Sydney attacker slammed local knife business for dulling his blades years before massacre

Joel Cauchi, who killed six people in a stabbing spree at Westfield shopping centre in Sydney, had previously posted about a knife company which he accused of filing down blades he had bought

The knifeman who slaughtered six people in Saturday's horror attack in Sydney once hit out at a knife business online slamming them for "blunting" his blades.

Joel Cauchi has been named as the 40-year-old who fatally stabbed six members of the public, before raising the knife to a police officer who shot him dead. Among his victims were 38-year-old mum Ashlee Good, whose baby was also seriously injured in the attack, 25-year-old Dawn Singleton, Jade Young, Pikria Darchia, 55, and security guard Faraz Tahir.

A further eight people, including Ms Good's nine-month-old baby, were injured and taken to hospital as a result of the attacks. The infant underwent emergency surgery and is currently "doing well", the family has confirmed.

Now chilling Facebook posts made by Cauchi have resurfaced as NSW Police investigate his background to probe possible motives for the evil killing spree. Cauchi, from Brisbane, had left a one star review of the Brisbane-based business on Facebook, after getting two knives honed which he said had been dulled down.

The suspected killer's profile appears to have since been taken down, but detailed he was working as an English tutor and had studied in Harristown, Queensland. In 2021, he posted: "Dealing with this business has been a nightmare for me. I put in two knives (one of which is pretty expensive) to be sharpened and he blunted them both".

He added: "I made sure that I clearly, repeatedly and correctly gave all instructions when I put them in and he blunted them, then was very unhelpful afterwards, either being unable or unwilling to fix the job, leaving me with two blunt knives that are basically useless now."

The business owner from whom Cauchi bought the knives - who confirmed the weapons were not used in Saturday's attacks - told The Australian he came to his workshop three years ago to have the knives sharpened, saying he "told me that he uses them every day in the house".

The unnamed business man said Cauchi brought a pig sticker - a knife with a thin, pointed blade with a double edge - and a hunting knife to be honed before leaving the scathing review. He described him as having a "really blank personality".

“Nothing angry, distorted, nothing like that,” he said. “He wasn’t happy, he didn’t smile. He was just very vague, very blank. The customer I was dealing with at the time actually was there as well, and even she said, he’s odd. She said, he’s a little bit weird.”

Cauchi had also posted in December 2020 in an outdoor pursuits group wanting to meet up with people "who shoot guns". Police said he had a previous history of mental health issues, and it's understood he had previously been diagnosed with schizophrenia, however it's not been confirmed whether he was experiencing poor mental health at the time of Saturday's attack.

NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb also told media on Saturday evening that the suspect was "known to law enforcement", and that there was no clear "ideation" at the time which would immediately suggest a terrorism motive.

Assistant Commissioner Anthony Cooke said Cauchi is believed to have come to New South Wales Police last month and that police had spoken to his family, who were co-operating with the investigation. He told a press conference: "As I had said last night, there is still to this point nothing that we have, no information we have received, no evidence we have recovered, no intelligence that we have gathered that would suggest that this was driven by any particular motivation, ideology or otherwise.

"We know that the offender in the matter suffers from mental health. We are continuing to work through the profiling of the offender but very clearly to us at this stage it would appear that this is related to the mental health of the individual involved."