{"id":665747,"date":"2026-05-12T09:55:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T09:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/665747\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T09:55:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T09:55:11","slug":"porepunkah-property-owner-says-he-helped-a-wounded-officer-after-dezi-freeman-shot-at-police","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/665747\/","title":{"rendered":"Porepunkah property owner says he helped a wounded officer after Dezi Freeman shot at police"},"content":{"rendered":"

The owner of the Porepunkah property where Dezi Freeman killed two police officers says he helped a third officer seriously injured in the shooting.<\/p>\n

Andrew Swift said he saw the aftermath of the incident at his rural property in Victoria’s north-east on August 26, 2025, and assisted the wounded officer.<\/p>\n

Speaking in a short interview to YouTuber Dave Armstrong released on social media, Mr Swift said the officer’s lower half was covered in blood from a gunshot wound and he needed help getting to an ambulance.<\/p>\n

“He was wearing dark coloured pants but you could tell they were all wet from blood from a gunshot [wound] somewhere down on his lower half,” Mr Swift said in the video.<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

The owner of the Porepunkah property where two police officers were fatally shot has spoken in an online interview. (ABC News: Kyle Harley)<\/p>\n

He said it was clear he would not be able to get the officer into a farming vehicle and told police he would get another vehicle to take the officer to an ambulance.<\/p>\n

“I could tell because of his lower injury I wouldn’t be able to get him into the Kubota [ATV] because it is sort of an upright vehicle,” he said.<\/p>\n

“So, I then said to police, ‘Alright I am going to go get a more suitable vehicle so we can get this guy in and get him to the ambulance.'”<\/p>\n

The video is a short preview of a longer interview expected to be released over the weekend.<\/p>\n

\"Screengrab<\/p>\n

Dezi Freeman was on the run for seven months before he was shot by police on March 30. (Supplied)<\/p>\n

In the video. Mr Armstrong said he was contacted by Mr Swift and his wife, Rebecca, in October.<\/p>\n

“Andy was an eyewitness to what occurred on that day. He is the only eyewitness outside of the police and the family,” he said.<\/p>\n

“He wanted to share his story with me and we recorded and went around the property.”<\/p>\n

He said they asked him to “get involved” because of a “serious mistrust of the media”.<\/p>\n

\"Police<\/p>\n

The entrance to the Porepunkah property when the shooting occurred. (ABC News: Danielle Bonica)<\/p>\n

Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim de Waart-Hottart were shot dead during the incident.<\/p>\n

Freeman fled the property immediately after the shooting, which he was living on with his family, triggering one of the largest police operations in Victoria’s history.<\/p>\n

A major manhunt was launched across the region as specialist units searched the bushland surrounding Porepunkah.<\/p>\n

Freeman was shot and killed by police at Thologolong in March after a seven-month search.<\/p>\n

An inquest into the incident will begin later this month.<\/p>\n

Victoria Police declined to comment as the matter is before the coroner.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More news from regional Victoria<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The owner of the Porepunkah property where Dezi Freeman killed two police officers says he helped a third…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[321469,64,63,72303,74052,44,6646,71351,321468,91558],"class_list":["post-665747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-andrew-swift","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-dezi-freeman","tag-neal-thompson","tag-news","tag-police-shooting","tag-porepunkah","tag-rayner-track","tag-vadim-de-waart-hottart"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665747","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=665747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}