Who want's to know where the rifle is that murdered "Bikie" Billy Grierson?
Published on 29 Apr 2018
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Who want's to know where the rifle is that murdered "Bikie" Billy Grierson by "Bent Cop" Don Hancock?? Don Hancock... "A bloody bent cop" now 17 years dead... Donald Leslie Hancock lost his head on his way home from the races!! Landed on his roof... The thing is what happened to the rifle he used to shoot the 'bikie' at Ora Banda????? My information may be right. Maybe wrong!! Maybe right!! Wapol may have found it? May not care too much! I was told by a person of ill repute... but let's face it that's the type of person who would know... just like I found very relevant witnesses who gave "startling new evidence" before the coronial inquiry into Shirley Finn murder namely, Maxwell Healy and Bob Meyers. Read the papers on them... I had given their names to all and indeed Max's affidavit was forwarded by me to all and sundry, including Detective Rainford of Wapol. I insisted to all and more the Bob Meyers must be subpoenaed to tell all... They finally did and Gee Whizz they did have a lot to say. Didn't they...
I wonder if Wapol will bother to contact myself via email at terencemclernon@gmail.com
Affidavit of Maxwell Raymond Healy:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B7-...
'90 per cent' of the police force knew who killed Shirley Finn - WA Today:
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/90-...
'Feared' WA detective central to Shirley Finn murder investigation dies: https://www.smh.com.au/national/weste...
Death of former detective stirs hope of truth in unsolved Shirley Finn murder case: https://thewest.com.au/news/wa/death-...
A police whistleblower in a corrupt political system - Brian Martin:
http://www.bmartin.cc/dissent/documen... Shirley Finn inquest: Man ‘beaten close to death’ by detective: https://www.perthnow.com.au/news/crim...
Gypsy Joker sniper shooting mystery: https://www.smh.com.au/news/national/...
Cop's daughter denies gun comment: https://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/...
"The daughter of a retired detective who was the prime suspect in the shooting death of a bikie has denied telling a customer in her father's pub that he had gone to fetch a gun after an argument with a gang. Alison Hancock, daughter of former Perth CIB chief Don Hancock, was working behind the bar in the Ora Banda Historic Inn on October 1, 2000 - the day Gypsy Joker member Billy Grierson was killed by a single rifle shot" The Fifth Estate/Chapter 13: The Duck 'Bills' The Fox:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTkK2... 1:14
Justice For all! Terence Mclernon 211 views 3:38
Shirley Finn/Cop Kill. Terence J. McLernon and the Corionial Inquiry. Terence Mclernon
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Terry Fibber Forger, Joshua Jr Magee & Colin Circles Pace and the Subiaco Farmer Jacks armed hold up Terence Mclernon
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Veterans Affairs A National Disgrace/ Jay 360 Terence Mclernon
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Corrupt ex-detective Carl Casilli to face jail Part 1 (Part 2 link at bottom of description) Terence Mclernon
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INTRODUCING COLIN "CIRCLES" PACE DISGRACED Terence Mclernon 669 views CORONIAL INQUIRY INTO MURDER OF SHIRLEY FINN.
Terence Mclernon 643 views
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371 views
Shirley Finn/Cop Kill Part 2.
The Maxwell Raymond Affidavit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7P7q...
Published on Jul 7, 2016
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You can help stop this happening again. Please email: Still no arrest? www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgIU3OW_VCo
To: Commissioner McKechnie info@ccc.wa.gov.au Premier McGowan wa-government@dpc.wa.gov.au Or better still, email them and tell them what you think! Thanks!
