requested the police <\/a>retract the statement, saying it made people think he was \u201ca criminal\u201d. In response to questions from Guardian Australia about their request in September 2023, the force said it was unable to comment because the shooting was subject to an ongoing investigation.<\/p>\n\u2018Gentle giant with a calm presence\u2019<\/p>\n
On Thursday, the inquest heard from assistant professor and forensic psychiatry expert Danny Sullivan, who concluded that Pampalian had probably slipped into a psychosis over the course of six months. Neither his tight-knit family nor doctor noticed anything out of the ordinary, nor had he ever experienced anything like it before.<\/p>\n
Eddie Pampalian (right) with his father, Chris. On Friday, the deputy state coroner wept as the family\u2019s lawyer read out a statement on behalf of Eddie. Photograph: Isabella Moore\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
Sullivan said Pampalian\u2019s psychosis, which appeared to manifest in a religious delirium, was in no way connected to his anxiety disorder, for which he had taken a daily antidepressant since 2014.<\/p>\n
On Friday Pampalian\u2019s brother, Eddie, described him as a \u201cgentle giant with a calm presence\u201d and the \u201cstar in the eyes\u201d of his two nieces. He knew Pampalian lived with anxiety, but said even at its worst, it only ever manifested as panic attacks.<\/p>\n
At 10.30am on the morning he was shot, the inquest heard, Pampalian\u2019s parents left the house. They said Pampalian appeared normal, and thought he was off work due to the flu.<\/p>\n
The inquest heard that multiple neighbours called police on the day of Pampalian\u2019s death after they saw him muttering to himself and chasing a woman up the road. One neighbour said he saw Pampalian try to get into one home on the street before entering another, which he didn\u2019t realise was Pampalian\u2019s own home.<\/p>\n
The police thought they were attending an active break and enter and not a mental health incident. The inquest heard that the first responding officer, Const Jason Bryan, who retired after the incident, shot Pampalian three times after he suddenly appeared metres away and ran at him with two knives.<\/p>\n
Sullivan told the inquest he couldn\u2019t see \u201cany way in which the police had the opportunity to engage in discussion or could seek to mollify his anxieties or distress\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI also believe there was no information that could have assisted police in approaching that situation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Police have made number of changes<\/p>\n
The inquest heard the force has changed several of its policies since 2023.<\/p>\n
Police officers\u2019 body-worn cameras now automatically turn on when an officer draws either their gun or Taser. The action will also switch on the camera of any officer standing within a 10-metre radius.<\/p>\n
Bryan did not turn on his body-worn camera before he shot Pampalian, and told the inquest he did not have time to do so until after the incident.<\/p>\n
The police have also increased the frequency of mental health training for officers, to annual face-to-face training.<\/p>\n
\u201c[The change] came as a result [of a] number of critical incident and mental health coronial matters,\u201d Det Supt Kirsty Hales told the inquest.<\/p>\n
On Friday, Pearce wept as the Pampalian family\u2019s lawyer read out a statement on behalf of Eddie, who sat at the inquest all week.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany people have been affected by this tragedy, not just our family,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSteve was loved deeply by his family and friends. He was known as a gentle giant with a calm presence and a warm sense of humour. Steve had a way of making people feel comfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n
The statement said he often spoke with one of his two nieces.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter his passing, one of the hardest moments was hearing her cry and say he would never know all the new things that happen in her life now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man shot dead by a NSW police officer after he ran at him with two knives was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":522660,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-522659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522659","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=522659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/522660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}