Victim’s brother lashes out at police, speaks of double tragedy

The brother of one of Darwin’s shooting victims says his sibling knew his alleged killer.

Michael Sisois was one of the Darwin shooting victims. Picture: Supplied

One of four men shot dead in Darwin had previously lost a sister to a shooting, his family has revealed, as they lashed out at authorities for previously releasing the alleged gunman on parole.

Michael Sisois has been confirmed as one of the victims of Tuesday’s shooting spree, gunned down in the Buff Club carpark.

Tragically, one of his sisters was shot dead by her abusive husband in Melbourne more than 30 years earlier.

His family believes the gunman may have been deluded that Mr Sisois spiked his drink and wanted “revenge”.

Mr Sisois, a 57-year-old roofer, was believed to have been out of town working for a couple of weeks and returned to Darwin on the day he was killed.

Relatives are still trying to piece together what happened, only finding out about 10.30am Wednesday that he was one of the victims.

Vince Sisois, whose brother Michael died in the shootings. Picture: Supplied

But they say Mr Sisois knew his suspected killer, Ben Hoffmann.

“All we know is they were work colleagues at one stage,” his sister-in-law, Tammy Sisois, told The Australian.

“From what I can gather myself, this person had it out for a few people, his brain is fried and he has these hallucinations that Michael has once spiked his drink and wanted revenge.

“He was on a rampage, out to get people he had it in for.”

Mr Sisois’s brother, Vince, slammed the NT government for allowing Hoffmann out on parole, saying he was known to be dangerous.

“They knew it, they knew something would happen and they let him out. Why?” he told Sky News.

“It’s their fault. They’ve not done their job properly

Hoffmann pleaded guilty in 2015 to charges relating to an ice-fuelled baseball bat rampage and was released on parole in January. He is expected to be charged today with four counts of murder.

“It’s not fair. They’re looking after the criminals, not the bloody innocent people,” Mr Sisois said.

Michael Sisois had never married and did not have children but was very close to his nieces and nephews.

His sister, Nicki Voukelatos, 38, was shot dead by her husband, Peter Voukelatos, in the Melbourne suburb of Blackburn South in January 1987.

The court was told Voukelatos was deluded about his wife having an affair. He was jailed for 15 years, to serve a minimum of 11 years.

“Now we’re going through it again with this one,” Ms Sisois said.

While the family was aware he got to know Hoffmann, many details were still unclear.

“All the family just gets together trying to put the pieces together, thinking how something would have happened,” she said.

“He’s not married, he hasn’t got kids or anything so he just does what he wants when he wants to, there’s no one to trace him or anything.”

“He wasn’t looking for Mr Smith”

A woman visited by suspected gunman Hoffmann just before the shootings began says he was asking for “somebody with a Greek name”.

Hoffmann turned up at the woman’s house on Jefferis Rd at Humpty Doo, 40km southeast of Darwin, at around 4pm Tuesday. He’d been at least once before, the woman confirmed.

“I couldn’t really understand the name of the person he was asking for,” she told The Australian.

“I couldn’t understand him. I said: ‘I don’t know who you’re saying or what you’re saying, whoever it is I don’t know them’, and that was it.”

The woman has said a friend had previously brought Hoffmann to the house. Hoffmann returned because he had “been misled”, she said without elaborating.

The person he was looking for was not named “Alex” — the name other witnesses say they heard Hoffmann calling during the shooting spree.

“Some Greek name. It wasn’t Mr Smith, I can tell you that.”

Asked if Hoffmann threatened her, she said: “I don’t scare easily.”

Other residents called police after Hoffmann drove into a number of properties on the same road, apparently trying to find the address he’d visited before. One resident saw he had a gun.

Police are believed to be probing Hoffmann’s drug connections or a personal feud as motivations for the Tuesday rampage.

The shootings began just after 5.30pm, with 33-year-old taxi driver Hassan Baydoun the first to be killed, gunned down in Darwin’s Palms Motel where he was a long-term resident.