Police officers have described the harrowing experience of rescuing one colleague and retrieving the bodies of two others after an attack on a rural property.
Emotional police officers have been hailed as heroes after telling an inquest how they rescued a colleague and retrieved bodies while under fire at a remote Queensland property.
After parking in the driveway of the Wieambilla property to stop shooters escaping in a vehicle, Senior Sergeant Christina Esselink heard the “bang, bang, bang” of shots from a high-calibre rifle.
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“This was big and it was close, and I thought we’re in trouble,” she told Brisbane Coroners Court on Friday.
As she was trying to find cover, another officer screamed at Esselink to run.
“I’ve just bolted over and he sort of lifted me and shoved me from behind.”
Esselink was giving evidence at an inquest into the shooting deaths of Constables Matthew Arnold and Rachel McCrow and neighbour Alan Dare who were ambushed and shot by Nathaniel, Gareth and Stacey Train on December 12, 2022.
The Trains were killed in a gunfight with specialist police that night on the property in the Western Downs area, west of Brisbane.
Asked if it would have been possible to take Dare’s body from the scene after parking her vehicle, Esselink said: “I thought about it but he had been murdered and it was a crime scene, and it was just shots and gunfire and we had nowhere to put him.
“It was sort of respectful to leave him … where he was. Everything was just crazy, crazy at the time.”
Sergeant Werner Crous told the inquest about an extraction team sent to rescue Constable Keely Brough who hid in grassland near a burnt-out vehicle after her colleagues were killed and retrieve the bodies of the two officers.
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Crous thought not more than four officers would volunteer knowing there was “a deadly thing going on” and he anticipated leading the team, he told the inquest.
“Instead of just getting four people being willing to enter this dangerous situation, I got four car-loads of people.”
One of those officers, Senior Constable Duncan Miller, said Brough had no physical injuries but was visibly traumatised when she was rescued.
A triple-zero operator speaking to Brough provided code words which Miller yelled out so she would know officers were nearby rather than the attackers.
Brough ran, holding her firearm until Miller yelled to holster her weapon.
“Then she’s launched herself over the fence,” he told the inquest, tearing up.
Asked if anyone hesitated before the extraction, Senior Constable Andrew Gates told the inquest: “Everyone was there voluntarily and everyone was prepared to do what needed to be done.”
At the property’s entrance he saw the vehicle gutted by fire and Dare’s body but kept moving, feeling like he was in a “fatal funnel” or a kill zone where there isn’t any cover.
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After Keely was rescued, Gates and his colleagues struggled to put the bodies of Constables McCrow and Arnold into a vehicle before leaving the property after a police helicopter arrived.
Legal representatives for officers and the police commissioner, and State Coroner Terry Ryan, thanked the officers for their bravery and leadership.
Queensland Police Union president Ian Leavers said the officers are heroes who showed extreme bravery while in danger.
Their actions have finally been acknowledged by the police service nearly two years after the shooting, he told media outside the court.
“It disappoints me incredibly … I think it could have been done a lot sooner.”
The inquest is set to continue for at least another four weeks.
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