Today is Monday the 30th of March. At approximately 8:30 a.m. Australian Eastern Standard Time this morning, wanted Australian fugitive 56-year-old Desi Freeman was shot dead by Victorian police at a rural property in Northeast Victoria.
Welcome to a special breaking news update here on Shadow Matter. Wanted fugitive Desi Freeman has been shot by police in an undisclosed rural property in Northeast Victoria.
Self-proclaimed sovereign citizen Desmond or Desi Freeman has been on the run from the authorities since late August last year 2025.
Two police officers were killed by Freeman at his Poor Punka property whilst conducting an arrest warrant for an earlier sexual assault charge.
Desi Freeman fled into the Victorian bush afterwards and has been at large hiding and evading police until today.
Shortly after 11:00 a.m. This morning, the Victorian Police Commissioner Mike Bush held a press conference to address the update of the situation.
A lot of the details at this stage have been purposefully withheld during the press conference.
In time, we are promised more information, but here’s what we know right now. The property location remains undisclosed.
There was a 3-hour standoff between the man who is believed to be Desi Freeman and the Victorian police.
Victorian Police Commissioner Mike Bush has stated that Freeman was given every chance to cooperate with police and surrender peacefully, but it looks like at this stage that he failed to comply with police demands.
There are suggestions that Freeman exited the building on the property which has been described as being a cross between a container or a long caravan.
Another rumor is that Freeman exited this construction wearing a blanket and he was heavily armed or armed at least.
Commissioner Bush also reported that police acted accordingly and that the shooting was justified. The first people made aware of today’s shooting of Desi Freeman were the families of the two officers slain by Freeman last August.
Detective Leading Senior Constable Neil Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim De Waard. At this stage, we have no idea who owns the property, if the owners of the property knew Freeman, or even if they had been helping him, but we are assured by Commissioner Bush that they will be interviewed as part of the post investigation.
Interestingly, this breaking news comes after the last police update in which Victorian police reported they believe Desi Freeman to be deceased.
Last December, cadaver dogs assisted in a targeted 5-day search for Freeman’s remains. This was brought up in the conference today, to which Commissioner Bush stated that while it was a good question, our professional investigators must explore all avenues of inquiry and that just happened to be one of them.
It has been reported by the media over the last 7 months that police believed Desi Freeman was potentially harbored by supporters and urged him to turn himself in.
Freeman’s Filipino wife, Amalia Freeman, also urged her husband to surrender. The search for the 56-year-old became Australia’s largest ever tactical police operation with personnel from interstate, the federal police force, and New Zealand police joining the hundreds of Victorian police searching for the fugitive.
As their efforts continued for months without a confirmed sighting, police posted a 1 million Australian dollar reward for information leading to his arrest, the largest of its kind in Victoria’s history.
The big question remains, how did all of this end up so tragically? A deep dive into Freeman’s radicalization may hold the answer.
According to an investigation from ABC, Freeman, whose real name was Desmond Filby, had posted anti-police sentiment in the years before writing on Instagram, quote, “The only good cop is a dead cop.”
End quote. On Facebook, he also called for the extermination of politicians. A disability pensioner, Freeman also tried to arrest a magistrate and was linked to an attempt to have former premier Daniel Andrews tried for treason.
One former friend told the ABC that Freeman had worked on an organic farm, but had long received unemployment benefits because of an inability to take orders.
Okay. At the time, Freeman was about 25 years old and living in his car.
He was unemployable, said the friend who had asked not to be identified. He couldn’t hold down a job.
“It was his temperament,” the friend said. The friend speculated that Freeman must have just lost it when he killed the two police officers.
He blamed the sovereign citizen movement for radicalizing Freeman. According to locals from the rural town of Poor Punka, where Freeman was at the time of the shooting in August, described Desi as a divisive figure in the community.
On the one hand, you’ve got a bloke who helps raise money for the fire brigade and an active part of the community.
On the other, you’ve got reports of aggression and hostility towards neighbors. A pivotal turning point for Freeman was the aforementioned private conviction of former premier Daniel Andrews.
In 20 21, Freeman attended a demonstration following a private prosecution of then premier Daniel Andrews for treason and fraud.
The court hearing descended into chaos with participants who joined by video link showing pictures of their chickens and doctored images of Mr.
Andrews as a dictator, according to multiple media reports. According to those who knew Freeman, the episode was a key moment that solidified his attitude towards police and the authority of the state.
He’d been arrested outside the courtroom and felt like he had been targeted by police, they said.
Police later suspended Freeman’s driver’s license after he was stopped for speeding and refused to take a drug test.
Freeman challenged the decision in the Supreme Court of Victoria, where he complained he and his family were the victims of a malicious prosecution.
Quote, “I had my firearms license canceled and lost my club membership,” Freeman told the court.
Quote, “We endured four acts of criminal trespass and harassment on our own home by police and I have been dragged through 4 years of court hearings.”
End quote. He lost his case. According to other reports from locals and associates of Freeman, he was described by some as a modern-day Rambo with a large arsenal of weapons.
“He had high-powered rifles and he had military rifles,” one friend said. “He has got stuff that you wouldn’t even dream about.
I saw it with my own eyes years ago.” It’s also been said that Freeman had a firing range up in the bush where he would practice target shooting.
Public records also revealed that Freeman had multiple run-ins with the police over the past 30 years, mostly for driving offenses.
Okay, so what about this earlier warrant for Freeman last year? What was the exact nature of it?
At this stage, I can only confirm these facts. The warrant specifically related to allegations of a sexual offense against a child under the age of 16.
The alleged offenses were reported to have occurred within the 2 years prior to the warrant being served.
Because of the sensitive nature of the case, the team of 10 officers included specialists from the Wangaratta Sexual Offences and Child Abuse Investigation Team or SOACIT.
So, that is all the information I have here for you. If this is your first time here, sorry, this is not my usual format, but every now and again I do surprise everybody with a breaking news update.
What are your thoughts on this? Let me know in the comments below. And as always, I’ve been Shadow Matter and you’ve been awesome.
