‘It’s a really nice knife’: Bondi Junction killer’s voice heard for first time

The voice and words of Bondi Junction Westfield mass killer Joel Cauchi have been heard in public for the first time, a year since he took six lives and was shot dead by a heroic police officer.

The recordings, made 15 months before the stabbing attack, captured a “missed opportunity” to intervene in Cauchi’s psychological deterioration, despite the desperate attempts of his loving mother and police to get him help.

The 40 year-old was living with schizophrenia and unmedicated for years before he walked into Bondi Junction Westfield armed with a USMC Ka-Bar knife and began stabbing innocent shoppers in April 2024.

A coronial inquest into the mass casualty event has reconvened for a second week of hearings focusing on interactions Cauchi had with police in his home state of Queensland.

Body-worn videos captured by QPS officers are the very first public record of Cauchi speaking.

Queensland Police Senior Constable Matthew McDonald and his partner Constable Hope Porter were called to the Cauchi family home in Toowoomba at dusk in January 2023.

Body-worn video from both officers, played in the inquest, began with a fidgety Cauchi in a purple LA Lakers jersey on the nature strip outside the weatherboard house.

The inquest has heard of Joel Cauchi’s troubled mental health history.Credit: Facebook

Cauchi had called the police, saying his father had taken away his “military collectibles”, including a USMC Ka-Bar knife.

The police seemed unsure about what type of items Cauchi was speaking about until Porter spoke to Cauchi’s mother, who said her son had been “raging” about his knives.

“They’re not army knives, they’re pigging knives,” Porter said, pulling McDonald aside.

“(Joel) actually laid hands on his dad saying ‘Gimme my knives!’ ”

McDonald told Porter that Cauchi appeared to have a “hard-on” for the knives.

Cauchi is clearly spoken as he speaks to police at his parents’ home.

“I was actually studying – English teaching,” Cauchi tells McDonald with a slight chuckle.

“I’m happy with living here, and it’s normally fine, but I just can’t afford this. It’s a really nice knife, it’s collector’s stuff I enjoy.”

Michele Cauchi outside her Toowoomba home in the days after the attack.Credit: Nine News

Cauchi’s mother Michele tells Porter her husband confiscated the knives because their son had been hearing voices and stomping around the house in the early hours.

“My son’s got schizophrenia, he’s really not well. He needs help. A couple of years ago he was at university, at the top of the class,” Michele said.

“I don’t know how we are going to get (him) into treatment, unless he does something drastic.”

When medicated, Michele told Porter, her son was a different man. He spoke two languages and had a degree.

The videos are striking because Cauchi is almost unrecognisable from the stony-faced and emotionless man who silently stalked through the shopping centre one-year later.

Ashlee Good, 38, Dawn Singleton, 25, Jade Young, 47, Yixuan Cheng, 27, Faraz Tahir, 30, and Pikria Darchia, 55, died in his three-minute rampage. He was shot dead by NSW Police Inspector Amy Scott.

The magnitude of Cauchi’s decline was not lost on the multiple QPS officers who gave evidence this week.

“He was well-dressed, he looked after himself, he was well maintained, you could tell he was educated,” Porter told the court.

“He didn’t spend his entire life crazy, he was a high-functioning human being, and I don’t know where the decline happened.”

Queensland’s laws prevented the officers from detaining Cauchi for a mental health assessment.

Prior to 2017 police were formerly allowed to detain people for an Emergency Examination Authority (EEA) if they pose an immediate risk to themselves or others. But that changed to only cover people who were a risk to themselves.

“There was nothing there to show he was a threat to himself … He certainly did not meet the criteria for an EEA,” McDonald told the court on Monday.

McDonald’s camera recorded as he scrolled through a list of warnings on a data terminal. One showed Cauchi had mental health problems, the other that he held a weapons licence, which the officers discussed.

“Oh, crikey,” Porter replied.

“He’s not getting his knives because who knows. Especially if he’s gonna lose contact with reality.”

The police at the time concluded there was nothing they could do that evening and left Cauchi on the dark nature strip as the crickets chirped.

But they emailed a mental health intervention co-ordinator (MHIC), a specialist within the QPS, warning Cauchi’s parents feared he would “harm himself or them” with the knives.

The MHIC was supposed to follow up with the Cauchis, but the email was overlooked and never acted on.

QPS’ acting MHIC, Peter McDiarmid, told the inquest he had no explanation for why he never acted on the email, other than he had been busy helping another unwell person that same shift.

“Unfortunately, it was an oversight and I did not follow up,” McDiarmid told the inquest.

CCTV footage of Cauchi during the Bondi Junction attack.

The station’s full-time MHIC, Tracy Morris, said McDiarmid was one of the very few officers willing to even act in her role when she was on leave given it required a specialised knowledge and interest in mental health, and the dire consequences if something went wrong.

Morris became emotional speaking about how devastated McDiarmid had felt since learning he had “missed an opportunity” to intervene in Cauchi’s deterioration.

“Had that been you in the hot seat at the time, would you have followed up?” counsel assisting Peggy Dwyer asked Morris.

“Yes,” she replied softly.

“(McDiarmid) had been thorough. It was an unintentional oversight.”

The inquest on Wednesday heard security staff in the Westfield took almost 20 minutes to make any public alerts about the armed attacker.

CCTV showed four members of the security teams huddling in a control room watching screens, speaking with supervisors and police over the phones.

Cauchi had began his attack at 3:33pm and was shot dead at 3:38pm. An emergency alarm went off one minute later but made no mention of an active armed offender.

The first alert about an attacker was made over the PA system at 3:52pm.

A senior security worker told the inquest the announcements should have gone out quicker.

“Everyone on the day tried to respond in the best way we could,” said Joseph Gaerlan, a security supervisor.

“I really feel frustrated watching the CCTV post the incident because, in my mind, the reality of the incident did not span over such a length of time.”

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