Stabbing Rampage at Sydney Mall Leaves 6 Dead, 9-Month-Old Baby Wounded

New South Wales Assistant Police Commissioner Anthony Cooke said in a press conference that the attacker, believed to be a 40-year-old man known to law enforcement, walked into the mall on Saturday afternoon and left before returning with a knife at around 3:20 PM local time.

After being alerted to the knife spree, a nearby officer pursued the assailant from behind as he moved through the mall. “He turned, faced her, raised a knife, and the officer opened fire, killing the suspect,” Cooke said.

“This all happened very, very quickly — the officer that was in the vicinity attended on her own, was guided to the location of the offender by people who were in the center. She took the actions that she did saving a range of people’s lives.”

Although the suspect’s motives remain unclear, preliminary investigations indicate that he acted alone, the incident was not an act of terrorism, and there is no continuing threat to the public.

“The devastating scenes at Bondi Junction are beyond words or understanding. Australians will be shocked this evening,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a news conference.

“This was a horrific act of violence, indiscriminately targeted at innocent people going about an ordinary Saturday doing their shopping tonight. Tonight the first thoughts of all Australians are with the victims of these terrible acts.”

Albanese offered “our deepest condolences and sympathies to all those who are grieving for someone they have lost” and praised the bravery of the lone female officer who entered the mall “by herself” and stopped the attack. “She’s certainly a hero; there’s no doubt she saved lives through her actions,” he added.

“They just said run, run, run — someone’s been stabbed,” one witness told ABC TV in Australia. ”[The attacker] was walking really calmly like he was having an ice cream in a park. And then he went up the escalators … and probably within about a minute we heard three gunshots.”

“It was carnage,” said another eyewitness who was in a cafe nearby with his two young children when the attack began, explaining that he saw a man suddenly “stabbing people indiscriminately.”

“If she did not shoot him, he would have kept going, he was on the rampage,” a bystander added. “She went over and was giving him CPR. He had a nice big blade on him. He looked like he was on a killing spree.”