WRITTEN BY: John P. Rafferty
https://www.britannica.com/list/9-infamous-assassins-and-the-world-leaders-they-dispatched
The murder of a president, prime minister, king, or other world leader can resonate throughout a country. Sometimes the assassination of a leader is so shocking and profound that it triggers what psychologists call flashbulb memory in a country’s citizens. Many will remember forever where they were and what they were doing at the moment they heard their leader was murdered. As a result of painful experiences in their histories, most governments now surround their leaders with protection, which ranges from a handful of personal bodyguards to elaborate security services, to deter a prospective assassin or group of assassins from carrying out their deadly actions. Unfortunately, some still succeed. Nine famous assassinations occurring since 1865 appear in this list.
John F. Kennedy was the 35th president of the United States (1961–63), who faced a number of foreign crises, especially in Cuba and Berlin, but managed to secure such achievements as the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty and the Alliance for Progress. He was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas.
He was the youngest man and the first Roman Catholic ever elected to the presidency of the United States. His administration lasted 1,037 days. From the onset he was concerned with foreign affairs. In his memorable inaugural address, he called upon Americans “to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle…against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.” He declared:
”In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility—I welcome it.…The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it—and the glow from that fire can truly light the world. And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.”
Lee Harvey Oswald is the accused assassin of President John F. Kennedy. As history records, at 12:30 pm on November 22, 1963, from a window on the sixth floor of the depository building, Oswald, using a mail-order rifle, allegedly fired three shots that killed President Kennedy and wounded Texas Gov. John B. Connally in an open-car motorcade in Dealey Plaza. Oswald took a bus and a taxi to his rooming house, departed, and about a mile away was stopped by Patrolman J.D. Tippit, who believed that Oswald resembled the suspect already being described over the police radio. Oswald killed Tippit with his mail-order revolver (1:15 pm). At about 1:45 pm Oswald was seized in the Texas Theatre by police officers responding to reports of a suspect. At 1:30 am on November 23 he was formally arraigned for the murder of President Kennedy.
On the morning of November 24, while being transferred from a jail cell to an interrogation office, Oswald was shot by a distraught Dallas nightclub owner, Jack Ruby. Ruby was tried and found guilty of murder (March 14, 1964) and sentenced to death. In October 1966 a Texas appeals court reversed the conviction, but, before a new trial could be held, Ruby died of a blood clot, complicated by cancer (January 3, 1967).
Abraham Lincoln was 16th president of the United States (1861–65), who preserved the Union during the American Civil War and brought about the emancipation of the slaves. Among American heroes, Lincoln continues to have a unique appeal for his fellow countrymen and also for people of other lands. This charm derives from his remarkable life story—the rise from humble origins, the dramatic death—and from his distinctively human and humane personality as well as from his historical role as savior of the Union and emancipator of the slaves. His relevance endures and grows especially because of his eloquence as a spokesman for democracy. In his view, the Union was worth saving not only for its own sake but because it embodied an ideal, the ideal of self-government. In recent years, the political side to Lincoln’s character, and his racial views in particular, have come under close scrutiny, as scholars continue to find him a rich subject for research.
John Wilkes Booth, a member of one of the United States’ most distinguished acting families of the 19th century, assassinated President Abraham Lincoln. Booth was a vigorous supporter of the Southern cause and outspoken in his advocacy of slavery and his hatred of Lincoln. He was a volunteer in the Richmond militia that hanged the abolitionist John Brown in 1859. By the autumn of 1864 Booth had begun to plan a sensational abduction of President Lincoln. He recruited several coconspirators, and throughout the winter of 1864–65 the group gathered frequently in Washington, D.C., where they mapped out a number of alternative abduction plans. After several attempts had miscarried, Booth resolved to destroy the president and his officers no matter what the cost.
On the morning of April 14, 1865, Booth learned that the president was to attend an evening performance of the comedy Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theatre in the capital. Booth hurriedly assembled his band and assigned each member his task, including the murder of Secretary of State William Seward. He himself would kill Lincoln. About 6:00 pm Booth entered the deserted theatre, where he tampered with the outer door of the presidential box so that it could be jammed shut from the inside. He returned during the play’s third act to find Lincoln and his guests unguarded.
