sitting in front of you and he’s complaining about being poisoned and the poison affecting him and he wants you to give him an antidote?” he said.
“Now is that normal? It isn’t, is it, doctor?”
Dr Dryden said he saw “lots of unusual people in the course of a shift” who he didn’t refer for a mental health assessment but agreed that complaining about poisoning and requesting an antidote was not normal behaviour.
Hoffmann has pleaded not guilty to all charges including four counts of murder. His trial continues.
EARLIER: ALLEGED Darwin gunman Ben Hoffmann twice presented to hospital complaining that his drink had been “spiked” by “dodgy people” on the morning of his alleged shooting rampage, a court has heard.
Triage nurse Stephanie Grainger told the court she was on duty at Royal Darwin Hospital when Hoffmann turned up shortly before 1am on June 4, 2019.
“He said that he thinks he needs help, he thinks someone had poisoned him,” she said.
“He said that he saw his friend put something in his drink, in his energy drink.
“He wasn’t 100 per cent sure but he was pretty sure that he saw his friend put something in his drink.”
After that Hoffmann was seen by clinical initiatives nurse Brianna McLarty who tested his vital signs which were all “within normal limits”.
“His concerns were that he felt as if his drink had been spiked, he was feeling dopey and groggy, he said and he reported to have been hanging out with dodgy people,” she said.
Ms McLarty said she suspected Hoffmann may have been on drugs at the time but said she didn’t do a blood test to find out for sure.
“He did seem to be somewhat atypical in his presentation, in his movements and his conversation,” she said.
“He just sort of had inconsistent or irregular movements, he was sort of a bit pressured, he was talking sort of as if he was on a time restraint.”
But Ms McLarty said Hoffmann left the hospital without seeing a doctor before returning about 4.26am when she checked his vital signs again and they were again within normal limits.
“There was another man accompanying Mr Hoffmann at that time, his relationship I’m not sure but they obviously knew each other,” she said.
This time Hoffmann was able to see a doctor but would not be admitted until more than 12 hours later after allegedly gunning down four men in a bloody shooting spree across Darwin.
EARLIER: THE woman who alleged mass murderer Ben Hoffmann “believed was his girlfriend” has told jurors in his trial he was smoking ice and “bossing” one of his alleged victims around on the day before prosecutors say he gunned down four men.
Kelly Collins told the court she observed an “awkward” interaction between Hoffmann and Michael Sisois at her home in Humpty Doo on the day before Mr Sisois was killed in June 2019.
Ms Collins said the trio were smoking ice in the late afternoon when Hoffmann “made (Mr Sisois) stand in the garden with a mozzie coil”.
“I observed Hoffmann standing over Sisois, dominating him, intimidating him,” she said.
“(He) told him to take a mozzie coil out in the garden and stand there with it.”
Ms Collins also testified that the ice she smoked with Hoffmann “didn’t taste right”.
“It just was off, maybe burnt, I’m not sure,” she said
Earlier, former Hells Angels Darwin chapter president Ian ‘Krane’ Hogan told the court he had “known of (Hoffmann) for probably 20 years” but “not personally” and denied ever poisoning him.
Mr Hogan said the last time he saw Hoffmann was “approximately three or four years ago” when he was visiting a friend at Holtze Prison.
“Ben Hoffmann approached me and muttered a few words and that was the last time I ever saw him,” he said.
Ms Collins also denied having any association with the Hells Angels or being “pimped out” by the man Hoffmann was allegedly looking for during the killing spree.
Hoffmann has pleaded not guilty to all charges, including four counts of murder. His trial continues.
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