For Gareth, Nathaniel and Stacey Train, living off the grid meant lots of books, lots of toilet paper and barricading themselves in their home in the event of a “religiously motivated terrorist attack”.
A five-week inquest is underway into the deaths of six people in December 2022 at Trains’ remote Queensland property in the Western Downs area west of Brisbane.
What motivated the Trains and the events leading up to the fatal shootings in Wieambilla that shocked the nation will soon be explored.
However, a glimpse into the Trains’ lifestyle has now been revealed at Brisbane Coroner’s Court.
Senior Sergeant Kirsty Gleeson, the forensic co-ordinator who investigated the shootings, was one of the first to form an opinion.
“I wouldn’t say they were very sophisticated,” he told state coroner Terry Ryan this week.
Gareth, 47, and Nathaniel, 46, were brothers. Gareth was married to Nathaniel’s ex-wife Stacey, 45.
Together they ambushed and shot dead officers Matthew Arnold, 26, and Rachel McCrow, 29, as well as neighbor Alan Dare, 58, before they were killed in a shootout with tactical police.
Police killers Gareth and Stacey Train had been publishing conspiracy theories before the incident.
Former school principal Nathaniel Train was married to Stacey before she married his brother.
It has been described as the country’s first domestic terrorist attack inspired by Christian extremist ideology.
Sergeant Gleeson arrived shortly afterwards at the 107-hectare Wieambilla property west of Brisbane.
The eight-bedroom home appeared to be set up for “off-grid living,” featuring water tanks, solar panels and no main electricity.
Walking into the kitchen and passing spent bullet casings inside the house, Sergeant Gleeson found healthy food and toilet paper, lots of toilet paper.
“There wasn’t a lot of packaged food, there was a lot of non-perishable goods,” he told the coroner.
‘They kept a lot of toilet paper in their pantries.
“But I guess you could say there was healthy living, healthy food in the kitchen.”
An object on the kitchen worktop also caught Sen Sergeant Gleeson’s attention.
It was a makeshift Faraday cage, a container used to block electromagnetic fields and telephone signals.
There were six mobile phones inside.
Negotiators had attempted to call the trains’ mobile phones every five minutes at one point during the six-hour police siege that followed the ambush, the investigation found.
Attempts to negotiate with the Trains were ignored or met with gunfire.
This released image shows a barricade and sniper positions that were set up months before the killings.
Police recovered a large amount of equipment and weapons, including arrows, from the property.
Inside the house, which had two bedrooms, there was not much furniture but there was a lot of reading material.
“They had basic furniture and a lot of books,” said Sergeant Gleeson.
‘In the bedrooms, there was also little furniture and not many personal belongings in closets, cupboards or drawers.
‘Several diaries, several letters and small notes were found throughout the house.’
Books were also found in another element of the property: the main hiding place for snipers.
Located almost 200 meters from his dirt road, he had a tent with a double mattress.
More books were found in a hiding place, which could be reached by a well-traveled path from the house.
Guns and bullets were also found around and inside the house, including this Ruger used by Gareth Train.
Among the items found in the hiding place was a copy of the novel The Godfather.
There was a busy path from the house to the sniper’s location, one of three “shooting positions” on the property.
Other “defenses” included a metal and wood barricade along the driveway and three mirrors outside the house designed to block intruders’ vision.
Satellite images revealed that sniper points and barricades had been in place since at least October 2022, two months before the fatal shootings.
Evidence suggests former elementary school principal Nathaniel Train was in the main hideout and used the scope on his high-powered rifle to track four officers.
Officers Arnold and McCrow arrived with two colleagues around 4:30 p.m. on December 12, 2022 for what they thought was a routine missing persons investigation.
They climbed over the fence. A coffee mug with the words “Have a nice day” written on it was taped to a post by the front gate.
This coffee mug with the legend “Have a nice day” was attached to a gate post near the entrance to the property.
Officers Matthew Arnold and Rachel McCrow were shot and killed at 4:37 p.m. while attempting to locate Nathaniel Train.
Without warning, Officer Arnold was shot in the chest and died.
Officer McCrow was then shot in the back and legs as he attempted to crawl for cover.
She pleaded with Gareth Train before he fatally shot her in the head at point-blank range, the inquest heard.
The trains started a fire to drive out the other officers, who then escaped under intense gunfire.
Good Samaritan Mr. Dare was fatally shot when he arrived to investigate the fire.
Alan Dare, a resident of the Trains, was shot dead while trying to find out what was going on.
An image from a police drone owned by Trains that was shown at the inquest.
About six hours later, tactical police shot the Trains dead within minutes of each other in the home after a shootout.
“I never observed any action by Gareth, Stacey or Nathaniel that indicated they were surrendering,” investigator Detective Senior Sergeant Nathan McCormack told the inquest.
“The only communication was that YouTube video titled ‘Don’t be afraid.’”
Gareth and Stacey Train filmed and uploaded the video to YouTube hours after the officers were killed, referring to the police as “devils and demons.”
Just minutes earlier, Stacey Train had emerged from the house to offer cups of coffee to the brothers after her husband fired at a police helicopter overhead.
Police said at the time that the Trains committed a “religiously motivated terrorist attack” influenced by the fundamentalist Christian ideology of Premillennialism, believing the world would end soon.
The coroner heard Gareth Train may have had a mental illness that led to a “shared psychotic disorder” with his wife and brother.
Gareth Train was caught on Matthew Arnold’s body camera removing his team vest
An expert is expected to tell the inquest that the Trains were experiencing “identical persecutory and religious beliefs that met the psychiatric definition of delusions”.
“COVID appears, in many ways, to be a trigger for some of the events that occurred,” Ruth O’Gorman’s counsel told the inquest.
In March 2020, Gareth Train began posting conspiracy theories on social media that appeared to be shared by his wife.
In August, their brother adopted them, according to the investigation.
After the Trains posted the YouTube video, the tactical police arrived.
Unlike the four ambushed officers, the specialized police response team was well aware of the impending danger.
“I thought ‘who shoots at police and just sits back and waits?'” Superintendent Timothy Partridge told the inquest.
The Trains were firing at police when they were shot in the head: Gareth at 10.32pm, Stacey at 10.36pm and Nathaniel at 10.39pm.