Entering the box, Booth drew a pistol and shot Lincoln through the back of the head. He grappled briefly with a patron, swung himself over the balustrade, and leaped off it, shouting, “Sic semper tyrannis!” (the motto of the state of Virginia, meaning “Thus always to tyrants!”) and “The South is avenged!” He landed heavily on the stage, breaking a bone in his left leg, but was able to make his escape to the alleyway and his horse. The attempt on Seward’s life failed, but Lincoln died shortly after seven o’clock the following morning.
Eleven days later, on April 26, Federal troops arrived at a farm in Virginia, just south of the Rappahannock River, where a man said to be Booth was hiding in a tobacco barn. David Herold, another conspirator, was in the barn with Booth. He gave himself up before the barn was set afire, but Booth refused to surrender. After being shot, either by a soldier or by himself, Booth was carried to the porch of the farmhouse, where he subsequently died. The body was identified by a doctor who had operated on Booth the year before, and it was then secretly buried, though four years later it was reinterred. There is no acceptable evidence to support the rumors, current at the time, doubting that the man who had been killed was actually Booth.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. His leadership was fundamental to that movement’s success in ending the legal segregation of African Americans in the South and other parts of the United States. King rose to national prominence as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which promoted nonviolent tactics, such as the massive March on Washington (1963), to achieve civil rights. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.
In the years after his death, King remained the most widely known African American leader of his era. His stature as a major historical figure was confirmed by the successful campaign to establish a national holiday in his honor in the United States and by the building of a King memorial on the Mall in Washington, D.C., near the Lincoln Memorial, the site of his famous “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963. Many states and municipalities have enacted King holidays, authorized public statues and paintings of him, and named streets, schools, and other entities for him.
James Earl Ray was King’s assassin. Ray had been a small-time crook, a robber of gas stations and stores, who had served time in prison, once in Illinois and twice in Missouri, and received a suspended sentence in Los Angeles. He escaped from the Missouri State Penitentiary on April 23, 1967; and in Memphis, Tenn., nearly a year later, on April 4, 1968, from a window of a neighboring rooming house, he shot King, who was standing on the balcony of a motel room.
Ray fled to Toronto, secured a Canadian passport through a travel agency, flew to London (May 5), then to Lisbon (May 7?), where he secured a second Canadian passport (May 16), and back to London (May 17?). On June 8 he was apprehended by London police at Heathrow Airport as he was about to embark for Brussels; the FBI had established him as the prime suspect almost immediately after the assassination. Back in Memphis, Ray pleaded guilty, forfeiting a trial, and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. Months later, he recanted his confession, without effect. In renouncing his guilt, Ray raised the specter of a conspiracy behind King’s murder but offered scant evidence to support his claim. Later in life his pleas for a trial were encouraged by some civil-rights leaders, notably the King family. In June 1977 Ray escaped from Brushy Mountain (Tenn.) Prison and remained at large for 54 hours before being recaptured in a massive manhunt.
Francis Ferdinand was an Austrian archduke whose assassination was the immediate cause of World War I. Francis Ferdinand was the eldest son of the archduke Charles Louis, who was the brother of the emperor Francis Joseph. The death of the heir apparent, the archduke Rudolf, in 1889, made Francis Ferdinand next in succession to the Austro-Hungarian throne after his father, who died in 1896. But because of Francis Ferdinand’s ill health in the 1890s, his younger brother Otto was regarded as more likely to succeed, a possibility that deeply embittered Francis Ferdinand. His desire to marry Sophie, countess von Chotek, a lady-in-waiting, brought him into sharp conflict with the emperor and the court. Only after renouncing his future children’s rights to the throne was the morganatic marriage allowed in 1900.
