A former lawyer of Man Haron Monis says he would have urged police to shoot Monis in the head with “no negotiation” if he knew the former refugee was the one holding 18 people hostage in the Sydney siege.
Lawyer Dr Nazir Daawar also revealed he kicked Monis out of his office in 2010 when the unrepentant self-anointed “peace activist” refused to plead guilty to sending offensive letters to the grieving families of Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan.
On the fifth day of the inquest into the Sydney siege, Nazir Daawar said members of the Iranian community had told him that Monis had a history of sexual assault in Iran, where he was wanted by police for those and fraud matters.
And in his statement to the inquest in Sydney, Daawar said he found Monis to be “a smart guy, but a very evil smart guy”.
Monis came to the western Sydney office of Daawar in January 2010 seeking representation in court the following day over offensive letters he had written to the families of Australian soldiers killed fighting in Afghanistan.
Monis called himself a peace activist and insisted his letters – that said soldiers were burning in hell – were part of his campaign for peace.
But Daawar had once been the head of the United Nations office in Afghanistan and, with a deep understanding of both war and peace, challenged Monis.
After an initial court appearance, Daawar told Monis that his letters were abusive and urged him to plead guilty.
The two argued about peace and Islam, including Monis’s ideas of “enforcing peace” through violence.
When Daawar insisted Monis plead guilty or find another lawyer, Monis flew into a rage, “like evil had occupied his body” with his eyes coming “out of their sockets”, the lawyer told the inquest.
Monis refused to plead guilty and told Daawar: “I pay money to you and what I say, you do that.”
Getting more enraged, Monis said: “I will make you famous.”
“You have probably come to the wrong lawyer,” Daawar said, adding: “Get out of my office.”
After kicking Monis out, Daawar said he received calls of support from members of the Iranian community, and an anonymous call from a man who said Monis was wanted for sexually assaulting a woman in Iran before he came to Australia in 1996.
In his statement, Daawar said if he’d known Monis was in the Lindt cafe, “I would call police to shoot him on the head and no negotiation”.
“I knew that will be the one and only way appropriate to deal with that situation.”
Criminal lawyer Manny Conditsis told the inquest Monis told him stories of being an agent for the Iranian secret service who had fled Iran when he no longer wanted to secretly record Muslim clerics for the authorities.
Conditsis said Monis refused to accept that his letters, which referred to deceased soldiers burning in hell, could cause offence.
When he finally convinced Monis to plead guilty in 2013, Conditsis thought he had convinced Monis to publicly apologise but, as soon as he saw a media pack outside the Sydney courthouse, “out came his mantra”.
There was some disagreement about Monis’s intelligence. High-profile lawyer Chris Murphy told the court he thought Monis was “not very intelligent” when he represented him for a day in 2009 but Conditsis said Monis was articulate and “a very intelligent man”.
However all lawyers spoke of Monis’s attention-seeking behaviour and their anger at his performances outside court for the cameras.
The hearing resumes on Monday.
