‘Mongrel idiot’: Former cops lash protester with Dezi Freeman sign at March for Australia protest

A former detective and colleague of police officer Neal Thompson, who was fatally shot in Porepunkah last week, has slammed protesters who carried a poster supporting an alleged cop killer at the “March for Australia” protest in Adelaide on Sunday.

About 15,000 protesters swarmed Adelaide‘s streets as part of the anti-immigration rally, with attendees carrying flags and placards.

One person was pictured holding a placard with a stylised picture of alleged cop killer and fugitive Dezi Freeman, who is on the run after allegedly shooting two police officers in Porepunkah in Victoria’s northeast on Tuesday.

Beneath the photo of the alleged shooter read “Free Man” with the southern cross symbol.

Constable Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim De Waart were gunned down at a property outside Porepunkah, about 300km northeast of Melbourne, while executing a search warrant on Tuesday morning.

Speaking to Today, former Victoria homicide detective Alex Krstic – who was a colleague of fallen officer Constable Thompson – said the sign was “disgraceful” and “obscene”.

“Personally, I regard that sort of thing as being that the context of the whole thing is disgraceful,” he told Today co-host Karl Stefanovic.

He laid into those who participated in the protest in support of the alleged shooter.

“Anybody who sides with these wackos and fringe dwellers … it’s just brutal stuff,” he said.

“No need for it.”

Another retired detective, Charlie Bezzina, told Sunrise the person who held the sign was a “mongrel idiot”, saying the message behind the placard “incites violence”.

“If you had control of it, you can say to these people, ‘That’s not part of this demonstration’. (Police) could have arrested him for inciting violence,” he said.

“That’s a disgrace.”

Police Minister Anthony Carbines told the ABC that police would take action against the sign holder if possible.

Mr Krstic last week told NewsWire that he first met Constable Thompson in Collingwood in the “mid-1980s” and became friends through their mutual love for the country and hunting.

Mr Krstic said Constable Thompson was a “good bloke” who would prefer to hear all sides of a story, no matter the situation.

“If you were a bad guy, you’d done something terrible, he would always put you in a position where he’d make you comfortable and he’d always give you an opportunity to tell your side of the story,” Mr Krstic told NewsWire.

“He was a good country cop, a good country detective.

“He could relate to offenders, to victims, to witnesses. That’s what made him such a good placement. You need to have empathy, and he had plenty of that.”

In a statement, Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Mike Bush said “this devastating loss of Neal and Vadim has struck at the heart of Victoria Police, the broader policing family and the community of Porepunkah”.

Mr Bush said Constable de Waart worked at St Kilda Police Station for three years after finishing his training and then joined joining the public order response team as a senior constable in April 2023.

“At the time of his passing, Vadim was on temporary assignment in Wangaratta,” Mr Bush said.

“An eternal optimist and avid traveller, Vadim was fluent in French, Spanish, Flemish and English.

“He had also completed scuba dives all around the world and motorcycling trips more locally with his friends and colleagues.”