When Dezi Freeman was killed after a 216-day manhunt, reporter Cassie Zervos was one of the first people outside of the police to know – with the new mum finding out just minutes after it happened.
On March 30, Victoria Police found Freeman hiding in a shipping container on a remote property in Thologolong, and began a three-hour stand of with the fugitive before he was fatally shot.
“I was about to go and meet a girlfriend to go to a mum and bubs gym class, but my Apple Watch kept vibrating so I checked by phone and the message said ‘DF found’, then a second later it said ‘DF dead’,” the 7News crime reporter tells Woman’s Day.
“I was holding Lucy thinking ‘who is DF’ obviously in baby mode running on no sleep – then it hit me and I just felt this sensation of heat running through my body questioning if it was true.”
After three different sources confirmed the news, Cassie, who’d been on maternity leave since October, lept out of mum mode and back into journo mode to break the story live on television.
“My boss called and said we’re going to get you live on air, and I thought ‘what do you mean?’,” Cassie says.
“I hadn’t washed my hair in seven days, I had baby vomit on my shoulder and I’ve been in baby mode for a while, but a few minutes later I was on the Morning Show providing a live update.”
BREAKING THE STORY
For Cassie, the morning of August 26 last year was like any other spent visiting various crime scenes around Melbourne with her cameraman.
But all that quickly changed when she first learned that Freeman had shot and killed two police officers who were executing a search warrant at his home in Porepunkah.
“It was freezing in Melbourne that morning, and I’d just entered my third trimester of pregnancy so I was feeling pretty heavy on my feet and everything was starting to hurt,” Cassie tells.
“I was having a snack in the cameraman’s car when messages from my contacts started coming through saying there’d been some sort of incident during a search warrant in Porepunkah. This contact told me two police members had been shot dead, and in that moment I just remember I had my hand on my stomach and my heart just sank.”
But soon her news instincts kicked in – and she and her cameraman made the 4.5-hour journey to Porepunkah in Victoria’s Alpine region where they went live on-air for about seven hours.
“Once we arrived, there were so many police roadblocks and officers were pulling cars over and checking them to make sure Freeman wasn’t hiding in one,” says Cassie. “I remember thinking we won’t be here for long, assuming he’d be captured or killed by the time we got there, but I ended up staying in Porepunkah for 17 days.”
EERIE FEELING
Freeman, who was a self-proclaimed sovereign citizen, fatally shot officers Neal Thompson and Vadim De Waart-Hottart while executing a search warrant relating to historical sexual offences.
He then fled into nearby bushland, kicking off a manhunt that would last seven months.
With Freeman nowhere to be found, and the small community grieving the loss of Neal and Vadim – Cassie says the feeling in Porepunkah was eerie, but they welcomed her with warmth.
“There were a few days wheer some of the coffee shops gave me a free coffee just to keep me warm, which was a lifesaver while working such crazy hours and heavily pregnant,” says Cassie.
But the town was also living in fear of Freeman, who at that point was armed and considered highly dangerous.
“The police union boss told me that some officers felt safer standing at police roadblocks at night, which is not safe,” she explains.
“They felt it was safer to do that rather than be out in their police uniforms out in the open during the day.”
As the manhunt went quiet in October – Cassie began her maternity leave and a month later, welcomed her daughter Lucy into the world with husband Paul in November.
An inquest held this week found that Freeman told officers to “come and get me” before he was shot and killed on March 30.
“Negotiations were attempted, however, were unsuccessful as the deceased was non-compliant with the negotiator’s instructions, calling police thugs and bullies, and saying that they were just there to hurt him,” Council Assisting Lindsay Spence told the inquest.
DARK PATCH OF HISTORY
As in the inquest continues, Cassie has teemed up with 7News anchor Michael Usher to unpack the story she’d covered for months for a podcast series called Dezi Freeman: The Hunt.
“I think this case will be remembered for being a really dark patch in Victoria’s history,” says Cassie.
“When people join the police force, I think Neil and Vadim will be remembered as two brave men who were out to protect the community and find justice against a man who hd serious allegations against him.”
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