{"id":453823,"date":"2026-02-02T15:40:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T15:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/453823\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T15:40:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T15:40:16","slug":"slain-police-officer-neal-thompsons-sister-says-death-would-be-too-good-for-dezi-freeman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/453823\/","title":{"rendered":"Slain police officer Neal Thompson’s sister says death would be ‘too good’ for Dezi Freeman"},"content":{"rendered":"

The sister of one of the two police officers shot dead in Victoria’s high country last year says death would be “too good” an outcome for the alleged shooter.<\/p>\n

Police this morning renewed an extensive search for alleged gunman Dezi Freeman, revealing they believed it was a “strong possibility” that the fugitive was dead somewhere in Mount Buffalo National Park.<\/p>\n

Police officer Neal Thompson farewelled at funeral<\/a><\/p>\n

Lisa Thompson says her final weekend with her boyfriend before he was killed in a shooting at Porepunkah was their best yet.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Lois Kirk \u2014 the sister of slain officer Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson \u2014 told the ABC that death would be “too good for him”.<\/p>\n

“But I don’t want to keep him in prison,” she added.<\/p>\n

The shooting in August 2025 sparked an enormous manhunt for the fugitive, who fled into bushland on foot.<\/p>\n

However, the efforts of hundreds of police, specialist equipment and cadaver dogs have so far failed to reveal any trace of the 56-year-old.<\/p>\n

Watching tragedy unfold ‘horrible’<\/p>\n

Senior Constable Thompson had been among a group of about 10 officers executing a warrant related to historical sexual offences at Freeman’s rural property on August 26, 2025.<\/p>\n

The 59-year-old was days away from retirement after nearly four decades in the police, most recently in the Wangaratta branch.<\/p>\n

He and his 34-year-old colleague, Senior Constable Vadim de Waart-Hottart, were killed in a subsequent shootout, while a third police officer was injured.<\/p>\n

\"Dezi<\/p>\n

Dezi Freeman has not been seen since fleeing on foot into bushland behind his Porepunkah property last August. (Supplied)<\/p>\n

“We were just informed by phone call, my sister was,” Ms Kirk said of the day of the shooting.<\/p>\n

“Then she came to my workplace and told me.”<\/p>\n

Ms Kirk said the period that followed, when the case was subject to intense media interest as Freeman remained at large, was “horrible”.<\/p>\n

But she said the family was “used to it now”.<\/p>\n

“We’re pretty tough. We don’t show a lot of emotion,” she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Kirk said the family had also received lots of support from Senior Constable Thompson’s mates over the past five-and-a-half months.<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

Senior Constable Vadim de Waart-Hottart was also killed in the Porepunkah shooting. (Victoria Police)<\/p>\n

‘The police force was Neal’s life’<\/p>\n

At his funeral in September, Senior Constable Thompson was remembered as a kind-hearted friend and a loving partner to his bereaved girlfriend, fellow police officer Lisa Thompson.<\/p>\n

Ms Kirk remembered her brother as a person who made the outdoors “his playground” and was a valuable member of the police force.<\/p>\n

“He was very tough,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Very much ‘I’ll get in there and help’. He was a very, very good cop.<\/p>\n

“The police force was Neal’s life. He loved it.”<\/p>\n

Police on Monday said there was “no proof” that Freeman remained alive more than five months after the shooting.<\/p>\n

More than 100 officers and volunteers are currently undertaking a five-day search in Mount Buffalo National Park<\/a> as they pursue the theory that the 56-year-old has died.<\/p>\n

A $1 million reward remains on offer for information leading to the arrest of Mr Freeman, the largest arrest reward in Victoria’s history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The sister of one of the two police officers shot dead in Victoria’s high country last year says…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":453824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1300,74053,72303,74054,72541,43,234255,647,74052,44,1158,71351,4905,41,39,42,40,660],"class_list":["post-453823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-death","tag-dezi","tag-dezi-freeman","tag-freeman","tag-fugitive","tag-headlines","tag-lois-kirk","tag-melbourne","tag-neal-thompson","tag-news","tag-police","tag-porepunkah","tag-shooting","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-victoria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/453824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}