Talk:Wieambilla shootings

The first shooting was a mass shooting.

The siege consisted of the initial shooting, the one that killed the 2 officers, a neighbor and injured another, and the second shooting killed 3 more people. By the definition Wikipedia goes by, mass shootings are when 4 or more are shot excluding the perp, so shouldn't the initial attack be mentioned as a mass shooting and not an ambush? Mixed Biscuit (talk) 12:24, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Whether or not the incident is considered a mass shooting, that does not prevent it from being an ambush. Where is this Wikipedia definition of a mass shooting? WWGB (talk) 12:31, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Mass shootings and ambushes are non-mutually exclusive. The article Mass shooting states there is no consensus on the definition, but that the term has been used in some incidents with as few as three surviving victims, while others have required a minimum of five fatal shootings.Ypna (talk) 06:12, 14 December 2022 (UTC) incorrect; Brough was not injured.

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Who shot Alan Dare?

I may have missed definitive sourcing in all the media articles but I cannot find any official statement that the Trains shot and killed Alan Dare, the neighbour who came to investigate. The media reports seem to accept this as implicit but neither of the two spokesmen - the police commissioner and the police union leader - ever stated this directly, merely saying that he was shot in the back. Can anybody find a source that is not just a journalist?

This report quotes Dare's wife:

"Ms Dare told NCA NewsWire she was kept in the dark by police on what was unfolding and was left to endure a horrific wait for information about what had happened to her husband.

'They're not telling me anything and I don't know if they will tell me anything,' she said.

'I know that he's gone but I don't know who killed him.'

She also talks about her husband left for dead, his property being seized, and no effort made to contact next of kin. As one of the very few non-senior police sources for this incident, she is clearly not conforming to the careful phrasing and slanting being provided to the media. The two police who survived the shooting have, so far as I know, not spoken directly about the events to the media apart from an anodyne statement released through the union. --Pete (talk) 18:47, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

"The brothers are the offenders who police say shot and killed two armed officers and neighbour Alan Dare". [1]

"Nathaniel Train ... , his brother and sister-in-law shot two Queensland police officers and a civilian dead in Wieambilla, police say.[2] WWGB (talk) 06:26, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

I thought I had made it clear. I'm well aware of articles like that where no sources are given. If "police say" something, then just who and when and where are the police saying it? What exactly did they say? Do we have any specific person making this claim? As I say, there may be a definitive source; it's just that I haven't seen one and I've been paying close attention to this. We don't have a single eyewitness report of anything before the police counterattack. The closest we hve is the wife of Alan Dare and she is pretty scathing in her remarks about the police. The Australian attributes some information - about jumping the fence and the male cop driving away from his three comrades - to a "source close to the investigation".

Surely if the event occurred as described, then we would have the two surviving cops front and centre at press conferences? With the three residents dead, there is no need to be coy about evidence in an ongoing investigation. Instead the survivors, their immediate superiors, and all police in the region have totally clammed up apart from obviously prepared statements that contain no details.

I think that if we in wikivoice are going to say that specific named individuals killed other specific individuals, then we need to be pretty sure of our sources. I have no problems with saying that the Trains murdered the two police because there is really no alternative scenario that makes any sense. There are two dead police and one shot up police vehicle and it seems unlikely that they fell to gunfighting amongst themselves and blamed the situation on the innocent Trains who were quietly having a cup of tea. There seems to be sufficient evidence that the Trains were conspiracy theorists opposed to government especially in the form of the police, and they had come to the bizarre point where they were willing to shoot up anyone in a police uniform.

But for this neighbour, we have no details at all apart from the report - from whom? - that he was shot in the back, which in itself makes little sense. If he was approaching the property to lend a hand, then was he walking or driving backwards? If someone saw him shot in the back, then why do they not identify the shooter? If on the other hand that detail comes from an examnation of the body, then that is a different story.

More details are emerging. The police had called on the Trains previously. They had an arrest warrant for Nathaniel Train related to an illegal border crossing with multiple firearms. I don't think that we need be laying blame or making unsourced claims about the police handling of the situation but I do thnk that we can be careful with our wording if we do not have solid sourcing, especially when no eyewitnesses can be found willing to identify themselves as the source of what few details have emerged from the very top of the Queensland police tree. --Pete (talk) 10:05, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Surely an eyewitness would be a primary source, which is not our preferred source. Is there some specific reason why you think the ABC, SBS and 7 News are not reliable secondary sources when they say the Trains shot Dare?

