The Lindt Café siege (also known as the Sydney siege) was a terrorist hostage-taking that occurred on 15–16 December 2014 when a lone gunman, Man Haron Monis, held ten customers and eight employees of a Lindt Chocolate Café hostage in the APA Building in Martin Place, Sydney, Australia.
The Sydney siege led to a 16-hour standoff, after which a gunshot was heard from inside and police officers from the Tactical Operations Unit (TOU) stormed the café. Hostage Tori Johnson was killed by Monis, and hostage Katrina Dawson was killed by a police bullet ricochet in the subsequent raid. Monis was also killed. Three other hostages and a police officer were injured by police gunfire during the raid.
Police have been criticised over their handling of the siege for not taking proactive action earlier, for the deaths of hostages at the end of the siege, and for the lack of negotiation during the siege. Hostage Marcia Mikhael called radio station 2GB during the siege and said, "They have not negotiated, they've done nothing. They have left us here to die."
Early on, hostages were seen holding a Jihadist flag against the window of the café, featuring the shahādah creed. Initially, many media organisations mistook it for the flag used by the Islamic State (IS); Monis later demanded that an IS flag be brought to him. Monis also unsuccessfully demanded to speak to the Prime Minister of Australia, Tony Abbott, live on radio. Monis was described by Abbott as having indicated a "political motivation," but the eventual assessment was that the gunman was "a very unusual case—a rare mix of extremism, mental health problems and plain criminality."
In the aftermath of the siege, Muslim groups issued a joint statement in which they condemned the incident, and memorial services were held in the city at the nearby St Mary's Cathedral and St James' Church. Condolence books were set up in other Lindt cafés and the community turned Martin Place into a "field of flowers." The Martin Place Lindt café was severely damaged during the police raid, closed afterwards, then renovated for reopening in March 2015.
Events
Prior to event
An anonymous call was made to Australia's anti-terrorism hotline 48 hours before the siege, raising concerns about the content of Monis' website. On his website, Monis had pledged allegiance to "the caliph of the Muslims", believed to be referring to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and denounced moderate Islam. It has been reported that the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation followed up on the call by reviewing the website and Monis' posts on social media but found nothing to indicate that he was likely to commit an act of violence.
Hostage-taking and negotiations
Monis entered the Lindt Chocolate Café at 53 Martin Place, Sydney, at 8:33 am Sydney local time on 15 December 2014 (AEDT, UTC+11). The café was located directly across from the Seven News television studios, and near the Reserve Bank of Australia, the headquarters of the Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, and Martin Place underground train station.
The hostage situation began at 9:44 am, when Monis forced Tori Johnson, the manager of the café, to phone 000.
Monis was bearded, wearing a black cap and wearing a black headband with the inscription, in Arabic: "We are ready to sacrifice for you, O Mohammad." He was carrying a blue sports bag, and armed with a sawn-off pump-action shotgun.
The shotgun was old but could fire four shots in five seconds.
Monis used hostages as human shields. He had chained and locked the automatic sliding glass doors of the café.
Monis claimed there were four "devices" located around Sydney. Then New South Wales Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione said that none of the alleged devices were found during searches. Monis also demanded that a hostage ask all media to broadcast that "this is an attack on Australia by the Islamic State". In addition, he demanded that an Islamic State flag be delivered to him, although the request was never fulfilled.
Hostages were ordered to hold up a Black Standard flag, with the shahādah in white Arabic letters (an Islamic creed declaring: "There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is the messenger of God"), against the window of the café. Some news reports initially mistook it for the flag used by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
Monis demanded to speak to the Australian Prime Minister live on radio, but this demand was rejected. This was relayed by hostage Marcia Mikhael, who said that she "lost it" when told that the Prime Minister was too busy, saying, "I don't care what [Abbott] is doing right now...I'm sure there's nothing more important happening in Australia...than the lives of the people in this café..."
