The moment police sniper killed teacher turned extremist, Stacey Train

An elite police sniper put a bullet through the head of a former schoolteacher turned Christian extremist as she pointed her rifle at a heavy armoured vehicle in a final stand against authorities after her husband and former lover murdered two young constables.

The conspiracy theorist killers behind the Wieambilla shooting: Gareth Train, Stacey Train and Nathaniel Train.

You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Give us your feedback.

You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Give us your feedback.

You can now listen to The Australian's articles.

An elite police sniper put a bullet through the head of a former schoolteacher turned Christian extremist as she pointed her rifle at a heavy armoured vehicle in a final stand against authorities, after her husband and former lover murdered two constables.

Two Special Emergency Response Team operatives told the ninth day of a coronial inquest into the Wieambilla shooting in western Queensland that the weapons used by Gareth, Nathaniel and Stacey Train during the siege were so powerful that bullets “rocked” a 9.5 tonne BearCat and smaller armoured vehicles.

Police stormed the remote property and killed the trio on December 12, 2022, hours after the Train men shot dead constables Rachel McCrow, 29, and Matthew Arnold, 26, and good Samaritan neighbour Alan Dare, 58.

A still from Polair 2 as it hovered over the Trains’ house. It shows Stacey Train standing on the stairs. Picture: QPS

Moments after Gareth Train died after being shot at 10.32pm by a sniper identified only as SERT Operative 201, his wife, former schoolteacher Stacey Train, emerged from the house carrying a rifle aimed at police.

“And that’s when I engaged the female, Stacey,” Operative 201 said.

“Given she had a firearm in her possession, I was able to do that from my position.”

The sniper’s shot hit her in the left side of the head before exiting out the other side. She immediately dropped her 22. calibre rifle and toppled down a short set of stairs.

The operative told the inquest they only injured Gareth Train, who was hit in the head and hip by police.

Nathaniel Train – a former school principal once married to Stacey Train and the brother of Gareth Train – was the last alive.

BearCat team leader, SERT Operative 114, told the inquest their team moved to within 60m of the stronghold as the principal kept shooting at them with a high-powered rifle from a log hide on the ground.

“The negotiations continued the whole time for him to surrender,” Operative 114 said.

“It was like his last stand as he stood up to fire the Glock when he was ultimately engaged.”

Nathaniel Train was shot in the head and killed at 10.39pm.

A Queensland police BearCat with several button holes in its windscreen.

The siege was sparked by the Train brothers ambushing four constables from Tara and Chinchilla, who had jumped the gate of their 43.5ha property, 311km west of Brisbane, to do a missing persons check on behalf of NSW police for the school principal.

The first shot at 4.37pm killed Arnold instantly, with McCrow executed minutes later.

Dare died after going to investigate the shots and associated fires. Two other officers managed to escape.

Operative 114 said the initial barrage of bullets unleashed by Gareth Train on the BearCat was so ferocious that the team was forced to retreat.

“There was a volley of gunfire like nothing that I had experienced before,” the SERT operative said.

“The accuracy of the first six or eight rounds to the front of the BearCat and how it rocked when a number of those rounds hit the front of the car was quite surreal.

“The laminate certainly was bulging on the inside.”

Detective Senior Sergeant Terrance Fergusson, from the Queensland Police Service Firearms and Cannabis Team, told the inquest that six guns and hunting equipment on the property were largely “unremark­able.”

The Trains had several high-powered rifles, two sawn-off firearms, and stocks of ammunition, as well as two spears, a number of hunting knives and two camouflage suits.