Bushfire Emergency Unearths Fugitive's Secret Hideout in Victoria
For seven months, Dezi Freeman had vanished into the remote high country of Victoria, seemingly disappearing like a puff of smoke. He could have remained hidden for years, but his luck ran out in January when a national emergency struck the tiny town of Walwa, an area he had previously chosen for its isolation.
Catastrophic Blaze Triggers Chain of Events
Devastating bushfires tore through the region, burning over 100,000 hectares, destroying 14 homes and 70 structures, and requiring more than 350 firefighters with aerial support to contain over a month. A neighbour revealed to Daily Mail that the fire began just metres from the abandoned shipping container where Freeman was hiding. Without communication or warning alerts, it was a miracle he survived the inferno.
However, the very act that likely saved him from the flames ultimately led to his demise. Daily Mail learned that Freeman began backburning around the property in a desperate bid to protect himself as the fire front closed in. After the fire, teams assessing damage and resident welfare detected suspicious activity on the supposedly abandoned farm.
Covert Police Surveillance and Discovery
Many locals had been evacuated, and with the owner, Rick Sutherland, interstate, the farm was marked as 'unoccupied'. A close friend explained, 'Dezi is a bushman and he is experienced in back burning. He would have done that if the fire was that close. So when the firefighters came in to do that themselves, that would have been noted as suspicious.'
Recovery teams quietly began monitoring the area, and once movement was detected, covert police surveillance was established. Police used over a month to ascertain if Freeman was being aided by associates, tracking a car linked to him making repeated 200km trips between his former home in Porepunkah and Walwa.
Fatal Standoff and Aftermath
On Monday morning, an elite specialist police team was deployed. After a three-hour standoff where Freeman refused to surrender, he was gassed and shot dead in a hail of bullets. During the confrontation, he is understood to have pointed a gun at officers, taken from a dead colleague months earlier.
Locals were shocked to learn they had been living near the double killer, who had been on the run since August after gunning down two Victoria Police officers during a raid in Porepunkah. One neighbour, Rebecca, told Daily Mail she called the landowner during the fires, saying, 'That fire was right there on the edge of the property. I called Rick to check he wasn't down there, and he told me he was in Tasmania, so no one would have been concerned about it.'
Reward and Investigation
This twist explains why no one is expected to claim the $1 million reward offered by Victoria Police for information leading to Freeman's capture. Rather than a tip-off, it was the bushfire emergency and subsequent suspicious activity that exposed his secret lair. The coroner is leading an independent investigation into the saga, and Freeman was described by acquaintances as an experienced bushman who knew the Victorian high country intimately.
