An inquest examining police responses to a Christmas Day siege in which a man killed himself has heard the Queensland police officers who attended had minimal or no domestic violence training.
Officers who responded to triple-0 calls in the hours before John Fredrick Schulte took his own life in 2018 appeared before a three-day coronial inquest into his death in Townsville on Monday.
The inquest is investigating the police response to the siege and the domestic violence complaints made by his estranged wife, Samantha Schulte, in the weeks leading up to Mr Schulte's death.
Ms Schulte told the inquest she had made repeated attempts to report her husband's emotional, psychological and verbal abuse to police.
She said she had also made police reports of the times he had repeatedly sexually assaulted her.
"He had so much control over where I went and where the children went," she said.
"I couldn't even talk on the telephone, I would get in trouble.
"I would be asleep in the middle of the night, and he would shine a torch in my eyes and my face.
"Or sometimes I would be asleep and I would wake up and he would just be standing over me, just staring."
Ms Schulte said her husband kept his guns under their bed.
Hours before her estranged husband's death, Ms Schulte said she received pictures of Mr Schulte holding a bullet to his head and a loaded rifle under his chin.
She said he had texted her earlier to tell their sons that "he loved them".
Job treated as a welfare check
At Monday's hearing, it emerged that about a month before Mr Schulte's death, Mrs Schulte had told police her husband had threatened to kill them both.
Constable Sharon Molyneaux, who was tasked with responding to Mrs Schulte's concerns, told the inquest she treated the job as a welfare check rather than a domestic violence incident.
"We didn't have any concerns for his mental health, and we certainly didn't believe there was domestic violence, but certainly now one would look into that a bit further," Constable Molyneaux said.
The court was shown body-camera vision of Constable Molyneaux responding to the job, in which Mr Schulte was heard saying his concerns stemmed from a lack of sexual intimacy with his wife over a three-year period.
"There's only so many times you can get rejected … you're a saint for putting up with it for that long," Constable Molyneaux was heard telling Mr Schulte in the vision.
"I really don't know what grounds she's going to justify that [a domestic violence order] on."
Constable Molyneaux told the inquest she did not identify the job as a domestic violence issue at the time because she had failed to identify domestic violence risk factors.
"There was nothing there for us to do a PPN [police protection notice] … there was not enough to take his weapons."
"At the time I did what I thought was right."
Police trained for domestic violence via online modules
Sergeant Peter "Glen" Alberich, who led the communications coordination team tasked with responding to Mrs Schulte's calls on Christmas Day, gave evidence at the inquiry.
He told the inquest officers receive limited practical training to prepare them for domestic violence cases.
"Just the online learning products that the police service provides us with," Sergeant Alberich told the inquest.
Another officer told the inquest that experience handling domestic violence cases is often done "on the job", unless police personally pursue further training.
"The vast majority is day-to-do experience, a lot is what you learn," communications coordinator Senior Constable Suzanne Warner said.
"I haven't pursued it as a specific area professionally, but it's been a matter of personal interest to me."
