Bondi shooting suspect had gun training with father before attack, police say

A man accused of killing people at Australia’s Bondi Beach is alleged to have carried out firearms training with his father in a rural area of New South Wales, according to Australian police documents.

The men are alleged to have recorded a video setting out their justification for the meticulously planned attack, according to a police statement of facts.

The police statement was released after Naveed Akram appeared in court by video link on Monday from a Sydney hospital, where he is being treated for an abdominal injury.

Akram, 24, faces 59 charges, including 15 counts of murder, 40 counts of causing harm with intent to murder over the wounded survivors, and one count of committing a terrorist act, following the attack in Sydney on December 14 that killed 15 people and injured dozens more.

Akram was wounded by police during the incident, while his father, Sajid Akram, 50, was shot dead at the scene.

The New South Wales government said Akram was transferred from hospital to prison on Monday, though authorities did not identify either facility.

Sajid Akram conducting firearms training in a countryside location, suspected to be in NSW. / Credit: NSW Courts and Tribunals/PA

Police allege Akram and his father began the attack by throwing four improvised explosive devices towards a crowd celebrating an annual Jewish event at Bondi Beach, but the devices failed to explode.

The devices were described as three aluminium pipe bombs and a tennis ball bomb containing explosive material, black powder and steel ball bearings. While they failed to explode, police said they were “viable” IEDs.

The antisemitic attack, which came at the start of the eight-day Hanukkah festival, was Australia’s worst mass shooting since a lone gunman killed 35 people in Tasmania in 1996.

Sajid and Naveed Akram just after 2.00am exiting 103 Brighton Avenue in Campsie, carrying long and bulky items wrapped in blankets. / Credit: NSW Courts and Tribunals/PA

The New South Wales government introduced draft laws to Parliament on Monday that Premier Chris Minns said would become the toughest in Australia.

The proposals include making Australian citizenship a requirement for a firearms licence, a change that would have excluded Sajid Akram, an Indian citizen with permanent residency.

Sajid Akram legally owned six rifles and shotguns. Under the proposed laws, recreational shooters would be limited to a maximum of four firearms.

One of two home-made painted IS flags found in the vehicle used by Sajid and Naveed Akram. / Credit: NSW Courts and Tribunals/PA

Police said a video found on Naveed Akram’s phone shows him with his father reciting “their political and religious views and appear to summarise their justification for the Bondi terrorist attack”.

The men are seen in the video “condemning the acts of Zionists” while they also “adhere to a religiously motivated ideology linked to Islamic State,” police said.

Video shot in October shows them “firing shotguns and moving in a tactical manner” on grassland surrounded by trees, police said.

“There is evidence that the Accused and his father meticulously planned this terrorist attack for many months,” police allege.

An impromptu memorial near the Bondi Pavilion, where thousands of mourners left flowers and messages after the massacre, was removed on Monday as the beachfront returned to normal activity.

Part of the memorial will be preserved by the Sydney Jewish Museum.

Funerals for the victims continued, including a service for French national Dan Elkayam in the nearby town of Woollahra, the centre of Sydney’s Jewish community. The 27-year-old had moved from Paris to Sydney a year ago.

The health department said 13 people injured in the attack were still in the hospital on Monday.