By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
A FEDERAL agent has described to a coronial inquest how he discovered teenager Numan Haider was shot in the head in front of Endeavour Hills police station on 23 September 2014.
Officer C, who can’t be identified, told the Coroners’ Court hearing on 16 March that two colleagues in a joint counter-terrorism taskforce agreed to meet Haider in the car park on the evening of the shooting.
One of those members – a federal agent ‘Officer B’ – returned into the station’s foyer soon after, clutching the right side of his head.
Officer C saw from a monitor inside the station that the agent was distressed, and ran to the foyer with another federal agent.
In the foyer, he saw a large gash on the side of Officer B’s head and asked a female citizen to phone triple zero.
Officer B said something to the effect of “he’s been shot”, Officer C stated to the inquest.
Another federal agent, Officer D, stated to the inquest on 16 March that he also ran to Officer B in the foyer and found him bleeding from his head and stomach.
“Haider went to shake my hand and then he just stabbed me,” Officer B allegedly told him.
Officer C then went to the car park and found the other JCTT member, Officer A, standing and his weapon drawn.
Officer A – a Victoria police detective – was facing Haider, who was lying on the ground on his back about four metres away.
Officer A, who said he’d fired the fatal shot, indicated that his shaking, cut left arm had been stabbed by Haider.
“The crook stabbed me,” Officer A said – or words to that effect – according to the statement.
Haider had a large “trauma wound” to his head and appeared dead, Officer C stated.
Officer C believed at the time Haider was holding a metallic object the length of a ruler.
The JCTT had allegedly requested the meeting with Haider to talk about the teen yelling and waving an Islamist banner in Dandenong Plaza five days earlier.
They also wanted to ascertain his security threat level, Officer C stated.
It was decided Haider would be met in front of the police station by a Victoria police officer and a federal police agent to build rapport and check him for weapons.
Two other JCTT members, Officer C and another federal agent, would wait inside.
“We didn’t want to intimidate Numan by having all four of us in the car park,” Officer C said in a statement tendered to Coroner John Olle.
“We wanted a low key, softly-softly approach, in particular given that we didn’t have the power or the basis to arrest Numan.”
About 7.32pm, Haider phoned to say he had arrived and was waiting in the car park. His arrival was sooner than anticipated and “caught me by surprise”, Officer C said.
“We would have preferred for Officers A and B to have already been in the car park when Numan arrived.”
Officers A and B are expected to appear at the inquest today.