In foreign affairs he tried, without endangering the alliance with Germany, to restore Austro-Russian understanding. At home he thought of political reforms that would have strengthened the position of the crown and weakened that of the Magyars against the other nationalities in Hungary. His plans were based on the realization that any nationalistic policy pursued by one section of the population would endanger the multinational Habsburg empire. His relationship with Francis Joseph was exacerbated by his continuous pressure on the emperor, who in his later years left affairs to take care of themselves but sharply resented any interference with his prerogative. From 1906 onward Francis Ferdinand’s influence in military matters grew, and in 1913 he became inspector general of the army. In June 1914 he and his wife were assassinated by the Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip at Sarajevo; a month later World War I began with Austria’s declaration of war against Serbia.
Princip’s act gave Austria-Hungary the excuse that it had sought for opening hostilities against Serbia and thus precipitated World War I. In Yugoslavia—the South Slav state that he had envisioned—Princip came to be regarded as a national hero.
Born into a Bosnian Serb peasant family, Princip was trained in terrorism by the Serbian secret society known as the Black Hand (true name Ujedinjenje ili Smrt, “Union or Death”). Wanting to destroy Austro-Hungarian rule in the Balkans and to unite the South Slav peoples into a federal nation, he believed that the first step must be the assassination of a member of the Habsburg imperial family or a high official of the government.
Having learned that Francis Ferdinand, as inspector general of the imperial army, would pay an official visit to Sarajevo in June 1914, Princip, his associate Nedjelko Čabrinović, and four other revolutionaries awaited the archduke’s procession on June 28. Čabrinović threw a bomb that bounced off the archduke’s car and exploded beneath the next vehicle. A short time later, while driving to a hospital to visit an officer wounded by the bomb, Francis Ferdinand and Sophie were shot to death by Princip, who said he had aimed not at the duchess but at General Oskar Potiorek, military governor of Bosnia. Austria-Hungary held Serbia responsible and declared war July 28.
After a trial in Sarajevo, Princip was sentenced (Oct. 28, 1914) to 20 years’ imprisonment, the maximum penalty allowed for a person under the age of 20 on the day of his crime. Probably tubercular before his imprisonment, Princip underwent amputation of an arm because of tuberculosis of the bone and died in a hospital near his prison.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was a leader of the Indian nationalist movement against British rule, and was considered to be the father of his country. He is internationally esteemed for his doctrine of nonviolent protest to achieve political and social progress. It was one of the greatest disappointments of Gandhi’s life that Indian freedom was realized without Indian unity. Muslim separatism had received a great boost while Gandhi and his colleagues were in jail, and in 1946–47, as the final constitutional arrangements were being negotiated, the outbreak of communal riots between Hindus and Muslims unhappily created a climate in which Gandhi’s appeals to reason and justice, tolerance and trust had little chance. When partition of the subcontinent was accepted—against his advice—he threw himself heart and soul into the task of healing the scars of the communal conflict, toured the riot-torn areas in Bengal and Bihar, admonished the bigots, consoled the victims, and tried to rehabilitate the refugees. In the atmosphere of that period, surcharged with suspicion and hatred, this was a difficult and heartbreaking task. Gandhi was blamed by partisans of both the communities. When persuasion failed, he went on a fast. He won at least two spectacular triumphs; in September 1947 his fasting stopped the rioting in Calcutta, and in January 1948, he shamed the city of Delhi into a communal truce. A few days later, on January 30, while he was on his way to his evening prayer meeting in Delhi, he was shot down by Nathuram Godse, a young Hindu fanatic.
Nathuram Godse believed that Gandhi treated Muslims with more respect than Hindus, by incorporating the Koran into his teachings in Hindu temples, for example, while refusing to read from the Bhagavad Gita in mosques. Godse was also critical of what he considered to be Gandhi’s ineffective use of power in the Indian National Congress during and after the partitioning of the country. On January 30, witnesses said that Godse shot Gandhi three times at point-blank range, as Gandhi made his way through the garden of a private residence. Gandhi was escorting four women and he was greeting members of the household on his way to prayer when Godse fired the shots. Gandi was thought to have died almost instantly, and Godse was immediately apprehended. In a statement released several months later, Godse noted that he bowed to Gandhi and wished him well before he opened fire.
