‘Leave me alone, you terrorist’: Dezi Freeman’s frequent run-ins with the police he hated

Dezi Freeman took his fight over a simple speeding fine all the way to the Supreme Court, claiming he had been harassed by police for a decade and showcasing a hatred for the force that would allegedly lead him five years later to kill.

While trying to clear his name, Freeman labelled officers “frigging Nazis”, “Gestapo” and “terrorist thugs”.

The hearings provide a snapshot of a troubled life. Charges for speeding and refusing a roadside drug test in 2020 led to removal of his gun licence. He told a court he lived in a van with his family while relying on Centrelink payments.

“I felt threatened and preyed upon ... even the sight of a cop or a cop car ... it’s like an Auschwitz survivor seeing a Nazi soldier. What’s worse than a swastika is the inverted pentagram, the satanic symbol that they wear, and they behave like it as well,” he told a judge.

Freeman, also known as Desmond Filby, bounced around almost every level of the justice system in the years before he is alleged to have this week killed Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson, 59, and Senior Constable Vadim de Waart, 35, and injured a third officer.

Court documents show the now 56-year-old appeared in Wangaratta Magistrates’ Court on June 30, 2022, when he was convicted and fined $1200 and had his driver’s licence cancelled for two years for refusing a drug-driving test, using a mobile phone while driving, and driving 16 kilometres over the speed limit on September 28, 2020.

‘Even the sight of a cop or a cop car ... it’s like an Auschwitz survivor seeing a Nazi soldier.’

Dezi Freeman

Freeman took his fight to the County Court and then all the way to the Supreme Court of Victoria seeking a judicial review. He claimed self-defence and later judicial bias, breaches of federal laws and human rights, and a “draconian” penalty. He told the court the cancellation of his driver’s licence was also causing him and his family great hardship, affecting virtually every aspect of their lives.

The County Court heard that on the day of the 2020 driving offences, two highway patrol officers tried to pull Freeman over on the Great Alpine Road near Porepunkah for speeding.

Freeman stopped at a nearby fish and chip shop. Officers pulled in behind him and a heated exchange occurred. He underwent a breath test but refused a drug test, telling the officers it was a medical experiment, while filming the interaction on his phone.

“Leave me alone, you terrorist. Get the hell away from me and go,” he is recorded saying on body-worn camera footage.

“Well that’s the little power trips you love, isn’t it? Out here with guns, guns, terrorising my kids again. I’ve been to court 15 times because of you corrupt scum. You corrupt filth. Fish and chips are getting cold.”

During his appeal hearing, Freeman represented himself and said powerlines, transformers and microwave transmissions might have interfered with the police radar. He then complained about the cancellation of his gun licence.

“What about equality of arms?” he asked while cross-examining one of the officers. “Are you capable of thinking about it? Or are you morally bankrupt?”

Freeman went on to tell the court he had a history of unpleasant encounters with police.

“I had to, like, get myself and my kids out of there and hope I wasn’t ... gonna get chased by [the police informant] or shot at or whatever else unknown,” he said.

“We’re [they] going to search the van? Then they find – because we’ve been fishing – I’ve got a fishing knife in the tackle box. Right? And next thing they pull out a knife and you can see on the front page of the newspaper now, ‘Oh, man’s arsenal of weapons seized in a van.’”

Freeman then claimed he had experienced a “lifetime of bullying and predatorial behaviour by police”.

Judge Peter Lauritsen eventually withdrew the speeding charge but upheld the two-year licence disqualification for the other two charges, the minimum mandatory term, enacting it from April 8, 2024.

Freeman then took his fight to the Supreme Court, where he said he had little education and was an impoverished, homeless disability pensioner who was unable to afford legal representation, calling for his conviction to be quashed.

On November 6, 2024, Justice James Gorton threw out the case.

Freeman also appeared in a magistrates’ court for other driving and safety matters.

On December 8, 2023, a case was heard in his absence at Myrtleford Magistrates’ Court. Court records show he was charged by Wodonga highway patrol with travelling 71km/h in a 60km/h zone at Porepunkah on June 3, 2023. He was convicted and fined $480 and ordered to pay $90.60 in court costs.

On January 19, 2018, Freeman faced the same court over another speeding offence. This time he appeared in person and pleaded not guilty to travelling 90km/h in a 80km/h zone at Tarrawingee on November 11, 2013. Court documents show the traffic camera office infringement was struck out.

At the Myrtleford court on February 5, 2021, a magistrate also withdrew a single charge against Freeman of breaching a personal safety intervention order on June 21, 2019.

It was during the prosecution of this case in mid-2020 that Freeman threatened to have magistrate Peter Dunn arrested for what he claimed was the judicial officer preventing him from having his case heard. During the hearing, Freeman said he was angry the case had been repeatedly adjourned.

He also accused the police involved of collusion and harassment, and complained of having to come to court 15 times.

“Does this court obey the law?” he asked Dunn. “I’m very angry. I have no grace left for anyone involved. You must stand down. You are now in my custody. You are not free to leave.”

Dunn adjourned the case for a contested hearing, telling the accused man, “Just because you say so, Mr Freeman, it doesn’t mean it’s right.

“Time to go, Mr Freeman.”

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