Detectives have released dramatic footage captured moments before an innocent man was shot dead in a suspected drive-by shooting.
Future father and businessman Aaron Toth, 30, was found with a fatal gunshot wound inside a Volkswagen Golf on Bride Avenue in Hampton Park, in Melbourne’s south-east, shortly after midnight on Saturday 27 April.
On Monday, her parents appeared before the media to call her killers cowards.
“They left him like a coward, left him to die on the side of the road,” said Toth’s mother, Kim.
“There has to be someone out there who knows something. He didn’t deserve to die like that, no one does.”
Detectives believe the carpenter’s death was a tragic case of mistaken identity.
He had just returned home from central Melbourne when he was shot inside his car.
His killers fled in a stolen Ford Ranger pickup truck, which was found burnt out at Sweeny Reserve in Berwick, about 9km from the scene of the shooting, at 2.30am.
Aaron Toth (pictured), a 30-year-old carpenter from Cranbourne, was found with a fatal gunshot wound inside a Volkswagen Golf in April.
Aaron Toth was pronounced dead at the scene as Victoria Police investigated (pictured: officers at the scene)
Homicide Squad detectives have released CCTV images of a series of incidents in which shots were fired in Hampton Park before the tragedy.
In the first incident, a stolen black Audi Q7 SUV, a black Volkswagen Golf GTI hatchback and a white Toyota Camry sedan were caught speeding on the Parkway in Hampton Park at 9:21 p.m. on Friday, April 26.
The black Volkswagen was seen driving into the pasture, at which point the sound of two gunshots was heard, before all three vehicles drove away from the area.
At 10.50pm, a stolen white Mitsubishi Outlander SUV was captured on CCTV chasing a stolen black Audi Q7 along Andrew Street, David Street and Jeffrey Street in Hampton Park.
As the vehicles travelled at high speed along Jeffrey Street, a person could be seen on CCTV leaning out of the passenger side window of the white Mitsubishi Outlander and firing a shot as it drove behind the black Audi Q7.
The sound of 14 shots was heard.
At 11.36pm, the black Audi Q7 crashed into the driveway of a residential premises on Grammar Way in Hampton Park.
Two men wearing light-colored pants and hooded sweatshirts and carrying jerry cans got out of the vehicle.
The two men emptied the canisters into the Audi before setting it on fire and fleeing the scene in a dark-coloured sedan waiting nearby.
That vehicle has not yet been identified.
Mr Toth was shot at 12.24am on Saturday in his vehicle, which was parked outside a home on Bride Avenue in Hampton Park.
Investigators have established that he had travelled alone from central Melbourne and had arrived at the address a minute earlier.
He had no involvement in the earlier incidents in the Hampton Park area and his death is being treated as a case of mistaken identity.
CCTV captured a stolen grey Ford Ranger utility vehicle turning left from Pound Road onto Bride Avenue, before travelling south on Bride Avenue.
The occupants of the vehicle fired at his vehicle as they passed by, fatally wounding him.
A 21-year-old man from Cranbourne North was charged with murder in June.
Police recovered this burned vehicle believed to have been used in the alleged murder.
Another vehicle recovered by police linked to the shootings
One of the destroyed vehicles
At 2.27am the white Mitsubishi Outlander and grey Ford Ranger ute set off in convoy towards Sweeney Reserve, Berwick.
The Ford Ranger utility vehicle was set on fire and the Mitsubishi Outlander used fled the scene.
Investigators believe all the incidents are linked and that there are still people involved who have not yet been identified.
The only vehicle that has not yet been recovered is the black Volkswagen Golf GTI hatchback.
Police are urging anyone with knowledge of those involved or the whereabouts of the black Golf to come forward and speak to police or submit an anonymous tip via Crime Stoppers.
