The man who fatally stabbed six people at Bondi Junction’s Westfield had not been taking his medication to treat his long-term schizophrenia in the years before the attack. The revelation was made in a preliminary hearing of a coronial inquest into the horrific attacks.

The first hearing into the stabbing rampage, in which Joel Cauchi killed six people before being shot dead, has begun.

A coronial inquest into the tragic stabbings at Bondi Junction has paid tribute to the “raw and painful” grief of Joel Cauchi’s victims as it seeks to reform state systems in the aftermath.

Joel Cauchi stabbed and killed six people at the Westfield shopping centre in Sydney's eastern suburbs in April before shot dead by a police officer.