Grave fears death toll will rise,
Shock as Melbourne remembers victims mowed down by fleeing driver.
Australian police fear the death toll could rise after a man on the run over a stabbing drove into Melbourne lunchtime crowds, killing four people and injuring 30.
Three people died in the CBD and another died later in hospital after the car sped along Bourke St on Friday, as visitors flowed in for the Australian Open tennis tournament.
Police Commissioner Graham Ashton says another 30 people were injured as the car ploughed through the mall and along footpaths.
He warned the death toll could rise, with five people still on the critical list, including a 3-month-old baby.
“We do have fears — grave fears — for the health of at least two or three of those that are in that critical condition,” he said.
The mother of the accused driver yesterday told the Herald Sun of her sorrow. Emily Gargasoulas — the mother of Dimitrious “Jimmy” Gargasoulas — said: “I’m so sorry to the families he’s hurt.
“When I found out about what he did, how he killed a child, I felt sick; so sick in my stomach.”
Her other son, Angelo, is believed to be recovering in hospital after Gargasoulas allegedly stabbed him.
Those killed at the scene were a 10-year-old girl whose mother and sister were believed to be in a critical condition, a 25-year-old man and a 32-year-old woman.
A 33-year-old man on his lunch break later died in hospital.
The 3-month-old is fighting for life in the Royal Children’s Hospital, where a 2-year-old is in a serious condition and a 9-year-old is in a stable condition.
Gargasoulas will be charged after surgery for a non-life-threatening gunshot wound to his arm. He crashed the car after being shot by police, ending an almost 12-hour rampage that began about 2am.
Ashton yesterday defended the police pursuit of the man after the stabbing, including a decision to call it off when the man was driving erratically.
“From my perspective, all decisions the officers made were in the interests of trying to protect community safety,” he said.
Coroner Sara Hinchey will examine the entire event, including police endeavours to catch the man, the role of the justice system in previous dealings with him and issues around his alleged mental health and drug abuse.
Premier Daniel Andrews says that she will be given any additional resources she needs and the Government would make whatever changes were necessary. Andrews was in the city, laying flowers for the victims, like many others Victorians and visitors touched by the tragedy.
Gargasoulas was due to face court over an assault on Friday. He had been charged on January 14, but freed by a bail justice.
Ashton said Gargasoulas was well known to police. He said police were sometimes frustrated by bail decisions but he respected the independence of the judiciary.
Bourke St mall is usually bustling with eager shoppers but yesterday people gathered to grieve.
Floral tributes were growing on the corner of the mall and Elizabeth St in the CBD as the shock of Friday’s tragedy sets in.
There are teddy bears, four stems of white roses for each life lost and a little card reading: “RIP Angels.”
One card reads: “You were a bystander, you were innocent, you could have been any one of us. You won’t be forgotten.”
Young and old gather to pay respects, along with tourists, mums and dads, but everyone wears the same expression of sadness, shock and grief.
You were a bystander, you were innocent, you could have been any one of us.