The tiny community of Thologolong is now forever linked to the violent demise of one of Australia’s most-wanted fugitives.

It’s where Dezi Freeman, on the run for months from authorities over the fatal shooting of two police officers, was himself gunned down on a remote property by the Murray River.

Until early yesterday morning, it was a good place to hide.

The dwellings on the property are far enough from the nearest road that a resident would be hard to spot from a passing car, and the nearest neighbouring property is a kilometre away.

The hills of Mount Lawson National Park loom behind the property. (ABC News: Maren Preuss)

The ramshackle collection of converted shipping containers, rusting caravans and car bodies sits at the end of a dirt driveway several hundred metres from Murray River Road, just a stone’s throw from the border with New South Wales.

It’s more than 150 kilometres north-east from Freeman’s property at Porepunkah, where he’s alleged to have shot dead two police officers, sparking the biggest manhunt in Victoria’s history.

The day Porepunkah went quiet and learned Dezi Freeman was dead

Seven months after a gunman killed two police officers on its streets, the tiny town woke to news that Dezi Freeman was dead.

The thick scrub of Mount Lawson National Park is visible, rising up over hills at the rear of the property.

On the other side of those hills sits the popular Kurrajongs campground, less than a kilometre from where Freeman was shot dead in the early hours of Monday morning.

The site looks like countless other rural Victorian properties, littered with disused barrels, containers, faded tarpaulins and miscellaneous farming equipment.

A dinghy and a kayak lying overturned on the ground look like they’ve seen better days.

The property where Dezi Freeman was shot dead is owned by a man called Richard Sutherland. (ABC News)

A rusting white container with the name of shipping company COSCO sits inside a ring of trees in the otherwise bare property.

This is where Freeman had lived for an unknown period of time since fleeing the scene of the police shooting at Porepunkah.

An entrance, covered in a faded awning, has been made in the side of the container.

A makeshift shelter and camping chairs were set up at the Thologolong site. (ABC News)

On a camp table set up beneath the awning sits a camp stove and a single white plate.

To the left of this makeshift outdoor dining area is where the heavily armoured police vehicle sat on Monday morning, with its hydraulic arm extended into contact with the container.

Metal doors are open at the far end of the container where Freeman was asleep when officers approached on Monday. (ABC News)

Former Victoria Police homicide detective Charlie Bezzina told ABC News Breakfast that the nature of the property was such that there “was no likelihood of innocent people being injured”.

“He’s in this steel box, it’s not like taking a sledge hammer and smashing the door down like you would at a house.”

The pole seen at the end of the police vehicle appeared to have been used to deploy tear gas into a hole in the dwelling, Mr Bezzina said.

“He could’ve stayed in there for forever and a day. At one point, someone’s got to make a decision and say ‘we’ve got to go in’,” he said.

The heavily armoured black police vehicle in the middle of the site. (ABC News)

At the far end of the container, where Freeman was asleep when officers approached under the cover of darkness, the metal doors are open, revealing an interior crammed with items.

It’s not clear whether these doors were opened by police or by Freeman as he exited the container with a firearm taken from one of the officers slain in Porepunkah.

Police vehicles remain at the site on Tuesday, as investigations continue into how Freeman evaded police for so long before meeting such a bloody end.

The property where Dezi Freeman hid in a remote part of Victoria, close to the border with New South Wales. (Google Earth)

Property owner now living interstate

The property where Freeman was shot dead is owned by a man called Richard Sutherland, who the ABC understands is aged in his 70s and has not lived at the site for several months.

He’s believed to have moved to Tasmania to live with relatives.

There’s no evidence Mr Sutherland knew Freeman or had any inkling the fugitive gunman was living at his property.

Police remained at the property on Tuesday. (ABC News: Maren Preuss)

Mr Sutherland’s brother, Neil Sutherland, lives close to Richard’s property at Thologolong.

Coincidentally, Neil was one of the first people to contact the ABC yesterday morning to report hearing a helicopter, loudspeaker and possibly a gunshot in the early hours of the morning.

When asked if his brother had a connection to Freeman he said: “No, not at all, he’s never, never met him.”

Neil Sutherland says he heard a police helicopter and a gun shot. (ABC News: Annie Brown)

Rebecca Chettleburg, who runs Nariel Valley Farm about an hour’s drive away, says she used to grow flowers on Richard Sutherland’s property for her floristry business and that she’s an old friend of his.

She said Rick, as she calls him, used to live in one of the containers and that he liked to live “off grid”.

An aunt of Richard Sutherland, Gina Sutherland, told the ABC she used to live on a property very close to Richard’s in Thologolong until just over a year ago.

She described Richard as “a bit alternative”.

On Tuesday morning, 24 hours after Freeman was shot dead, the entrance to the property remained blocked by police vehicles as officers continued to pore over the site.