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Dezi Freeman: The disturbing video that sent alleged cop killer over the edge before two officers were killed

Madeline CoveThe Nightly
Dezi Freeman's secret facebook page rant before the alleged cop killings.
Camera IconDezi Freeman's secret facebook page rant before the alleged cop killings. Credit: The Nightly

Warning: Disturbing content

Just weeks before fugitive gunman Dezi Freeman allegedly gunned down two Victorian police officers, he raged online about a brutal case of police misconduct that had shocked the country.

On August 9, the day two rogue Sydney officers were sentenced for savagely assaulting a vulnerable woman, Mr Freeman reportedly posted a furious tirade on his secret Facebook account.

“GUTLESS WORTHLESS PIG VOMIT WENT TO PRISON FOR THIS COWARDLY ATTACK THAT SHOWS WHAT COPS ARE REALLY LIKE,” he wrote, sharing a news link about the jailing of officers Nathan Black and Timothy Trautsch, The Daily Mail reported.

Former police officers Timothy Trautsch (left) and Nathan Black have been jailed for at least three years.
Camera IconFormer police officers Timothy Trautsch (left) and Nathan Black have been jailed for at least three years. Credit: AAP

The pair had been convicted over a sadistic 2023 attack in Emu Plains, where they pepper-sprayed a naked woman’s genitals, kicked her in the head and dragged her across the road.

Former police officers Timothy Trautsch and Nathan Black have been jailed after they beat and tortured a woman.
Camera IconFormer police officers Timothy Trautsch and Nathan Black have been jailed after they beat and tortured a woman. Credit: 7NEWS

Judge Graham Turnbull condemned their behaviour as “gratuitous cruelty,” telling the court, “I struggle with what the possible reason was, beyond the intention to inflict gratuitous pain.”

Eighteen days after Mr Freeman’s post, two officers, Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim de Waart, were dead, allegedly shot by Mr Freeman when police came to his Porepunkah property to serve a warrant.

A third officer was wounded, while Mr Freeman vanished into the Alpine bushland.

Mr Freeman’s hidden Facebook profile, “Buffalo Ezi,” was originally created to share photos of “nature, family and friends.”

But in August, it became a mouthpiece for his deep mistrust of police and the justice system.

“Australia’s justice system is littered with corruption – it’s a scam,” he wrote on August 12.

Days before the shootings, he shared a YouTube video titled Do Australians have rights? with the grim note: “We are not free.”

Investigators now believe the posts give insight into his state of mind leading up to the deadly ambush.

The case that so enraged Mr Freeman centred on a schizophrenic woman, released from jail just hours earlier, who refused to cooperate with the two young constables.

Body-cam and CCTV footage suppressed for more than a year and finally released at sentencing shows her naked, sobbing, and pleading for help as she is thrown to the ground, stomped on, punched, and sprayed six times with capsicum spray.

The victim died of unrelated causes 18 months later.

Acting NSW Police Commissioner David Hudson said the assault “completely contradicts the commitment we make as officers to uphold the values and ethics of wearing the blue uniform.”

“As a police officer of over 40 years, this is one of the worst examples of contravening our core values and ethics I have ever seen,” he said.

“This type of behaviour is not acceptable at any level within the New South Wales Police Force.”

Both Black and Trautsch have been sacked and are now serving prison terms of more than five years.

For Mr Freeman, the case appeared to confirm his sovereign citizen beliefs that Australia’s justice system was “a scam.”

Weeks later, his alleged attack on officers escalated into one of the darkest chapters in Victoria Police history, and he remains on the run.

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