A police officer has told an inquest into the fatal shooting of a man who was holding a woman hostage that he made the decision to repeatedly fire his gun because he believed there was "an imminent threat" to her.
Constable Christopher McCormack was among the officers called to a Carlisle delicatessen in November 2014, where 38-year-old Brendan Lindsay was holding a worker, Sheila Tran, at knifepoint.
It's believed Mr Lindsay was under the influence of the drug ice, and officers said they shot him because they believed he was going to kill Ms Tran.
Constable McCormack, who graduated from the police academy three years prior to the incident, was one of the four officers who fired their guns at Mr Lindsay as they surrounded him in an arc outside the delicatessen.
Officer kept firing after others stopped
A total of 13 shots were fired in the space of nine seconds and the inquest has heard up to 11 of them hit Mr Lindsay, who died at the scene.
Constable McCormack fired the final shots and today he testified that he discharged his gun four or five times as Mr Lindsay and Ms Tran were falling to the ground.
He said while he could not see the knife in Mr Lindsay's hand, he made the decision to use his gun as he was running towards Mr Lindsay and saw him make a stabbing motion.
"I've seen what I perceived to be Mr Lindsay's arm with the knife moving towards [the hostage's] back, just as they were falling … it was a very short amount of time," he said.
He said the other officers had stopped firing their guns, but he still believed there was "an imminent threat" to the life of the hostage.
Constable McCormack said after he fired his first shot he thought to himself "shit, this is not working", so he fired again.
"It wasn't until the final shot that I saw no more movement," he testified.
Earlier, another officer who fired his gun, Dylan Stringer, said he believed if the officers had not taken "positive action" to stop Mr Lindsay, his hostage would have been killed.
The inquest has heard that the officers who fired their guns were later "arrested on suspicion of causing grievous bodily harm".
They were "unarrested" later the same day, and both Constables Stringer and McCormack said they were told their arrests "were not appropriate" and "it would not happen again if a similar situation arose".
