Fifth slaying in spate of Melbourne shootings

A fifth person has died on Melbourne’s bloody streets within 10 days after Winis Apet, 20, was shot when he left a busy cafe.

Police at the scene of a Sunday’s murder in which 20-year-old Winis Apet was shot and killed outside a Springvale cafe. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

A fifth person has died on Melbourne­’s bloody streets within 10 days after a young man, Winis Apet, was shot and killed when he left a busy cafe in the city’s southeast on Sunday night.

The brazen shooting has prompted a former gangland detectiv­e to warn that criminals will take advantage of the overworked homicide squad to settle scores.

Paguir Pan, 19, faced court yesterday charged with the shooting murder of Mr Apet, 20, in a laneway as he left a crowded cafe in Springvale.

Mr Apet had spent about an hour in the cafe with friends and was allegedly ambushed and killed with a single shot to the chest 48 seconds after going out the back door of the building. Paramedics worked on him but he died at the scene, making him the fifth man shot and killed since March 1.

Associates of Mr Apet said he knew that he was a target.

“The victim, I know him personally, the victim has been posting it up all night saying that he heard that he was going to get shot up,” one woman told media.

Cafe owner Ali Adam said Mr Apet was “calm and collected” in the cafe and described the gun used in the shooting as “sophis­ticated”.

CCTV images broadcast yesterday showed the suspected gunman allegedly on his way to the shooting, carrying a bag thought to have contained the weapon.

Winis Apet.

Mr Pan, from Dandenong, was arrested 12 hours after the incident and was charged yesterday afternoon with murder. He was brought to the Melbourne Magistrates Court but did not appear.

His lawyer made no application for bail and he was remanded into custody ahead of a hearing tomorro­w.

Solicitor Katie Powell told the court Pan did not want to appear “due to how he’s feeling” and requested that he be seen by a custody nurse.

Police moved quickly yesterday to rule out links with other recent­ shootings across the city, which have included a shooting at a boxing match on March 1, a shooting in Dandenong on March 3, and the shooting of two men in Meadow Heights on March 4.

“Police believe the parties were known to each other and do not believe there is any further threat to the community,” a spokes­woman said.

Former homicide detective Simon Illingworth warned that “itchy trigger fingers” could lead to more deaths.

“When you start getting a spate of these things, some of the drug dealers, organised crime, start getting itchy trigger fingers,” he said.

“The unfortunate reality is when these things start occurring in fairly large quantities, as now, people take opportunity of the overworked homicide squad tied up investigating them to settle a score.”

Police confirmed the two men allegedly involved in the Springvale shooting knew one another.

SES crews searched a path in Dandenong looking for a weapon or other evidence. The Police Minister Lisa Neville said that there was no reason for the public to feel unsafe.

“These are people often involved in bikie gangs or organised crime,” she said yesterday.

“Police are taking it extremel­y seriously.”

Police also tried to reassure the public.

“By any standard, ­Melbourne is a safe city. By global comparisons we are a safe city,” Commander Tim Hansen said.

Weapons and explosives offences have more than doubled in less than a decade, according to data compiled by the Crime Statistics Agency Victoria.

There were just over 7000 offenc­es of this type recorded in 2009, with the figure skyrocketing to 15,701 in 2016 before declining slightly to 15,022 last year.

Sunday’s shooting follows a wave of shootings in Melbourne over the past two weeks.

The first shooting occurred last Friday week in Kensington, where three men were shot outside the Melbourne Pavilion, killing builder Ben Togiai.

Two people were arrested in Bankstown in Sydney’s west on Friday night over the shootings. Mikhael Myko, 25, has been extradited to Melbourne, while 27-year-old Abdullah El Nasher is in hospital after jumping from a balcon­y.

Two days after the shootings in Kensington, Mitat Rasimi’s body was found with multiple bullet wounds after he crashed his car in Dandenong in the city’s southeast.

On March 4, Ali Ali, 28, and Deniz Hasan, 40, were found dead 500 metres apart after being shot in Meadow Heights about 10pm.