Four charged after police link shootings across Sydney and Lake Illawarra
By The Times of Australia
Police have charged four young people after detectives linked three alleged drive-by shootings across Lake Illawarra and Sydney’s south-west, in what investigators say is part of an organised criminal activity probe.
The charges landed before dawn on Thursday, after Taskforce Falcon detectives, backed by the Raptor Squad and South West Metropolitan Operations Support Group, raided homes in Fairfield, Liverpool and Macquarie Fields about 6am on Wednesday.
The case reaches back to three separate shootings in April. Police say shots were fired towards a home on Kalang Avenue at Kanahooka, near Lake Illawarra, about 4.30am on Thursday 9 April. Three days later, homes in Punchbowl and Greenacre were hit in the early hours of Sunday 12 April. Nobody was injured, but police say several rounds were fired into the front of the homes before the people in the vehicle left the scene.
Detectives later formed Strike Force Albanstine and treated the three scenes as linked. That detail matters. These were not random windows broken in the night, according to police. The charges allege organised criminal activity, the kind of suburban gun work that leaves families sleeping behind brick walls while someone outside decides a house is fair game.
An 18-year-old man was arrested at Moorebank and taken to Liverpool Police Station. A 19-year-old Fairfield man was also arrested, along with a 17-year-old boy at Macquarie Fields and a 16-year-old Liverpool boy. All four were charged with two counts of firing a firearm at a dwelling as part of organised criminal activity, and participating in a criminal group by contributing to criminal activity.
The two men were refused bail to face Liverpool Local Court on Thursday. The two teenagers were refused bail to face a children’s court the same day.
Police are still looking for the driver of a red Mitsubishi Pajero with a P-plate on the back, seen around Punchbowl near the time of one of the alleged shootings.
Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or through the NSW Crime Stoppers website. Police have reminded the public not to send information through social media pages.
Source: NSW Police Force, 18 June 2026.
