Our son, Luke Gilbert, a 24-year-old, was shot dead by Queensland police on 1st October 2022. He was provoked whilst crossing the road by a cop allegedly romantically rejected by his girlfriend. Luke was not under arrest or suspected of committing any crime and the highly suspicious circumstances are being covered up!

Our world stopped that day and since then, the “criminal justice” process has been nearly as brutal for us as our son’s death.

In August 2023, the coronial inquest into Luke’s death concluded. The inquest focused not on the actions of the police but was a character assassination of our young boy. Instead of asking questions like why they shot him despite no crime having been committed, the police and the media talked about Luke’s mental health from years earlier to justify the police shooting.

His girlfriend was inexplicably removed from the witness list without informing us, even though she spent the day of the shooting with Luke. Her statement wasn’t shared with the board - it seems like every piece of the story that doesn’t align with the police narrative has been excluded.

Luke had no witnesses to share his side of the story from the day. Statements from any friends, family, partners, ex-partners or work colleagues were not included. But a psychoanalysis of his tattoos was given a hearing.

We were denied the opportunity to make a victim impact statement based on claims it was defamatory by the lawyers representing the police! The impact statement was a chance for us to share the real living person that Luke was, behind the headlines: the beautiful blue-eyed boy who meant the world to us.

Critical issues remain unresolved -

• Luke's girlfriend came forward after the inquest alleging a prior relationship with one of the officers the year before meeting Luke. She met him on Tinder and rejected him due to his attitude towards his job. She also alleges he was watching them have breakfast just hours before killing Luke. The coroner refused to admit this as evidence and deemed it irrelevant!

• Evidence pertaining to the prosecution of Constable Bryce Collins, who committed offences against our son when he illegally accessed Luke's information on his police computer and then disclosed information to a member of the public, has been withheld and repeated requests to obtain this have been denied so the impact that his actions may have had on Luke being killed or the subsequent investigation have never been scrutinised.

• Critical video evidence, including Luke's final walk up the street before coming face to face with his killers is being covered up and was never available during the inquest despite indisputable proof that it has been digitally altered.

• Ballistics evidence has been withheld. Forensic evidence does NOT match what was allowed to come out during the inquest. Forster was allowed to say he fired 4 bullets and Murray was allowed to say he fired 1 bullet but forensics says otherwise and we still don't know if Luke was killed by Forster or Forster and Murray.

•False witness statements were heavily relied upon to create the false narrative that we are still fighting against despite video evidence not supporting them. 

There are still many shocking details and evidence that we are not allowed to share. We strongly dispute the FRAUDULENT findings of the inquest which was an investigation by the police, for the police concluding that police did nothing wrong and even worse, that our son had wanted to die. This is a profound and dangerous miscarriage of justice.

We call for a fully independent inquiry into the death of our son, one that genuinely scrutinises the conduct of all officers involved, the integrity of the investigation, and the actions of oversight bodies.

We also support the Queensland Council for Civil Liberties’ call for a broader review into police shootings. Data shows that in the year Luke was killed, Queensland Police shot more people than police in the rest of Australia combined. Luke’s death follows a recurring pattern: police union making false commentary justifying shootings within hours, long before any inquest, undermining public confidence and due process.

This is not justice.
This is perverting the course of justice.

Please follow our journey on Instagram or Facebook page for more information and help us give Luke a voice by supporting and sharing this petition. 

Luke mattered. Truth matters. Justice demands better.