Western Australian police have revoked or suspended firearms permits and seized guns from dozens of owners as part of an investigation which authorities have linked to “sovereign citizen” views that reject government authority.Officials say the crackdown on gun owners comes after a fatal shooting in August of two Victoria state police officers by 56-year-old Dezi Freeman, who remains a fugitive.Freeman is suspected of murdering Detective Senior Const. Neal Thompson and Senior Const. Vadim de Waart-Hottart, and wounding a third officer, during a police visit to serve a search warrant at his rural property in Porepunkah, a town of just over 1,000 people located 320 kilometres northeast of Melbourne.Afterwards, Freeman fled alone, on foot and heavily armed, into the surrounding wilderness.His actions prompted law enforcement in Western Australia to identify and target firearms owners suspected of holding similar views.“The mission of this operation was simple, and that was to validate and verify our intelligence on who may hold sovereign citizen ideologies here in Western Australia,” Col Blanch, the state’s Police Commissioner, told the media on Sunday.Australian officials say Freeman has long embraced sovereign citizen beliefs, a movement that rejects government authority – something he himself has stated in numerous court appearances..UPDATED: At least four dead, eight wounded after shooting and arson at church in Michigan .In a 2024 case before the Victoria Supreme Court, the presiding judge wrote that Freeman had “a history of unpleasant encounters with police officers,” whom he referred to in his submissions to the court as “Nazis” and “terrorist thugs.”In late Sept. and early Oct., police visited 70 properties over five days, seizing 135 firearms and suspending or revoking 44 gun licences.Social media posts and information from other gun owners were used to identify targets.“If you have made it very clear that you do not abide by the laws of Western Australia, set by the Parliament, then there is no way that you can be a fit and proper person,” Blanch said.In the past three years, six police officers in four states have been shot dead by members of the public, which Blanch said was “unprecedented” in Australia.In response, Western Australia enacted stricter firearms laws in June 2024 — which the state government touted as the toughest in the country — including limits on gun ownership to 10 firearms per person for most citizens.Meanwhile, the search for Freeman continues in rural Victoria, as hundreds of officers have traversed the local bush, checking caves and mine shafts, with no confirmed sightings of the fugitive so far.Victoria’s Police Commissioner Mike Bush did not confirm the reason for why a search of Freeman’s property occurred at the time of the deadly incident, but told reporters that attending officers included members of a unit that investigates child abuse and sexual offences.