The fact that he was shot in the back is unusual, but given that he was investigating the fire - so not necessarily approaching the Trains directly - it is plausible. The Trains had apparently "wounded and then fatally shot [the police] again at close range", so they evidently weren't "playing fair". Mitch Ames (talk) 10:49, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

It seems to me that Pete is hinting at a bizarre alternative universe where the cops shot Dare in the back! We have multiple reliable sources that report Dare being shot by the Trains, more than sufficient to pass the WP burden of evidence. Let's stick to the known facts as posted across the media. WWGB (talk) 11:27, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

"Bizarre"? The whole thing is bizarre. Weird new details keep on emerging. Apparently Constable Arnold was shot with a rifle bullet in the stomach that travelled up his spine and lodged in his neck, killing him instantly.[3] That seems pretty bloody bizarre to me. The problem is that theee "multiple reliable sources" have all turned out to be effectively unsourced. None of these journalists link back to an eyewitness or an authority figure making a definite statement. I've asked a couple of times if you can find anything more definite than a journalist writing "police say". Not because I think they are lying but because we as an encyclopedia should go for the best possible source in this still developing story. I think at the very least we should be cautious in what we say in wikivoice as definite fact when we can't actually tie a claim back to a reliable source. (ETA. The article as it stands now seems reasonably well-founded.) --Pete (talk) 19:14, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

bullet in the stomach that travelled up his spine and lodged in his neck, killing him instantly.[4] That seems pretty bloody bizarre to me. — The source you mention, the Daily Mail, is not considered reliable. Mitch Ames (talk) 03:05, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Just another magic bullet. WWGB (talk) 03:28, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, that thought occurred to me as well. They eventually solved that puzzle. I dare say in due course we'll get more answers. Right now there are a few very odd things about this. Obviously the cops aren't being completely straight in their initial stories - as one expects when something goes wrong - for example the revelations that it wasn't just a missing person check out of the blue; they had a warrant for the guy's arrest on weapons and other charges and they had visited multiple times previously which is why they sent four cops in a coordinated operation. My experience in watching the Queensland Police since the days of Bjelke-Petersen is that when they promise an investigation to get to the facts, the report is never released if the police made mistakes. Of course police make mistakes; they are human, after all, and doing a difficult and dangerous job under pressure. I just wish they'd be more forthcoming about it. In the meantime we have an encyclopaedia to write and facts are our bread and butter. --Pete (talk) 10:38, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

• @WWGB and Skyring: in hindsight is this still a conspiracy theory you two are willing to endorse? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 07:09, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Inquest

Has the outcome of the inquest into the death of Alan Dare been released ? Doug butler (talk) 02:05, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Has there been an inquest yet? I can't see anything listed on the link off [5]. Kerry (talk) 08:56, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

Article title

I find "Wieambilla police shootings" a bit misleading as a title. Are we discussing the police doing some shooting at Wieambilla? Perhaps the annual marksmen competition? It seems to me that it doesn't make clear that police were being shot at (as opposed to doing the shooting) and it doesn't indicate the seriousness of the shooting (that the police were killed, not just bullets wizzing past). Looking in Category:Murder in Australia, it would seem the most common naming of the Wikipedia articles is "Murder of ..." in which case should it be "Murder of police at Wieambilla" or something like that. I can understand when the article was started (at the time of the event), we didn't know too much about the whole situation, but, this morning's statement by the Qld Police says "executed a planned attack directed at police" and that "There was significant evidence of advanced preparation and planning" (with more detail of ambush sniper positions etc). Your thoughts? Kerry (talk) 02:13, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the current title could be misconstrued, but I dislike the focus on police only. It is a disservice to Dare. Perhaps something like "Wieambilla shooting" or "Wieambilla murders"? WWGB (talk) 02:55, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Agree it could change. Don't like "Murder of police at Wieambilla" as there was also a civilian victim. LibStar (talk) 02:58, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

"Wieambilla murders" works for me. It doesn't capture that this was a deliberate ambush of police, but equally I agree the death of the non-police neighbour is a complication in the naming. Of course, if we make "Wieambilla murders" the title, we can have as many other redirects as we like to include other words that people might use in search terms such as "police", "dare", etc. Kerry (talk) 07:55, 18 February 2023 (UTC)

What's wrong with "Wieambilla shootings"? I don't find any "X murders" in the Category:Mass shootings in Australia tree; almost everything is "shooting"/"shootings" or "massacre", and the only exceptions are the Battle of Broken Hill and one biography of a mass shooter. If you look at Category:Mass shootings in the United States, you find just 13 uses of "murder"/"murders" (and four aren't really on topic: "Murder of Nick Corwin", "John List (murderer)", a redirect, and an appearance in the category description), versus 168 uses of "shooting"/"shootings". Nyttend (talk) 19:01, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

SERT breach

SERT didn’t breach the house, they were positioned all around the outside as the suspects had built a wall to cover themselves 117.20.69.111 (talk) 12:47, 11 June 2023 (UTC)

Soverign Citizen Movement ties?

