Window Cleaner Witnessed Sydney Siege

Window cleaner David Wilson witnessed police descend on the cafe with guns drawn from his perch across the street. ‘We were on the outside a building on a ledge cleaning the windows…but we were quite high up.’

Sydney siege over, gunman dead: Three people are dead after police stormed a Sydney cafe overnight, ending a dramatic 16-hour siege in the city centre. The dead include the gunman in the Lindt cafe, self-styled Iranian cleric Man Haron Moris. At about 2.10am on Tuesday a "confrontation" occurred between police and a man who had taken a number of people hostage inside the Lindt cafe at Martin Place in the CBD, NSW Police said in a statement. Shots were fired.

A 50-year-old man was pronounced dead after being taken to hospital. Another man, 34, and a woman, 38, were also pronounced dead after being taken to hospital. Four people were injured, including a woman with a gunshot wound to her shoulder and a male police officer, who suffered a non-life threatening wound to his face from gunshot pellets.

The crisis, which began about 10am (AEDT) on Monday at the popular Lindt cafe, escalated dramatically about 2am on Tuesday when five hostages ran from the cafe. Minutes later, shots were fired and police stormed the premises. Paramedics quickly followed with stretchers and ambulances took the most seriously injured to hospitals around the city. Window cleaner David Wilson witnessed police descend on the cafe with guns drawn from his perch across the street.

Window cleaner, David Wilson, managed to get a birds-eye-view of police swarming into Martin Place as he and a colleague cleaned the windows of a building across from the Lindt Chocolate Café. ‘We were looking around and there were cops running around and guns drawn. Some people came out & they looked like your usual coffee drinkers and that was about all we saw,’ Mr Wilson said, adding that his colleague’s initial response was to get out his phone and start filming.

At least two gunmen were involved in the siege but dozens of armed police sealed off the streets surrounding the site.