Police are investigating what they believe to have been two botched gang killings of innocent people in Sydney's west this week.
A man in his 40s was gunned down outside a west Sydney duplex where he was working on Wednesday afternoon, with a university student shot dead in his family's southwest Sydney home on Tuesday.
There have been five suspected cases of mistaken identity since May 2025, with fears reckless overseas criminal leaders are worsening the potentially misguided attacks.
Veteran police officer and Bond University criminology expert Terry Goldsworthy said there seemed to be an increased recklessness around gang killings in the past year.
"Usually there is a level of professionalism that goes into these things," he told AAP.
"It seems to me in these recent cases you may have some guns for hire getting round who are amateurs.
"It's almost a clown show really, it's just ludicrous."
But Dr Goldsworth said the killing of people with no links to organised crime could continue if NSW Police did not get on top of the issue of warring gangs.
"We saw what happened in Melbourne when underworld wars erupt," he said.
Several major underworld figures were gunned down in public during the Melbourne's gangland war, which lasted around a decade from 1998.
"People become more brazen, a bit more carefree in terms of taking action," he said.
Despite the back-to-back killings, the NSW government insisted the situation was under control.
Retired NSW Police Sergeant Glenn Gorick said two suspected mistaken identity shootings in two days was "unheard of".
He said a major question for authorities should be where the shooters were getting the victims' addresses.
"Whether it be law enforcement, whether it be council enforcement, or people with access to the electoral rolls … but someone is divulging information to get these addresses," he said.
"And sometimes the intended victim doesn't live there anymore, but the address is still currently theirs, and that's where I think these mistaken identities are occurring."
Sydney residents were rightfully becoming increasingly fearful that they could inadvertently be caught up in gang violence as a result of recent attacks, Mr Gorick said.
"These are just everyday Australians going about their lives, and now they're thinking: 'Well, they got the wrong house there. Now, am I next?'" he said.
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