Wieambilla murders a wake-up call on the dangers of sovereign citizen cults

We simply cannot allow young police officers to walk into these situations without an understanding of the risks they will encounter. Picture: Supplied

Four young police officers ambushed, two of them shot dead, one wounded, the other, who can only be described as a hero, left in a world of pain and trauma, and a neighbour executed, shot in the back.

Three innocent people dead. The three perpetrators, also dead, got what was coming to them.

The term that hasn’t been used by police or media to date is domestic terrorism but that is surely what led to the deaths of three innocent people. The incident also stands as a warning on the dangers of cult behaviour and the rapid radicalisation of individuals amplified by disinformation associated with the pandemic.

There has been a media focus on Gareth Train and his online conspiracy laden rants. Whether it’s the Port Arthur massacre as a false flag or babbling about the “Luciferian agenda”, 5G, Bill Gates, the CIA as a “Jesuit cabal”, freemasonry, and secret government depopulation policies through vaccines, it is mere wallpaper.

The belief systems of conspiracists are an intellectual cul-de-sac for rational people. There’s no point trying to comprehend them or seek some truth from them.

After reviewing several of Gareth Train’s posts, I would identify him as a sovereign citizen aligned conspiracy cultist. This mentality, reinforced in social media echo chambers, led to his radicalisation. In turn, it would appear that his wife and brother were radicalised. In the case of the brother, Nathaniel, it seems his radicalisation occurred in the space of just a few months.

Gareth Train.

Sovereign citizens, sometimes known by their Canadian nomenclature as Freemen on the Land, believe the state and its law enforcement arms have no authority over them.

It’s an amorphous collective. Some sovereign citizens spend their time attempting to find holes in Australia’s constitutional framework. Others engage in doomed but exhausting legal battles with the state or individuals unfortunate enough to have crossed their paths. Some engage in taxation fraud which is how the movement first started in the US in the early 1990s. Many drive the roads unlicensed, their vehicles uninsured and unregistered.

All are living on the fringes of society — geographically, ideologically and culturally. Their numbers are hard to discern but there are various state and federal reports that put the figure at somewhere around 100,000 in this country alone. Not all are dangerous, but many are.

It is only a matter of time before sovereign citizens come into contact with police. That’s where the problems begin. In the US, routine traffic stops have escalated into shootouts. At a routine traffic stop in Arkansas in 2010, Jerry Kane grappled with a police officer before his 16-year-old son, Joseph emerged from the vehicle and opened fire, killing both officers. The father and son sov-cits went on a spree thereafter shooting and wounding two more police officers before they were shot to death by police.

Kane had outstanding warrants, an expired driver’s licence and uninsured vehicle. He and his son had been touring the country holding seminars where Kane would lecture participants on bogus legal pathways to avoid paying creditors or tax.

Sergeant Brandon Paudert was the first cop killed by Joseph Kane. He was shot fourteen times in the head, neck and shoulders by Joseph Kane bearing an AK-47 variant. Paudert’s father, Bob, was chief of police at West Memphis, Arkansas.

Bob Paudert now travels the US speaking to other law enforcement officers to educate them on identifying sov-cits and taking steps to reduce risk. He speaks of practical measures for cops on the beat, calling for backup as a rule.

Jerry Kane was in the FBI database as a red flag, but this was not known to local police. Two weeks earlier, Kane had been arrested and held in custody for two days in New Mexico for failure to produce a driver’s licence. By the time Bob Paudert’s son and his colleague approached the vehicle in Arkansas, Kane and his son were itching for a firefight.

Intelligence that could have been shared was not and a routine traffic matter became a murder scene.

The outpouring of grief over the murders of two young police officers, and the murder of a civilian in the Western Downs of Queensland needs to find form as a wake-up call for law enforcement across the country.

There was clearly a failure of intelligence that led to the ambush. Gareth Train had firearms on the property and licences to possess them. Not unusual in that part of the world. But he had a long history of social media engagement in the conspiracy theory alternative universe. And in 2020, he posted what stands as an ongoing threat to police.

“I have directed law enforcement to leave my premises over the last 20 years, having no reason or grounds, and at times have also asked them to remove their hands from their weapons or pull their pistols and whistle Dixie. Fortunately for me they have all been cowards,” Train wrote.

Had this information been made available to Queensland Police — and it was not hard to find, it is difficult to understand why four young police officers on general duties were dispatched to the property.

Wisdom in hindsight, perhaps.

Two weeks ago, I watched a video filmed by a sovereign citizen. He’d been pulled over by a single highway patrolman for driving an unregistered and uninsured vehicle. The sov-cit refused to show his licence and cited laws and associated nonsense. These are the language triggers that should inform police of what they are dealing with. The police officer was patient and stood his ground. There was no physical altercation and the video ended with the outcome unclear.

The 251 Wains Rd property in Wieambilla.

I got the distinct feeling that the police officer had no experience in dealing with sovereign citizens and was unable to identify the immediate risk he was facing.

That needs to change across the country with training made available to all police officers so they can quickly identify risk. In the US, the standard response is to withdraw and call for back up.

Intelligence and security agencies need to share information across all law enforcement. Similarly, senior police need to do their homework before they send young officers off to enter the premises of a sovereign citizen. This means doing some deep digging into a suspect’s online posts, devoting time and manpower to monitoring conspiracy cult groups and seeking advice from experts in this field.

We simply cannot allow young police officers to walk into these situations without an understanding of the risks they will encounter.

As a society, we need to properly understand the nature of the threat. And that takes me back to my original point, that what occurred in Wieambilla this week was domestic terrorism.