A coroner has handed down his findings in the case of a gunman who sparked a three-day manhunt in the Goulburn Valley and southern Riverina before being shot dead by police last year.
The coroner found the police officer who shot Stanley Gordon Turvey dead in September last year had acted appropriately.
The officer fired three shots as Special Operations Group police confronted Turvey, who was armed with a sawn-off shotgun at an Ardmona property on September 20, 2023.
The coronial inquest examined the conduct of police during the firearm prohibition order compliance search in Katandra West on September 18, 2023, as well as their conduct in attempting to locate and apprehend Turvey on September 18, 19 and 20.
It also examined the use of force by the police Special Operations Group officers in his final moments, with Turvey shot dead by an officer.
Coroner John Cain also looked into the absence of body-worn camera footage or any other recording of the interaction between police and Turvey on September 20, as well as the absence of any radio recording of the SOG officers or State Surveillance Unit that day.
The inquest heard Turvey, 33, led police in a manhunt that started in Katandra West on September 18, when police went to check on Turvey at a Katandra West property.
Turvey was not allowed to own or possess guns.
A police intelligence circular had been sent out on July 28, 2023, over footage where Turvey had shot a gun out of the window of a car and that he was in possession of a long-arm gun.
The intelligence circular also referenced Turvey saying he was “going to war with police”.
The day after the circular was released, Turvey was charged over possessing an imitation firearm with a detachable silencer.
On September 9 and September 14, 2023, he was seen in Shepparton and Murchison with a sawn-off gun.
On September 18, 11 police officers in five vehicles went to a house at Katandra West to do a Firearms Protection Order compliance search warrant on Turvey.
On arrival about 11.30am, Turvey ran to a bungalow out the back, before pointing a gun at two police officers telling them “f*** off and leave me alone or I’ll blow my head off”.
Police drew back before Turvey fired a shot into the air.
At 12.24pm he drove off from the property.
In the hours that followed, Turvey made a man at Youanmite drive him to Finley after crashing the car he had been driving.
He then forced entry to a home, and when the female resident arrived home, frightening her and telling her he knew her partner.
The woman did not tell police Turvey had been there until the next day as she was scared what he might do to her.
Turvey also got his cousin to drive him to Yarrawonga that afternoon and book him into a cabin at a caravan park.
The cousin did not know Turvey was wanted by police at the time and contacted police at 4pm the following day after he found out.
Turvey’s plight throughout Victoria continued on September 19 where incidents included brandishing his gun and getting a man to drive him in to Yarrawonga, and punching a tradie in the head twice while demanding keys to a vehicle.
He briefly turned up in Shepparton later in the morning, before next showing up at a house in Tatura asking for help at 1pm.
By 8pm he was back in Shepparton, asking associates for help, and trying to get into a stranger’s car.
In the early hours of September 20, he was still in Shepparton, turning up at several houses in Shepparton and Mooroopna, before making a woman drive him to a family friend’s home in Turnbull Rd, Ardmona, after 8.30am.
While at the Turnbull Rd house, several people, both in-person and on the phone — including his father — urged Turvey to hand himself in to police.
When the SOG officers arrived shortly after 10am, the woman came out of the house and walked towards police.
When she was halfway to them, Turvey also left the house with the gun.
The court heard he initially held the sawn-off shotgun in the air, before pointing it at himself.
Within a couple of metres of police, Turvey started to pull the gun away from his own temple.
It was then that one of the officers shot Turvey three times, fearing that he was going to shoot one of the other officers, the woman, or turn the gun towards him.
At the same time, another officer used his taser on Turvey.
In handing down his findings, Coroner John Cain said the cause of death was by gunshot injury to the chest.
He found that the “overarching police response was timely and reasonable and there was no missed opportunity to locate (Turvey) earlier”.
Mr Cain also found that while it was “not possible” to determine how long it took Turvey in leaving the Turnbull Rd house to when he was shot, there was “seconds between his appearance outside and the discharge of the firearm and taser” by police.
Mr Cain noted that while there was no ammunition in the gun and it was incapable of being discharged normally, the police did not know this.
He said he was satisfied the firing of the shots and the taser had been in response to a perceived threat by Turvey.
“I’m satisfied the use of lethal force... complied with all legislative and policy requirements,” Mr Cain said.
Furthermore, Mr Cain was critical about the lack of radio recordings from the incident, but said he did not intend to investigate them further, saying they were “best characterised as a misunderstanding” between police and Motorola and had since been rectified.
Mr Cain was also critical of the lack of body-worn cameras by any of the SOG officers or any other recording devices.
A livestream camera had been set up for observation reasons to show the front doorstep, but it did not record, and did not show what happened after Turvey had left the steps.
Mr Cain accepted that current body-worn cameras were impractical for use by covert SOG officers, and that there were no body-worn cameras issued to police on this day.
However, he made a recommendation that the chief commissioner of police continue to review the feasibility of body-worn cameras — or alternate technology — being used when the SOG were operating overtly and that this be implemented when an operationally viable technology was identified.