Knight’s Depression since Duntroon
The direct result of continuous bastardization and victimization by senior staff cadets whilst training at RMC Duntroon since 13th January 1987 had driven Julian Knight serving then as a junior staff cadet to stab his key tormentor, Kokoka’s Company’s then lead senior cadet Philip Mongo Reed.
Late on Satuday night 31st May 1987, Knight had been drinking with college colleagues and friends at the Private Bin nightclub in Civic. He had already had an altercation with Reed and other senior cadets at the nightclub that night, when at 0255 hours (2:55 am) on the Sunday, Knight stabbed Reed in the side of the head.
Immediately following the stabbing, Knight had surrendered to two Australian Federal Police officers in a nearby laneway, and he had subsequently been charged with malicious wounding, assault and assault occasioning actual bodily harm. Knight was now on bail – a $5,000 self-surety – and he was due to appear in the Australian Capital Territory Magistrates Court on the 10th November 1987.
Knight was subsequently forced to resign from Duntoon and the Army which took effect in absentia on 24th July 1987 whilst he was in Melbourne. Knight had also attempted to re-enlist in two Army Reserve units; the 7th Transport Squadron, and the unit he had served in during 1985-87, the 4th/19th Prince of Wales’s Light Horse Regiment.
On both occasions he had been rejected because of the pending criminal charges that had been laid against him. The pending charges not only prevented Knight from re-enlisting in the Regular or Reserve Army, they also prevented him from pursuing almost all of the alternative careers he had considered following. The impending criminal convictions would effectively permanently exclude him from a military career – his lifetime career aim, and in his mind his “reason for living”.
The only asset Knight owned was a Holden Torana SLR5000 V8 sedan he’d purchased with the car loan in April 1987.
Since his forced resignation from Duntroon in July 1987, Knight being broke and unable to find a job in Canberra, unable to afford to live by himself, he returned to Melbourne and stayed at his step-mother’s rented house in Clifton Hill. But she had since turned his childhood bedroom into an extra living room, so forcing Julian to “camp out” in the front room.
Almost penniless, Knight had no ability or experience to earn a decent wage and, consequently, took on menial work as a casual storeman/driver for a Melbourne clothing firm, Cuggi Rarity Stores Pty Ltd.
But the wages were poor and so was finding it near impossible to meet the weekly repayments on his $6,000 Defence Force Credit Union car loan. He was already two weeks behind with the repayments and he still owed over $5,800. In addition to the car loan he had around $1,200 of other debts. His financial problems were creating a great deal of anxiety and his daily alcohol intake was now around five times what it had been when he was in the Army (which says a lot, given Army RnR culture is inebriation).
Knight decided then to sell his Torana in order to help him pay off his debts, and he had made extensive attempts to sell it, but a buyer still hadn’t eventuated. The car was repossessed by the finance company and sold at auction for just over $2,700. “A bargain” says Knight.
To compound his problems with re-adjusting to civilian life, Knight’s former Melbourne girlfriend wanted to have nothing to do with him, and his Canberra girlfriend had remained behind in Canberra. He had drifted apart from his local Melbourne friends.
To add to his anxiety, Knight’s natural mother, who was living in the Republic of South Africa, had failed to respond to a letter sent to her by Knight’s social worker.
On the Sunday morning of the shootings, 9 August 1987, Knight after a night’s drinking, awoke at 11:30 am in his temporary bedroom in the front room of his mother’s house at number 6 Ramsden Street, Clifton Hill. It was the 16th day since his forced discharge from Duntroon and the Australian Regular Army.
Knight’ Alcohol Consumption
1310 hours
Between 13:10 and 16:10 on Sunday 9 August 1987, Knight attended a belated birthday party for his mother at his grandmother’s house in the Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn. Whilst at the party Knight consumed two cans of regular beer.
He left the party in his own car and drove his younger sister home before driving aimlessly around the Clifton Hill area. At about 1650 hours (4.50 pm) Knight went to see an old girlfriend in nearby McKean Street in Fitzroy North to give her a magazine. He only stayed at her flat for about five minutes then he continued to drive aimlessly around the area.
Minutes later the gearbox of his car, his only asset, jammed and stuck in second gear. Recall his car had been vandalised by senior cadets in a revenge attack following Knight’s stabbing of senior cadet Reed.
He limped the car back to where he was staying at his mother’s home at 6 Ramsden Street in Clifton Hill, where he changed clothes and drank another car of beer, his third that afternoon, before walking angrily around to the nearby Royal Hotel, his local pub, at around 17:30.
1730 hours
At around 5.30pm, Julian then walked angrily around to the nearby Royal Hotel, about three blocks away, or a 300 metre walk north of his mother’s home. None of Knight’s friends were there so he drank alone from around 17:30.
