Alleged Bondi Beach gunman charged with another 19 offences
2 hours agoShareSaveAdd as preferred on Google Simon Atkinsonand Lana Lam, Sydney Court sketch of Naveed Akram, 24, during a hearing in February The man accused of killing fifteen people in an attack on a Jewish festival at Sydney's Bondi Beach in December has been charged with 19 additional offences. Naveed Akram was already facing 59 charges after the shooting including 15 counts of murder, 40 counts of attempted murder, and one count of committing a terrorist act. According to court records seen , new charges were filed in April but have only now been confirmed by authorities. The fresh charges are 10 counts of "shoot at with intent to murder", six counts of discharging a firearm with intent to resist arrest, and three counts of causing wounding or grievous bodily harm with intent to murder. Akram, 24, has made a series of short court appearances but is yet to enter a plea to the charges. He is due back in court in August. On Wednesday, prosecutors told the court that investigators from the Joint Counter Terrorism Team were "progressing" steadily through the evidence. It includes 230,000 CCTV images as well as content on several devices belonging to people with alleged links to Akram which need to be translated, prosecutors said. Outside court, Akram's lawyer Leonie Gittani told the media that the extra charges were not a surprise to her client. "He was sort of aware of it on the last occasion, but [in] a matter of this magnitude, it's not unusual for additional charges to be laid," she said, according to the national broadcaster ABC. "It's a process now that we've got to follow." Asked about the CCTV images, Gittani said: "It's an unprecedented matter and so... there's a lot to come. We've got a job to do, and that's what we intend to do". Akram's father Sajid Akram, 50 - who was also armed and shot at the crowd on Bondi Beach - was killed . The younger Akram was critically injured . Court documents released in late December alleged that the two shooters "meticulously" planned the attack on Bondi Beach for months and visited the location for reconnaissance two days prior. One video - taken on one of their mobile phones in October - was described as showing the men sitting in front of an image of an Islamic State group (IS) flag. They could be heard making statements about their motivations for the attack and condemning "the acts of 'Zionists'", police said.
Original story by BBC Asia • View original source
Anonymous Discussion
Real voices. Real opinions. No censorship. Resets in 15 hours.
About NewsBin
Freedom of speech first. Anonymous discussion on today's news. All content resets every 24 hours.
No accounts. No tracking. No censorship. Just honest conversation.
Loading comments...