William McKinley was the 25th president of the United States (1897–1901). Under McKinley’s leadership, the United States went to war against Spain in 1898 and thereby acquired a global empire, including Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. The ratification vote was extremely close—just one vote more than the required two-thirds—reflecting opposition by many “anti-imperialists” to the United States acquiring overseas possessions, especially without the consent of the people who lived in them. Although McKinley had not entered the war for territorial aggrandizement, he sided with the “imperialists” in supporting ratification, convinced that the United States had an obligation to assume responsibility for “the welfare of an alien people.”
Renominated for another term without opposition, McKinley again faced Democrat William Jennings Bryan in the presidential election of 1900. McKinley’s margins of victory in both the popular and electoral votes were greater than they were four years before, no doubt reflecting satisfaction with the outcome of the war and with the widespread prosperity that the country enjoyed. Following his inauguration in 1901, McKinley left Washington for a tour of the western states, to be concluded with a speech at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. Cheering crowds throughout the journey attested to McKinley’s immense popularity. More than 50,000 admirers attended his exposition speech, in which the leader who had been so closely identified with protectionism now sounded the call for commercial reciprocity among nations. The following day, September 6, 1901, while McKinley was shaking hands with a crowd of well-wishers at the exposition, Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist, fired two shots at the president’s chest and abdomen. Rushed to a hospital in Buffalo, McKinley lingered for a week before dying in the early morning hours of September 14.
Leon Czolgosz was a millworker who became an anarchist after considering the disparity between rich and poor and witnessing the tensions between workers and managers at the factories in which he worked. Czolgosz was 28 years old when he shot McKinley. Some sources state that Czolgosz was inspired by the assassination of King Umberto I of Italy by Gaetano Bresci, who was also an anarchist, roughly one year before.
On September 6, 1901, Czolgosz stood in line to meet president McKinley. He concealed an Iver-Johnson revolver with a handkerchief. (The day was very warm, and many people at the exposition held handkerchiefs in their hands to dab the sweat off their faces, so Czolgosz did not stand out.) When it was his turn to meet McKinley, Czolgosz raised his weapon and fired two shots. Only one bullet struck him, which punctured his abdomen and injured his stomach, pancreas, and kidney. McKinley’s presidential security and possibly some of the people in line brutally beat Czolgosz before he was arrested and taken away. After arriving at Auburn State prison in Auburn, New York, on September 27, Czolgosz was pulled off the train and beaten unconscious by a mob who threatened to lynch him. Prison guards drove off the angry crowd, and Czolgosz spent the month that followed in a cell and was permitted no visitors. Czolgosz was executed in the electric hair on October 29, 1901.
James A. Garfield was the 20th president of the United States (March 4–September 19, 1881), who had the second shortest tenure in presidential history. When he was shot and incapacitated, serious constitutional questions arose concerning who should properly perform the functions of the presidency. On July 2, 1881, after only four months in office, while on his way to visit his ill wife in Elberon, New Jersey, Garfield was shot in the back at the railroad station in Washington, D.C., by Charles J. Guiteau, a disappointed office seeker with messianic visions. Guiteau peaceably surrendered to police, calmly announcing, “I am a Stalwart. [Chester A.] Arthur is now president of the United States.” For 80 days the president lay ill and performed only one official act—the signing of an extradition paper. It was generally agreed that, in such cases, the vice president was empowered by the Constitution to assume the powers and duties of the office of president. But should he serve merely as acting president until Garfield recovered, or would he receive the office itself and thus displace his predecessor? Because of an ambiguity in the Constitution, opinion was divided, and, because Congress was not in session, the problem could not be debated there. On September 2, 1881, the matter came before a cabinet meeting, where it was finally agreed that no action would be taken without first consulting Garfield. But in the opinion of the doctors this was impossible, and no further action was taken before the death of the president, the result of slow blood poisoning, on September 19.
