originally planned to capture and domesticate the animals, creating a pastoral herd that would have afforded his family a comfortable lifestyle. Arguing that money spent on the BTEC program "would be better spent on research on AIDS," Ansell considered the destruction of the animals an outrageous waste of good livestock. Three neighboring graziers were eventually awarded $100,000 in government loans, but Ansell was never compensated for his losses. Mimosa pigra weeds also began taking over the floodplain, rendering it useless. With no money to fight the invasive weeds, the Ansells were forced to sell their cattle station in June 1991. The couple's 15-year marriage soon disintegrated and the Ansells divorced. Depressed, unemployed, and cash-strapped, Ansell began growing marijuana, later becoming a user of amphetamines. In June 1996, he began dating Cherie Hewson. The couple lived at Urapanga Station, an Aboriginal outstation on the Roper River about south of Darwin. Over the next several years, the couple's drug addiction became more destructive, culminating in a psychotic episode that ultimately claimed Ansell's life in a shootout with police. Death Ansell was killed following a police shootout on 3 August 1999. The deadly altercation began at approximately 10:45 a.m. on the roadblocked intersection of Stuart Highway and Old Bynoe Road, near Acacia Hills. Ansell had ambushed veteran Sergeant Glen Anthony Huitson and his partner, rookie Constable Jamie O'Brien, with a shot from Ansell's .30-30 lever-action rifle deflecting off a police car and fatally striking Huitson in the abdomen, below his bulletproof vest and severely injured onlooker Jonathan Anthonysz in the pelvis and lower back. A gun-battle immediately erupted involving numerous officers of the Adelaide River Police Station. About five minutes into the fight, Ansell was shot dead. O'Brien killed Ansell with a shotgun after unloading on Ansell's position with his Glock pistol, having missed all his previous shots. The battle ended the authorities' 12-hour search for an attacker who shot and seriously injured two nearby residents (David Hobden in the eye and Brian Williams in his index finger) the previous night. Ansell's girlfriend Hewson was with him but escaped before the gun-battle occurred; she fled, eventually turning herself in to Brisbane police on 7 August 1999. Although police were at a loss to explain Ansell's motive (he could have easily escaped the roadblock had he chosen to), it was later determined that Ansell had been raving about Freemasons prior to his death; he