A man who carried out a stabbing rampage at a Sydney shopping center appears to have targeted women, police said.
Joel Cauchi, 40, caused panic in the busy Westfield Bondi Junction complex on Saturday when he began stabbing people with a long blade.
Five of the six people who died were women. A number of others were injured, including a child.
The New South Wales Police Commissioner told Australia's ABC News it was “clear” Cauchi was focusing on women.
The dead person was security guard Faraz Taher (30 years old), who tried to intervene in the attack.
“The videos speak for themselves, don't they?” Commissioner Karen Webb told ABC News Breakfast.
“It is clear to me, and it is clear to investigators, that this is an area of interest in which the perpetrator appears to have focused on women and avoided men.
“We don't know what was going through the perpetrator's mind, which is why it's now important for investigators to spend a lot of time interviewing those who knew him, were around him, and were close to him.
“So we can get an insight into what he was thinking.”
Authorities previously said the attack was likely “mental health-related” for Cauchi, who was shot and killed by a police officer on Saturday.
He was already known to police but was not arrested or charged in his home state of Queensland. Queensland Police said he lived itinerantly for several years and was first diagnosed with mental illness when he was 17 years old.
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