The public and the media were obsessed with this drawn-out passing of the president, leading historians to see in the brief Garfield administration the seeds of an important aspect of the modern president: the chief executive as celebrity and symbol of the nation. It is said that public mourning for Garfield was more extravagant than the grief displayed in the wake of President Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, which is startling in light of the relative roles these men played in American history. Garfield was buried beneath a quarter-million-dollar, 165-foot (50-metre) monument in Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland.
Charles J. Guiteau was a mentally disturbed man who worked unsuccessfully as an editor and a lawyer. He became a staunch supporter of the Stalwart wing of the Republican Party, who favored electing Ulysses S. Grant. (After 36 ballots at the Republican convention in Chicago, James Garfield, who was a dark horse and part of the reformed faction called the Half-breeds was elected the nominee, with Chester A. Arthur, a Stalwart, as his running mate.) After changing an incoherent speech he had written for U.S. Grant called "Grant vs. Hancock,” who was the democratic nominee, to "Garfield vs. Hancock,” Guiteau delivered the speech himself once or twice to small groups of people.
Guiteau convinced himself that his speech was responsible for delivering Garfield’s victory over Hancock. Guiteau wrote letters to Garfield to press the president to reward him with an ambassadorship to Austria or a position as the head of the U.S. Consulate in Paris. Representatives of the administration did not answer his letters, and Guiteau moved to Washington, D.C., to speak personally with Garfield’s staff. When his attempts to secure an overseas post were rebuffed, he resolved to kill the president. After shooting the president, Guiteau was immediately arrested. Guiteau appeared unhinged during his trial; he claimed that he was doing the Lord’s work by shooting Garfield. He died by hanging on June 30, 1882.
Indira Gandhi served as prime minister of India for three consecutive terms (1966–77) and a fourth term from 1980 until she was assassinated in 1984. She was the only child of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India. After Nehru died in 1964, he was succeeded by La Bahadur Shastri, who served as India’s prime minister until he also died suddenly. Upon Shastri’s death in January 1966, Gandhi, who had been working with or serving as a member of the Congress Party since 1955, became leader of the Congress Party—and thus also prime minister—in a compromise between the right and left wings of the party. Gandhi and the Congress Party remained in power until 1977 (largely through the declaration of a state of emergency throughout India, imprisoning her political opponents, assuming emergency powers, and passing many laws limiting personal freedoms). After their defeat by the Janata Party that year, the Congress Party with Gandhi at the helm regrouped and returned to power in 1980.
During the early 1980s Indira Gandhi was faced with threats to the political integrity of India. Several states sought a larger measure of independence from the central government, and Sikh separatists in Punjab state used violence to assert their demands for an autonomous state. In response, Gandhi ordered an army attack in June 1984 on the Sikhs’ holiest shrine, the Harmandir Sahib (Golden Temple) at Amritsar, which led to the deaths of at least 450 Sikhs. Five months later Gandhi was killed in her garden by a fusillade of bullets fired by two of her own Sikh bodyguards in revenge for the attack on the Golden Temple.
Rajiv Gandhi, Indira’s son, became the leading general secretary of India’s Congress (I) Party (from 1981) and prime minister of India (1984–89) after the assassination of his mother. He was himself assassinated in 1991. While his brother, Sanjay, was alive, Rajiv largely stayed out of politics; but, after Sanjay, a vigorous political figure, died in an airplane crash on June 23, 1980, Indira Gandhi, then prime minister, drafted Rajiv into a political career. In June 1981 he was elected in a by-election to the Lok Sabha (lower house of Parliament) and in the same month became a member of the national executive of the Youth Congress.
