Dwyer said there was evidence Cauchi’s actions followed “rudimentary planning”, but no motive was apparent. In the years before 2024, Cauchi had bought several knives. He bought the knife ultimately used in the attack in south-west Sydney on February 24.
On January 25, he made a note on his phone: “Call knife sharpener and confirm it doesn’t need sharpening for mall use.” Less than a month later, he made a note to “check out malls and also where to run”.
Dwyer said other notes in January and February “all suggest that he was planning a strike or attack”.
The brothers (left and centre) of murdered security guard Faraz Tahir arrive at the NSW Coroner’s Court.Credit: Kate Geraghty
This was “very different to how Mr Cauchi presented or behaved or appeared to think when he was medicated”, Dwyer said.
The inquest heard Cauchi had searched for an article about the neuroscience of serial killers’ brains, bands loved by serial killers, the most recent mass stabbing in Australia, “cop killer”, and: “What do people regret while dying?”
On the morning of the stabbing, Cauchi searched for the Columbine High School massacre.
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Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Marks, the officer in charge of the Bondi Junction investigation and the first witness at the inquest, said Cauchi was an isolated person with darkening fixations, but there was no evidence suggesting he was targeting women.
“I just believed whoever was in his way, when he was running, was who he attacked,” Marks said.
The inquest heard that a security officer, watching CCTV in Westfield’s control room, had stepped out for a bathroom break for less than two minutes. In that time, Cauchi had begun stabbing people. His rampage lasted just over three minutes before he was shot dead.
Marks lauded the bravery of security guards, one of whom died confronting Cauchi, and Young’s partner who warned other shoppers off while rushing to her side in those frantic moments.
But the composure of the veteran detective seemed to break when describing Good, who died saving her child from Cauchi’s attack.
Peggy Dwyer, SC, (left) outside the Coroners Court in Lidcombe on Monday.Credit: Kate Geraghty
“I think Ms Good should be posthumously awarded a valour award for what she did,” Marks said, with tears in his eyes.
The inquest watched a computerised rendering of the path taken by Scott as she chased Cauchi through the shopping centre, ending near the air bridge on the fifth floor.
Marks revealed Scott, face to face with the armed killer, had told everyone to stay behind her as she drew her weapon.
Scott ordered women with prams, who were sheltering in pot plants behind Cauchi, to flee before he began running towards the officer.
He was just 6.5 metres from Scott when her two rounds struck him in the upper torso and neck. A third round flew across the air bridge and hit a pot plant.
Scott’s “textbook” actions and care saved their lives and many others, Marks said.
“The investigation found that Inspector Scott discharged her firearm lawfully and within all policies and procedure; she acted bravely and professionally,” he said.
Floral tributes mark the one year anniversary of Bondi Junction Westfield stabbing earlier this month.Credit: Edwina Pickles
Dwyer said the evidence unequivocally showed Cauchi was a man who was “seriously unwell”, “far from home and far from the watchful eye of his parents”, who had previously kept him connected with health services.
“The expert psychiatric evidence is clear and unanimous that Mr Joel Cauchi was floridly psychotic on the 13th of April,” Dwyer said.
“Expert toxicology evidence suggests that Mr Cauchi had been using cannabis … in the days preceding his death. The use of marijuana also preceded Mr Cauchi’s initial diagnosis of schizophrenia in 2001.
“I expect the court will hear expert psychiatric evidence that use of cannabis would likely have exacerbated the psychotic symptoms that Mr Cauchi was experiencing around the 13th of April, but, conversely, expert evidence is also likely to shed light on the fact that use of cannabis may be a symptom of schizophrenia or psychosis.”
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Dwyer said Cauchi had displayed an interest in guns in 2021, and a psychiatrist provided a report to the “Queensland Police Service weapons licensing branch … in which he confirmed that Mr Cauchi was at that stage, in his view, a fit and proper person to be issued with a weapons licence”.
“The available evidence suggests that Mr Cauchi did not follow through with a gun licence and that is very, very fortunate.”
He was reported to Crime Stoppers in 2022 after attempting to watch a school swimming carnival in Toowoomba, Dwyer said.
“The school took swift action, and he was not permitted to attend,” she said.
The court was not seeking to stigmatise those living with complex and chronic mental illness, Dwyer said, and most people living with schizophrenia will never commit any form of violent attack.
Cauchi’s parents loved and cared for him all his life, and they were shocked he had committed these terrible acts of violence, she said.
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