Teen travelled 90 minutes before allegedly attacking bishop

A teen charged with stabbing Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel at a Sydney church has a long history of concerning behaviour consistent with mental illness, a court has been told.

The 16-year-old boy fronted court for the first time on Friday morning as it was revealed he allegedly travelled up to 90 minutes from his home address to carry out the horrifying attack.

He remains under guard in hospital after he was charged with committing a terrorist act.

Police allege the teen attacked the 53-year-old bishop and another priest during a livestreamed service at the Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley on Monday.

The matter was mentioned briefly in Parramatta Children’s Court on Friday morning.

The teenager is being held at a health facility and did not appear via videolink and was represented by his barrister Greg Scragg.

The matter is due back in court in June but Mr Scragg flagged that it might return to court sooner to address the issue of psychological assessment.

“This is a young person, on my instruction, in need of help in relation to a long history of behaviour consistent with suffering from mental illness or condition or disorder,” Mr Scragg.

He said he wanted the teenager to undergo psychological assessment as quickly as possible.

AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw said items, including electronic devices, were seized from the teen’s home on Tuesday before investigators spoke to the boy.

“Yesterday (Thursday) investigators attended a medical facility to interview the alleged offender, where he was charged with committing a terrorist act,” he said.

“We allege that the act committed meets the definition (of terrorism) for reasons outlined in a statement of facts, but I will not go into those facts here today.

“I want to reinforce that our job is not done … We target criminality not countries, we investigate radicalisation and not religion.”

Mr Kershaw said investigators were still reviewing electronic material allegedly seized from the boy’s home.

“As you’d probably be aware of people have thousands and thousands of videos and images that they store and also what we find on social media,” he said.

“The joint counter-terrorism team will go through all of that material forensically to establish what the other avenues of inquiry are, but also evidence going to the charge.”

Mr Kershaw said the AFP were “really encouraging the big companies to do the right thing” after Facebook was ordered to remove content linked to the alleged attack.

“They know that that is going through their systems and their servers, and they need to do the right thing and take that material off the internet,” he said.

For her part, NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb condemned “misinformation being scattered on social media” and said social media sites “have a role to play”.

“I think leading a social media platform should bring with it big social, corporate responsibility,” she said.

“I think to have images like that online, they need to be removed immediately and not left up there.”

Ms Webb was unable to provide details of the allegations but said police would allege the teen travelled up to 90 minutes from his home address to carry out the attack.

The teenage boy, who cannot be identified, was restrained by parishioners and was later transported to hospital, where he has remained having severed his own finger.

The stabbing sparked a violent confrontation between police, during which the rioters allegedly smashed patrol cars and lobbed bricks and stones at officers.

Speaking to the media on Friday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese rebuffed questions suggesting multiculturalism in Australia had failed after the alleged stabbing attack and riot.

“Overwhelmingly, multiculturalism has been a part of modern Australia, and people in cities like Melbourne and Sydney live in peace, harmony and are enriched,” he said.

Mr Albanese said he recently attended Greek and Sri Lankan events in major cities this week which showed the nation’s multiculturalism was “overwhelmingly” a success.

“But, there’s no doubt that this is a terrible event,” he said, referring to Monday’s alleged incidents.

“Like most things that are important in life, we make need to make sure that we nurture our multiculturalism and that we at all times show respect for each other.

“Clearly, this was a terrorism event,” he alleged. “My response as well, as a Sydneysider, was very disappointed with the police being attacked.

“Our police do extraordinary work in order to keep us safe and they shouldn’t have been subject to the attacks that happened on that evening.”

The first man arrested over the alleged riot, 19-year-old Dani Mansour, was told in court on Thursday he faced allegations he filmed himself kicking two police cars.

The Mt Druitt barber was granted strict conditional bail by magistrate Aaron Tang, who ordered Mr Mansour not to communicate with any of the rioters.