Would this attack fall under the soverign citizen movement in addition to Christian fundamentalism? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.118.219.43 (talk) 19:50, 8 November 2023 (UTC)

Additional Arrest in Connection to Attack

Breaking News Story https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-06/qld-wieambilla-shooting-arrest-arizona-queensland-police/103196120

"The 58-year-old was arrested near Heber Overgaard, north-east of Phoenix, on December 1 US time as part of the investigation into what police have labelled a religiously-motivated terrorist attack." 110.175.174.167 (talk) 04:41, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

I have added something to the article about it. Note that you are also free to add content to this article. HiLo48 (talk) 05:54, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

At the time of the articles publication, little detail on its relevance to the shootings was apparent. I wanted to have the article flagged as potentially being relevant to the case and await further information before it was added. I could have been more specific with my talk post. 110.175.174.167 (talk) 03:37, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Drug Use, Reactions & Fundamentalist Christianity?

I recently saw a couple of news articles claiming this attack was religious, which puzzled me as from what I recalled the connection was tenuous. On a whim I thought I'd double check if the attack had been noted on Wikipedia - it has, but this piece shares the same problems as the news articles.

- There is no mention of the drug use previously reported. Was that claim subsequently disproven?

- The reactions section has responses by PM Albanese, the Queensland premier, New South Wales premier, and condolences by assorted police entities. Why not Ronald Train's? Is it not relevant, or too belated to factor in? Family of perpetrators usually defend their relative, but he didn't!

- The attacks are labelled as a fundamentalist Christian terrorist attack, the Trains as religious extremists who subscribed to "a broad Christian fundamentalist belief system ..." yet premillennialism is the dominant view of evangelical Protestants and I haven't heard or seen any evidence of the Trains being practicing Christians, quite the contrary in fact. Does fundamentalist, as used here, include such types, or is does it refer more to the wild eyed AK-47 wielding sort that stars in so many older Hollywood films? If fundamentalist is =/= evangelical Christian, and fundamentalist belief =/= mainstream Christianity, then does the article need to be qualified? The Investigation section quotes Linford for instance, and yet even a cursory reading of Wikipedia shows she's either clueless on the subject, or else Wikipedia's premillennialism article is badly wrong. I know which was I'm leaning but I'm hoping others might suggest how to modify things rather than do anything unilaterally.

Thoughts? 121.45.141.74 (talk) 05:49, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia content is based on reliable sources. The article appears to be well sourced to me. But you are free to provide other appropriate sources that support your view. HiLo48 (talk) 06:14, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Reliable sources that go into details are difficult to find but what about https://www.news.com.au/national/queensland/news/cop-killers-in-strange-love-triangle-as-locals-say-train-brothers-used-ice/news-story/35b2d63b454e8c964abad47a15477347. Per the article in question a local from the nearby town of Tara said the brothers had been taking ice (amphetamine) around the time of the shooting. Delusions and paranoia can occur not only in heavy users, but even with therapeutic doses - though this is rare.

As for the pre-mill issue, what about commentary by Bill Muehlenberg an American-born apologist and ethicist who teaches ethics, apologetics and theology at several Melbourne Bible Colleges - https://billmuehlenberg.com/2023/02/17/christianity-eschatology-and-terrorism/

Yes it is a blog i.e. generally unacceptable, but it is said apologist\ethicist\theology teacher's site and thus an expert source no? Per 'your' reliable sources link - "Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications".

In short it argues that claims by authorities about connections to premillennialism are wild, reckless and defamatory. They clearly know nothing about the subject, ignore the fact many millions of Christians subscribe to premillennialism, and by suggesting it is cultic and linked to terrorism, engaging in religious bigotry and vilification - which is supposed to be illegal. (Note Muehlenberg spoke about this on a radio program but there's no link or reference to say when or which station sadly). Christianity is the exact opposite of what the Trains engaged in yet whereas when Muslims go all Allahu Akbar and kill infidels in Australia, which has happened, the media seek alternative explanations, but the media and police are focusing on 'Christian fundamentalism' despite how tenuous the connection is. Just like ancient Rome "... authorities blamed Christianity for the evils of their day because they either hated it, or were totally ignorant concerning it. I guess history can repeat".

Alternatively - https://www.christiantoday.com.au/news/history-is-repeating-itself.html

The CT link basically says authorities appear to be pulling a Nero. They're clearly speaking in ignorance about something they know nothing about, and ignoring the impossibility of what they're claiming. While the blog article is more in depth, CT is the published source.

Thoughts? I can consider what and where additions should go if the sources are accepted. I very much doubt there will be MSM articles on the pre-mill aspect though so expert commentary as opposed to Linford publicly demonstrating her ignorance will be hard to find elsewhere.121.45.136.160 (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 03:56, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Assuming no commentary I'll consider making changes in the future, perhaps a summary of both sources and the drug claim elsewhere. 121.45.138.79 (talk) 06:18, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I think that neither is a reliable source, on expert grounds or otherwise. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:27, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

What would be the difference between the wild eyed AK-47 wielding sorts and the wild eyed 10/22 wielding sorts? Is firearms selection an indication of religious convictions? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:27, 3 January 2024 (UTC)