Mamdouh Habib said he knew Monis well and offered to help the NSWPF negotiate with him. He believed that Monis was "sick and disturbed" over his failure to gain access to his children, and said Monis could trust him to get his message out. Lawyer Manny Conditsis had represented Monis and had also offered help because he said that Monis respected what he had to say to him. Barrister Michael Klooster who had met Monis in the café before the siege called the police at 2:17 pm. Other Muslim leaders also offered to help, including the Grand Mufti of Australia, Ibrahim Abu Mohamed.
All such offers were rejected by the police because they had no control over what the untrained negotiators might say or do. However, Mikhael said that after the request to speak to the Prime Minister was refused: "It was then that I knew that there was not going to be any negotiation and we were just left there. ...They were waiting for him to kill someone or shoot something so they [could] come in. ...There was nothing proactive about that operation, nothing."
Belinda Neil, who was a negotiator for the NSW Police, stated that in negotiations, "[W]e want to try and talk to the hostage-taker. ...[W]e want to find out why he's there, why is he doing this, and we don't just go into this situation hoping to resolve it in half an hour." This approach would be consistent with the Behavioral Change Stairway Model. However, Mikhael stated that no such negotiation took place. Habib said that he called both the NSWPF and the Attorney General twice during the raid, but they did not return his calls. Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione confirmed during the siege that "we're not dealing directly with him ... we do not have direct contact with the offender."
Several hostages made contact with media outlets and relayed Monis' demands to them. At the request of the New South Wales Police Force, they were not published during the siege. The social media profiles of the hostages were also used to relay demands.
At 1:43 am, Tori Johnson texted his family "He's [Monis] increasingly agitated, walks around when he hears a noise outside with a hostage in front of him. Wants to release one person in good faith, tell police." This was reported to the police ten minutes later.
During the early stages of the siege, the Australian Government and the NSW authorities did not label the event as a terrorist attack. However, as the siege continued, NSW Police authorised the engagement of the state's counter-terrorism task force, treating the incident as an act of terrorism.
Escape of first five hostages
At around 3:37 pm, two hostages, John O'Brien and barrister Stefan Balafoutis, escaped from the front entrance of the building, followed by a third hostage, café employee Paolo Vassallo, who ran out from a fire exit at the side of the building. At around 4:58 pm, two female hostages, both employees, Jieun Bae and Elly Chen, escaped by running from another entrance of the building and were met by Tactical Operations Unit officers.
Monis was unaware that Jieun Bae and Elly Chen had escaped. Hostage Jarrod Morton-Hoffman made noise to cover their exit and persuaded Monis that media reports of five hostages escaping were wrong. After the escape, Monis threatened to kill hostages.
The police State Technical Investigation Branch planted a covert listening device in the café during the night. At one point, the device picked up Monis saying that he wanted to kill any escaping hostages.
Breach and hostage rescue
At 2:03 am on 16 December, a "very loud bang" was heard as Monis shot towards six hostages fleeing from the building. At 2:11 am Monis fired a shot towards the kitchen, and was heard on the police listening device reloading his shotgun. The hostage Fiona Ma then escaped through the front door, and two Tactical Operations Unit teams were ordered to move very slowly towards the two entrances.
At 2:14 am, four minutes after the Tactical operations teams were ordered in, Monis shot Tori Johnson in the back of the head, killing him. The execution was witnessed by TOU sniper Sierra 3-1, who reported a hostage down. TOU Operators armed with M4A1 carbines threw eleven stun grenades as they stormed the café.
Monis was shot in the head. TOU Officer A – later identified as Ben Besant, whose identity was the subject of a suppression order only lifted in 2024 – stated that "I watched the (Carbine) laser ... from the centre of his chest go to his head and his head exploded and he fell". Besant fired a total of 17 rounds, and Officer B fired 5 additional rounds. Some fragments of those rounds killed hostage Katrina Dawson. Three other hostages and TOU Officer B were injured by crossfire.
