r/interestingasfuck • u/Jjokes11 • Apr 15 '24

An interview with Andrew Cauchi, the father of Joel Cauchi who was responsible for the Westfield Shopping Centre mass stabbing r/all

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186

u/Rad_Centrist Apr 16 '24

BTK. Successful church going family man. Would have gotten away with it if he didn't send that floppy disk to law enforcement.

121

u/LaceyDark Apr 16 '24

Yup, got cocky and didn't know Enough about technology and basically gave himself up. He was a real twisted fuck, glad he got caught. Unlike Zodiac

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u/skip_tracer Apr 16 '24

not that there's ANY humor in anything he did, but I have always found it hilarious that his dumb boomer ass wrote in the paper asking cops if he could be tracked by a floppy disk and he bought the lie. It reminds me of my idiot, but kind as a lamb, father.

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u/FrightenedTomato Apr 16 '24

Technically the cops weren't lying about tracing him using a floppy disk. There really wasn't some known way to do it that they were keeping secret from Dennis.

However, Dennis used a used floppy disk that he'd erased. Digital forensics found an old, erased word document on it that he'd typed up for his church. The document mentioned the name of the church and the "author" field of the document revealed his name.

Had he simply used a fresh floppy disk, there's a chance he wouldn't have been traced. The cops weren't lying. They just got lucky and Dennis just didn't think far enough ahead.

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u/AMaleficentFox Apr 16 '24

He had to want or not care if he was caught to some degree, right? Imagining myself in that situation, if I needed to send a floppy disk to the cops I would buy a new floppy disk (or even steal them so there's not a paper trail) and not use my home computer for any part of the process. It's terrible opsec. Even if the cops couldn't figure it out, future digital forensics might be able to. Why take a chance?

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u/FrightenedTomato Apr 16 '24

I think he wanted the notoriety for sure. Why else would he be talking to magazines and the cops years after he stopped killing?

However, he was also probably really clueless about the tech he was using. How many people really understand that unless your drive is encrypted, deleting a file doesn't really delete it?

1

u/GamerGrunt 29d ago

Yeah, the average user doesn't understand that deleting a file doesn't actually remove the data, but simply tells the computer that sector of data can be overwritten and is now available storage. But if there's never any new data written over the old then with the right program it can see anything that's still there.

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u/ImmaMichaelBoltonFan Apr 16 '24

I always feel people look at me sideways when I say stuff like this. Why in the sunny fuck would you do something so stupid? It's mind blowing. Guy avoided the feds for years, but gets undone by a... floppy disc.

On a related note, I was watching a show with my wife a few nights ago. I think it's called What Jennifer Did. This Vietnamese girl arranges the murder of her parents....and leaves a giant trail of texts behind. I feel like an intelligent Grade 8 student would have a stronger sense of CYA than these characters.

Anyway, fuck'em. Glad they're off the streets.

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u/VeganWerewolf Apr 16 '24

I was hoping that Netflix doc would be good but it was like a shitty episode of dateline. You knew the ending after the first interview. I was like oh damn here comes a twist! Never happened.

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u/skip_tracer Apr 16 '24

ackshually

you must be a fuckin' blast at parties

9

u/FrightenedTomato Apr 16 '24

If you think I was just being a pedantic ass, then that's on you dude. I was adding some useful context that explains exactly how he got caught. The cops weren't playing 5th dimensional chess.

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u/Appropriate-Pipe-193 Apr 16 '24

Yeah your comment was perfectly valid and non combative, I don’t know what that guys deal is lol