Dezi Freeman remains missing in Victoria after allegedly shooting two detectives, prompting a large-scale manhunt.
It has been 11 days since Dezi Freeman was seen alive as he fled armed with guns into dense bushland after allegedly shooting dead two detectives in a small Victorian town.
A large-scale manhunt involving 450 officers, heat-detecting aerial assets and assistance from the Australian Defence Force has failed to yield any results.
Parts of Porepunkah, in the state’s northeast, remain shut down and residents are still on edge hoping the self-described sovereign citizen can be found before the weekend.
However, experts say if he has taken refuge inside one of the area’s thousands of mineshafts he may never come out alive.
There is speculation the 56-year-old may be hiding in a mineshaft hole, one of many dotted across the rugged terrain, given the conditions, at times, have been cold and wet with temperatures plummeting to single digits.
Mineshaft experts Christopher Bogusis and Kyle Cranfield agreed he could be underground as cops and sniffer dogs searched above.
Cranfield said the holes provided warmth and protection from the treacherous weather, but it can be dangerous for those who don’t understand how they work.
“CO2 [carbon dioxide] will sit and pool in a mine, you may, at the entrance, be fine, you may even walk into it and be fine … but once you go down below a certain level, it will just pool there,” he told the Herald Sun.
“[If] you lie down in there to take a sleep, you are never getting back out, that’s your forever nap.”
Extra police were being deployed to Porepunkah and the surrounding area as colleagues prepared to farewell Senior Constable Vadim De Waart-Hottart in Glen Waverley on Friday.
Loved ones and colleagues will say goodbye to Detective Leading Constable Neal Thompson, who was on the cusp of retirement, next week.
Travellers and residents have been told to avoid the areas of Bright, Falls Creek and Mount Hotham in the high country and find alternate routes.
The continued manhunt has hurt tourism, with small business owners urging the state Government to provide “emergency economic support”.
A new video of the accused killer has emerged showing him protesting at a park in the town of Benalla during the Covid pandemic.
He is approached by a male and two female officers, with one saying it was fine for the small group to gather and demonstrate peacefully given they were out of lockdown.
But in the almost 30-minute video shared to Facebook, Freeman repeatedly verbally clashes with police as he tried to reason why he did not have to wear a face mask, despite one of the officers saying it was required by law.
“I am speaking to you in relation to the mask coverings. I am not going to get involved in a constant argument here, okay?” a female officer said.
Freeman continued to argue with police.
“Because I know the law and because I try to uphold the law and protect myself and I try to find out what’s going on, they try to demonise me,” he said.
Later, the officer said some of the protesters were in breach of the public health orders for failing to wear a face covering and asked for their names and addresses.
Freeman argued he did not have to wear a mask.
“There’s so many reasons why these, these mask directions often don’t apply, all right, because people are protected by higher laws and those higher laws overrule those other laws. Are you aware of these? Do they teach you this at the police academy?” he asked.
The 56-year-old continued his rant.
“This is the trouble, you guys are given guns, tasers, all this gear. No offence, but like the intelligence of a kindergarten child without the proper training. I don’t mean that offensively,” he said.
The fed-up officer then explained to Freeman he would be placed under arrest for refusing to co-operate with police before the clip showed him fleeing.
Investigators suspect, if he is alive, that he could be being helped by a local or someone from his network to evade police.
Asked about sovereign citizens in the area, Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Mike Bush said they know “those type of people like to live more remotely and off the grid”.
More than 100 properties have been searched since the deadly shooting as officers and sniffer dogs on Thursday scoured bushland near Buckland River.
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