Police declared the siege over soon after, later confirming that Monis was killed in the hostage rescue. Two hostages had died, and another three were injured by police bullets. TOU Officer B, whose face was grazed by a police bullet, was discharged from hospital later in the day.
At the inquest, Counsel assisting the coroner, Jeremy Gormley SC, said, "No shot fired by Mr. Monis, other than the one that struck and killed Mr. Johnson, struck anyone." Mitchell McAlister, who was a TAG East assaulter with the 2nd Commando Tactical Assault Group questioned the police use of M4A1 carbines with 5.56mm NATO rounds. Carbine rounds could have "dangerous effects in a dense and enclosed environment." It was initially unclear why 22 shots were fired by police, of which 13 hit Monis. The rounds were continuously fired in the belief that the hostage taker could reach for a bomb trigger.
Flag raids
At around 2:00 pm on 15 December, police contacted Rebecca Kay, a member of the Muslim community, and asked her to help source an ISIS flag for Monis. Kay contacted many people in the Muslim community but ultimately the police sourced their own flag. However, the flag was never given to Monis.
The following day, NSW and Federal Police raided three homes of people who had been contacted in the attempt to source the flag. Kay assumes that her conversations had been monitored. Kay said she would help police in another crisis, but "with this incident they have not built trust at all. You don't understand...the fear that [the AFP and ASIO] create, and how they stalk...members of our community..." Lawyer Zali Burrows questioned the purpose of the police contacting Kay in the first place, stating, "Why didn't they just print [a flag]?"
Police strategy
The NSW Police Force followed a "contain and negotiate" strategy to avoid any direct action unless a hostage was killed or injured. They decided that this strategy could deliver a "peaceful negotiated outcome" because Monis had not harmed any hostages, despite having threatened to do so. Monis had not reacted violently to the escape of five hostages on two separate occasions, or due to none of his demands being met. Further, Monis claimed to have a bomb, and "if the bomb was triggered, all of those inside the café and those attempting a rescue were not likely to survive". At 8:20 pm and again at 11:35 pm, the head of the Tactical Operations Unit attempted to persuade the other commanders to take a "Deliberate Action" plan and storm the café. This plan was overruled by Task Force Pioneer commanders and Assistant Commissioner Mark Jenkins due to the danger to the hostages and police officers.
TOU snipers could not fire due to "the narrow windows, the moving around of Monis, the risk to hostages if there was a missed shot, (and) the position of the snipers behind glass".
At 11:00 am, Operational Commander Mick Fuller approved negotiations for the release of half of the 18 hostages in return for Monis being allowed to talk on ABC radio. However, the Negotiation Commander decided not to do so because it conflicted with a standing policy to not negotiate with terrorists.
The first negotiator was not told that the Grand Mufti of Australia and a barrister who represented Monis had offered to help negotiate with Monis. He only found out about Monis's demand for the ABC to broadcast that Australia was under attack after a Facebook post from one of the hostages was read out on radio 2GB. Monis had also demanded that the Christmas lights be turned off. The first negotiator thought that doing this would have provided an opportunity to bargain with Monis, but he did not hear back from commanders as to whether it was possible so "discarded" the option.
He was then relieved by a second negotiator, but did not tell him about the demand that the Christmas lights be turned off. Hostage Selina Win Pe told the second negotiator Monis wanted to know why it hadn't happened. It was later revealed an Ausgrid team had assembled to switch off the lights, but was sent home.
A third negotiator later said that he did not have the Christmas lights turned off because he had to have reassurance that the hostage taker would not carry out his threat to kill Win Pe. He said there was some "step-by-step" process to have the hostages released (after nineteen hours). Jenkins says he would have liked the Christmas lights turned off quickly, and was unaware that this had been found to be possible. Jenkins was also not told about the Johnson text near the end of the siege that Monis wanted to release a hostage.