A 56-year-old man has been charged after allegedly entering Western Australian minister Hannah Beazley’s office in Perth while carrying nunchucks and making verbal threats.
WA Police allege the man entered the office on Albany Highway, Victoria Park, at about 1.10pm on Wednesday. No one was injured during the incident.
Police said the Bentley resident was arrested in nearby Bentley and charged with being armed in a way that may cause fear, making a threat to unlawfully do an act and possessing a prohibited drug.
“It will be alleged the man made verbal threats while in possession of an improvised martial arts weapon (nunchucks),” WA Police said.
The man was due to appear in Perth Magistrates Court on Thursday.
Beazley, Western Australia’s Local Government Minister, was in state parliament at the time. She said two members of her staff had been confronted by the incident.
“I have spoken to my staff, who are understandably shaken and upset by what took place,” she said.
“Right now, my focus is on the welfare of those staff members.”
The alleged incident came days after federal MP Helen Haines was critically injured in what police described as a deliberate attack outside her electorate office in Wangaratta, in north-east Victoria.
Haines, 65, remains in a critical condition at The Alfred hospital in Melbourne after she was struck by a Toyota LandCruiser. Surgeons amputated both of her legs following the incident.
Parliamentarians have since been urged to strengthen their personal security. The Australian Federal Police, ASIO and Home Affairs officials brought forward security briefings for MPs, senators and their staff amid what they described as a heightened threat environment.
