On the 15th of December 2014, a terrorist took over the Lindt Chocolate café in Martin Place, in the heart of Sydney, Australia, holding 18 customers and staff hostage, creating a siege that would last for over 16 hours.

Although numerous hostages escaped, by the time the event conclude,d 2 innocent people were dead, 4 others were injured.

For 10 years, this incident was suppressed under a government-mandated gag order. This prevented the New South Wales Police Tactical Operations Unit (or TOU) members from even publicly revealing their names. As a result, despite a detailed and scathing coroner’s inquest report, the largest and most expensive in Australian history, there has been very little discussion about what actually happened that night, particularly from a tactical perspective.

In keeping with the standard policy of The Debrief, we will not be discussing the name, objectives, or affiliations of the terrorist in the hope that time will erase his memory. We will, of course, be discussing the names of the team, and in this case, hostages, because they are heroes and need to be remembered. I hope you enjoy my conversation with Ben Besant.

Guest:

My guest today is Ben Besant. Ben, or ‘Officer A’ as he was identified in the coroner’s report, was the lead member of the Alpha Team during the intervention and the officer who engaged and killed the terrorist. He is currently the author of a book Tiger! Tiger! Tiger! which details not only what happened that night but also explains a very personal battle to recover his mental health following ‘the Lindt Café siege.’

Resources:

Ben Besant - https://tigertigertigerbook.com/

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100086482286065#

Resolute Ready - https://resoluteready.com/

Official Report - https://coroners.nsw.gov.au/documents/findings/2017/lindt_cafe_findings-and-recommendations.pdf

On May 24, 2022, an active shooter took the lives of 19 children and two staff members and physically and mentally injured the survivors, their families, staff, teachers and the broader community in Uvalde, Texas. At the request of Uvalde's leadership, the U.S. Department of Justice established the Critical Incident Review (CIR) to conduct an independent, objective assessment of what happened that day and assess the systems in place in the weeks leading up to May 24. The goal of the episode is to provide information to those most affected by the tragedy and to build knowledge regarding how to best respond to incidents of mass violence. This panel will provide an overview of the incident and present observations and recommendations from the DOJ report in the areas of tactics, leadership and incident command.

Guests: Nazmia Comrie & Frank Fernandez - USDOJ COPS Office

Resources:

DOJ Report - https://cops.usdoj.gov/uvalde