A pregnant woman and a man have been found dead at a home in the outback Queensland town of Charleville, in an apparent murder-suicide after a protracted overnight standoff with police.
Police confirmed on Thursday that a toddler, who was found unharmed, had been at the home during the eight-hour siege that began on Wednesday evening.
Several streets in the remote town, 600km west of Toowoomba, were locked down by police after officers arrived at the property on King Street following reports of “a serious assault”.
An emergency declaration, under the state’s Public Safety Preservation Act, was in place for about eight hours.
When specialist officers entered the home, just before 1.45am, they found that a 45-year-old man and a 23-year-old woman were dead.
The incident will be investigated by Queensland police’s ethical standards command because it occurred during a police operation.
Assistant police commissioner Matthew Vanderbyl told reporters on Thursday that the situation became “quite dynamic and quite threatening to police quite quickly”, prompting the need for specialist officers and a negotiator.
Vanderbyl would not be drawn on whether the man and woman had any prior contact with authorities, or whether this was being treated as a domestic violence incident.
“It’s probably too early to speculate whether it’s DV related at this stage,” he said.
“We’re still advising the next of kin of the persons involved.
“We’re still to fully establish the circumstances of who the deceased persons were and their role in the community.”
Shaun Radnedge, the mayor of the Murweh shire council, said that based on the information he had been given “there is no ongoing risk to the public”.
“The situation has been brought to an end,” Radnedge said.
“This tragedy will be felt deeply across our small community. I know many people will be struggling to come to terms with what has happened.”