2050 hours
At around 20:50 (8:50 pm) Knight reportedly began to feel the effects of the beer he’d been drinking. His complex depressed combined with extreme intoxication manifested into a delusional psychotic “vision” of a soldier being ambushed, which caused some ‘brain snap’ acute mental state to what he later described to detectives as a ‘call to arms’.
He was intensely angry, hyper-stressed, agitated delirious, delusional to the point of being impelled to postal revenge, and it was against society. He felt as if it was a “call to arms” and fibvve minutes later he rushed from the pub and jogged back to his mother’s house in Ramsden Street.
Shooting Gallery Preparation
Arriving back at his mother’s house a few minutes later, he spoke briefly to his sister when she met him in the hallway outside the front room. He then waited until his sister returned to the rear of the house to watch a movie on TV with their mother, before he ventured upstairs to his mother’s bedroom.
Stored under her bed were his legally owned and licensed weapons: a .177 calibre Daisy BB air rifle, a .177 calibre Chinese air rifle, a .177 calibre Crosman model 766 air rifle, a .22 calibre Ruger model 10/22 semi-automatic rifle, a 12-gauge Mossberg pump-action shotgun, and a Chinese-made 7.62mm calibre M14 semi-automatic military rifle. Knight retrieved the Ruger rifle, the Mossberg shotgun and the M14 rifle, then he took the Ruger and the Mossberg back downstairs to the front room.
He then returned to his mother’s room and collected the M14, and a steel ammunition box and a leather shotgun cartridge belt from his mother’s wardrobe, before returning to the front room to load the three firearms. After loading the firearms and stuffing his pockets with around 100 rounds of ammunition, including a “suicide” 7.62mm round which he placed in the front right hand pocket of his jeans, he placed a black combat knife down the back of his jeans. He then slung the M14 over his back and picked up the Mossberg and the Ruger in his right and left hands respectively.
Immediately afterwards, at around 21:30, he opened the front door of the house and ran out into Ramsden Street. After running west along Ramsden Street and crossing the nearby railway line, Knight reached the eastern side of the main four-lane arterial road known as Hoddle Street.
Gun Collection
Upon arrival at his mother’s home, Julian spoke briefly to his sister greeting him in the hallway outside the front room. Julian then waited until his sister returned to the rear of the house to watch a movie on TV with their mother, before secretly walking upstairs to his mother’s bedroom. Notably, Julian’s sister was never asked by the Court to testify as a witness to her observation of Julian’s state of mind at the time. She was the last person to talk to him in at around 2110 hours (9:10 pm) before his shooting spree commencing just 20 minutes later.
Stored under his mother’s bed were his legally owned and licenced weapons:
- A .177 calibre Daisy BB air rifle
- A .177 calibre Chinese air rifle
- A .177 calibre Crosman model 766 air rifle
- A .22 calibre Ruger model 10/22 semi-automatic rifle
- A 12-gauge 8-shot Mossberg pump-action shotgun
- A 7.62mm calibre M14 semi-automatic military rifle.
Over the following ten minutes, Julian retrieved the Ruger rifle, the Mossberg shotgun and the M14 rifle from underneath his mother’s bed, then he took the Ruger and the Mossberg back downstairs to the front room. He then returned back up to his mother’s room and collected the M14, a steel ammunition box and a leather shotgun cartridge belt from his mother’s wardrobe, before returning to the downstairs front room to load the three firearms and prepare.
After loading the three firearms and stuffing his pockets with ammunition, he placed a black combat knife down the back of his jeans. He then slung the M14 over his back and picked up the Mossberg and the Ruger in his right and left hands respectively. Significantly, Julian also stowed his “suicide” 7.62mm bullet round in the front right hand pocket of his jeans as part of his delusional mission.
By 2120 hours (9:20 pm) Julian was ready in his psychotic state and ‘off his face’, all loaded up with his arsenal. He left the house on foot, jogging westward along the footpath of Ramsden Street towards busy 4-laned Hoddle Street just 40 metres away. He then crossed the railway level crossing over Ramsden Street and turned hard left into busy four-laned Hoddle Street to his delusional ‘ambush position’.
He had gone vengeful postal Full Metal Jacket.
References:
[1] ‘Julian Knight- The Hoddle Street Massacre‘, 8th March 2013, Aussie Criminals (defunct website), http://aussiecriminals.com.au/high-profile-criminals/julian-knight-the-hoddle-street-massacre/
[2] ‘Julian Knight: biography’, 19th May 2019, by FAMpeople, https://fampeople.com/cat-julian-knight
[3] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2007-08-09/hoddle-street-killer-wont-be-forgotten/635402
[4] http://www.melbournecrimetours.com.au/hoddle.html
[5] http://www.julianknight-hoddlestreet.ca/julian-knight-research-file/hoddle-street-massacre.html