Eight children, the youngest of them only 15 months old, have been found dead at a suburban home in the northeastern Australian city of Cairns, police said Friday.
Police said they were called to the property in the Manoora area Friday morning after reports of a woman with serious injuries.
“During an examination of the residence, police located the bodies of the children, all aged between 18 months and 15 years,” the Queensland Police Service said in a statement.
Detective Inspector Bruno Asnicar sought to allay fears among local residents about the deaths.
“There’s no need for the public to be concerned about this other than it’s a tragic, tragic event,” he told reporters near the crime scene, adding that the area had been secured and was being well-patrolled.
“These events are extremely distressing for everyone,” Asnicar said. “Police officers aren’t immune from that. We’re human beings as well.”
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that some of the victims were believed to have been stabbed, but police haven’t confirmed that information.
The injured woman, who is believed to be 34 years old, is being treated for her wounds and is helping police with their investigation, according to the statement. She’s in stable condition and is not under police custody, Asnicar said.
At this stage, he said, police haven’t so far been able to establish the relationship between the woman and the children or the relationships of the children with each other.
‘An unspeakable crime’
Cairns is a remote coastal town of roughly 150,000 residents that’s popular with tourists as a jumping-off point for visiting the Great Barrier Reef.
“The news out of Cairns is heartbreaking,” Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said in a statement. “All parents would feel a gut-wrenching sadness at what has happened. This is an unspeakable crime.”
The road has been blocked off and the crime scene locked down, police said, with officers from criminal investigation, child protection and crime scene units at the scene.
Specialist police officers will also be arriving from Brisbane, another city in Queensland, Asnicar said.
“This is not a small job. We’re not taking this lightly at all,” he told reporters. “We will cover every angle before this is finished.”
A neighbor of the house where the bodies were found said the family who lived there had always been very quiet. She told CNN affiliate Seven Network that she’d heard no noise from the house Friday as she sat in her front room — until the sudden burst of police sirens.
Australia had already been shaken this week by a dramatic siege at a cafe in the heart of Sydney, in which two hostages were killed, as well as the gunman who was holding them captive.
“These are trying days for our country,” Abbott said.
