The theory that Westfield Bondi Junction knifeman Joel Cauchi specifically targeted women during his stabbing spree at the shopping center has been dismissed by police.
Six people – five women and a male security guard – were killed when 40-year-old Cauchi attacked people with a 30cm knife on April 13.
A nine-month-old girl was among 12 others stabbed before the knifeman was shot dead by NSW Police Inspector Amy Scott.
NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb said after the gender pattern of the attack was clear.
“It is clear to me… The perpetrator targeted women and avoided men,” Commissioner Webb told the ABC on April 15.
However, a month after the attack, there is a debate within NSW Police over that theory.
One senior police source was skeptical, pointing out that Cauchi had also stabbed men, but not fatally.
Police are no longer convinced Bondi Junction Westfield knifeman Joel Cauchi (pictured) targeted women when he went on a violent stabbing spree
Victims pictured in top row L-R: Yixuan Cheng, 27, Ashlee Good, 38, and Pikria Darchia, 55. Pictured L-R bottom row: Jade Young, 47, Dawn Singleton, 25, and Faraz Tahir, 30.
“Do I think he was targeting women? No, I don’t. He stabbed three men and a baby, he just ran around stabbing people,” the source told the newspaper Daily telegram.
Those killed in the attack were new mother Ashlee Good, 38, bride-to-be Dawn Singleton, 25, security guard Faraz Ahmed Tahir, 30, architect Jade Young, 47, artist Pikria Darchia, 55, and economics student Yixuan Cheng, 27.
However, another police source previously told the Daily Telegraph that investigators believe Cauchi “certainly targeted women.”
The source said police had reviewed extensive footage of Cauchi’s movements through the mall and saw how he selected his victims.
“I don’t think there’s any other way to look at it,” the source said.
‘You can see in the images that he walks past other people. He just keeps walking past it and then attacks a woman.”
Cauchi, a schizophrenic from Queensland, had moved to Sydney just weeks before the attack and had no fixed address at the time.
He was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a teenager and his parents said he had stopped taking the medications that had caused his psychosis.
Cauchi’s father Andrew had suggested that his son had targeted women at the mall because he wanted a girlfriend.
Cauchi’s father Andrew previously suggested his son (pictured) had attacked women at the mall because he wanted a girlfriend
Just days after the attack, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb (pictured) said it was “obvious” to her that Cauchi had targeted female shoppers
“He wanted a girlfriend and he has no social skills and he was extremely frustrated,” Anthony said A current issue.
Cauchi lived at home with his parents in Toowoomba until he was 35.
His father recalled discovering five large U.S. Army combat knives in his bag when he visited the house in 2023, which he quickly confiscated.
“I said, ‘Look, Joel, you’re welcome to stay at my house, but you won’t have these knives here,’” Andrew said.
“I took them from him and it was hell, you know, really hell… he went crazy.”
Podcaster Abbie Chatfield said she believed the objectification of women and Australia’s poor mental health system were both causes of the attack.
‘This violence does not start from nowhere. This starts with people constantly talking about women as if they are objects,” she said.
‘This objectification of women enables the dehumanization of women, and ensures that men can easily walk down a slippery slope towards violence.
“Whether that’s domestic violence, domestic violence, verbal abuse, negligence, sexual harassment, assault, rape, murder, mass murder.”