Thank you for following the news along with us today.
We will be publishing some education news later tonight if you’re a real news junkie and want to check back in.
Tomorrow, we will continue to bring you new information about the Floreat killings.
On a lighter note, we will also bring you the latest in WA property, some fun food news and an exciting exclusive interview with a prominent Perth personality in the Lunch with Jesinta Burton series.
See you in the morning!
Emma
Murdoch University Professor Simon McKirdy.Credit: Murdoch University
Sticking with environmental news green groups are lauding Environment Minister Reece Whitby for removing a biosecurity expert and former Chevron employee from a committee tasked with assessing whether a fifty-year extension of the Karratha Gas Plant should go ahead.
Whitby announced on Tuesday he had removed esteemed biosecurity expert and Murdoch University Professor Simon McKirdy as co-chair of the committee after advice from the State Solicitor’s Office over potential conflicts of interest given his employment history at Chevron.
Chevron is a one-sixth owner of the Karratha Gas Plant and Northwest Shelf project.
WA Police Commissioner Col Blanch has responded to Ariel Bombara’s scathing criticism of police actions weeks before her father Mark murdered two Floreat women with one of his 13 legally owned firearms.
In a press conference, Blanch confirmed that Bombara and her mother asked police for a temporary 72-hour restraining order to protect them from Mark in the weeks before the murders took place, but said the idea was rejected because the circumstances “would not have met the threshold of the order”.
WA Police Commissioner Col Blanch.Credit: Hamish Hastie
He said a full internal investigation had been launched into all of the family’s requests for help but revealed the investigation had already begun before Ariel Bombara’s statement was made public.
“A police order is issued where we are concerned about an imminent threat to people,” he said.
“This [request for help] happened some seven weeks earlier [than the murders]. It’s what we knew at the time. We’re all standing here today with the benefit of hindsight.”
Blanch said a family violence incident report was submitted, but that where that report went and what action was taken as a result of it, would form part of an investigation.
“The investigation will determine what we knew at the time and whether those decisions were appropriate,” he said.
“It’s important that we do this thoroughly.“
The Bombara women did not have a violence restraining order on Mark and had not applied for one.
Speaking generally Blanch urged anyone fearing for their safety from a gun owner should apply for a VRO.
“If you are in a violent relationship with a person, a family violence restraining order, immediately will remove firearms from a person,” he said.
Blanch deflected whether police rejection of the Bombaras’ request for a 72-hour restraining order would have discouraged them from applying for a full VRO.
“My job today is not to cause more grief to the family involved. The discussions that were had on that night about a range of things should form part of the investigation,” he said.
“But again, I can only reinforce getting a family violence restraining order would’ve removed guns from any person.”
WA Police Commissioner Col Blanch will hold a press conference at 3pm today to address the claims made by the daughter of Floreat double-murderer Mark Bombara that she tried to warn police on multiple occasions about his threats and guns.
Hakea prisoners are currently in lockdown with staff refusing to open any cells, concerned for their safety amid overcrowded and understaffing.
The WA Prison Officers’ Union said staff had made the decision to lock down the prison themselves after days of warning management the prison could not be operated safely.
Prisoners have been locked in their cells and will not be allowed visitors. Credit: Fairfax
The prisoner count is sitting at around 1170 – 170 prisoners more than the prison can cater for – while operating at 40 to 50 prison officers fewer than what it needed to safely handle that number.
Union Secretary Andy Smith said they had genuine concerns for prison officers’ safety.
“Staff have finally taken it upon themselves to refuse to work in these unsafe conditions,” he said.
“The prison is practically overflowing. There are three people being crammed into cells built for one, there are people sleeping on the floor.
“It’s just an accident waiting to happen.”
Smith said prisoners would stay in their cells and there would be no visitation until further notice.
Premier Roger Cook has just held a press conference, announcing that the contraceptive pill will now be available over the counter for women aged 16 to 39.
He’s been asked to respond to the comments made by the daughter of Floreat murderer Mark Bombara, who shot dead his wife’s best friend and daughter on Friday.
Cook said the details shared by Ariel about the “sickening crime” were distressing, but he declined to comment on her allegations she and her mother repeatedly tried to warn police about her father.
“We will be seeking clarification from police in relation to operational matters,” he said.
Yesterday, WA Police Minister Paul Papalia said Bombara had no criminal record, and that he had only come to the police’s attention recently when his wife requested an escort to collect her belongings from the marital home two months ago, fearing for her safety.
“There had been no reports to police prior to her going on the 31st of March,” he said.
“She did not report an offence, or seek a response at that time in relation to anything that had happened historically.”
Ariel claims she contacted police on three occasions between March 30 and April 2 to raise the alarm about her father’s threats to their lives and his guns.
The daughter of Mark Bombara, who murdered two women inside their Floreat home on Friday has released a statement this afternoon.
WA Police have used genealogy to narrow their search for an alleged child rapist from a family tree of 3500 people to just one – a bricklayer living in Perth with no criminal record.
Gavin Durbridge, 54, was 21 years old when he allegedly grabbed a 13-year-old boy who was cycling through Carine Open Space on the way to his friend’s house in October 1991.
WA police officer Chloe White.
He’s accused of threatening the boy with a knife and ushering him into bushland where the teen was blindfolded, gagged and raped.
Durbridge was refused bail in Perth Magistrate’s Court this morning on the basis that the prosecution had “a very strong case”, including DNA, against him, and that the facts were “some of the worst” ever heard by the Magistrate.
WA Police detective Chloe White said the breakthrough in the 33-year-old unsolved case came yesterday, when Durbridge was arrested and charged with deprivation of liberty and sexual assault.
“It was definitely not the day he expected, and his life will be changed forever,” she said.
She said the victim, now in his 40s, was elated to hear about charges being laid.
To some positive environmental news, scientists have discovered that coral reefs located hundreds of kilometres off the Kimberley coast have avoided mass bleaching despite high summer temperatures.
A team from the Australian Institute of Marine Science and the University of Western Australia have just returned from a field trip to the Scott, Ashmore and Mermaid Reefs.
Ashmore, WA oceanic reefs, off the coast of the Kimberley region. Credit: Anna Cresswell/ Australian Institute of Marine Science
There had been concerns they would be affected by bleaching after satellite monitoring indicated heat stress had been building to levels associated with mass bleaching and mortality early in the summer.
But a series of cyclones and storms in the region between February and April likely cooled waters sufficiently to avoid a mass bleaching event.
AIMS coral reef ecologist Dr James Gilmour, who led the field work, said it was rare positive news to be able to share in the midst of a global bleaching event, and the fifth mass bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef since 2016.
“It was a relief to observe that the WA oceanic reefs had not been impacted in a similar way,” he said.