Whereas Sanjay had been described as politically “ruthless” and “willful” (he was considered a prime mover in his mother’s state of emergency in 1975–77), Rajiv was regarded as a nonabrasive person who consulted other party members and refrained from hasty decisions. When his mother was killed on Oct. 31, 1984, Rajiv was sworn in as prime minister that same day and was elected leader of the Congress (I) Party a few days later. He led the Congress (I) Party to a landslide victory in elections to the Lok Sabha in December 1984, and his administration took vigorous measures to reform the government bureaucracy and liberalize the country’s economy. Gandhi’s attempts to discourage separatist movements in Punjab and Kashmir backfired, however, and after his government became embroiled in several financial scandals, his leadership became increasingly ineffectual. He resigned his post as prime minister in November 1989, though he remained leader of the Congress (I) Party.
Gandhi was campaigning in Tamil Nadu for upcoming parliamentary elections when he and 16 others were killed by a bomb concealed in a basket of flowers carried by a woman associated with the Tamil Tigers. In 1998 an Indian court convicted 26 people in the conspiracy to assassinate Gandhi. The conspirators, who consisted of Tamil militants from Sri Lanka and their Indian allies, had sought revenge against Gandhi because the Indian troops he sent to Sri Lanka in 1987 to help enforce a peace accord there had ended up fighting the Tamil separatist guerrillas.
The Mafia in Australia Pt-1 - Drugs, Murder and Politics (PART 1 of2 )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLLuibWJS8M
Published on Dec 14, 2015
Published on Dec 15, 2015
West Australian Govt is Corrupt to its Core
Max Igan and Brendon O'Connell
Published on Apr 23, 2017
Brendon O'Connell Interviewed by Max Igan.
A meeting of two great minds devoted to exposing ZIONIST infiltration in Australia
Two good friends of mine that spell out the absolute corruption of West Australian Government. Infested with criminals throughoutthe entire justice system is a bad joke while the W.A. Police themselves are full of petty criminals thieves, liars and thugs. Wake up Australia...
If this goes on they will eventually incarcerate every poor person to make a Prison system that would make Hitler proud. Invaded by criminal elements and run by the worst of the worst, Western Australian criminal justice system is by far the laughing stock of the Westminster system.
The infiltration of zionist agents into Western Australia will soon make W.A. a truly awful place to live, more than it already is.
Thinking of moving here? Listen to this audio interview and think again.... Please support Max //youtube.com/user/TheCrowhouse And Please Support Brendon https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFRV... "..Western Australia in effectively run by Zioniosts and Freemasons who call Perth and Western Australia "New Zion" and refer to is at their "Prize" because of the immense wealth Western Australian has in mining and other extremely valuable resources..." "..Western Australian Billionaire Media Magnate Kerry Stokes in a well respected senior Red Lodge Freemason who purchased the Rothschild Bible for around $15 million. Many main streets in Israel are called Rothschild Street, just like many main streets in cities are called "Main Street" of "High Street"..." "...one of the main people that caused the arrest of Brendon O'Connell was powerful Zionist Jew Stanley Elliot Keyser..." "... There is a big difference to people who call themselves Zionist and people who call themselves just Jewish..."
Uploaded with Permission from Max Igan and Brendon O'Connell. Interview from Wednesday 19th April 2017.
by David Weber 23 Oct 2015
Photo: Western Australian Police Commissioner Dr Karl Joseph O'Callaghan
Is called the Three Monkeys - Who ...Sees No Evil.... Hears No Evil .. Speaks No Evil
John Roderick Mckechnie, for the Director of of Public Prosecutions for Western Australia, the appointed a Supreme Court Judge
Brendon Lee O'Connell states in the video interviews that
"... Roger brought a kilo of cocaine into Western Australia and the Western Australian the police stole 250 kilos of Cocaine
The police even bashed a university law professor Robert Cunningham and his wife and went to their home and stole their hard drive of police video footage...
Most of the organised criminals and Bikie gangs in Western Australia work for the police .. when you see Bikie or other people being beaten up by police it means that these people do not work for the police ...there are a lot of South African intelligence that got out of South Africa.. the motto is do what ever you want just don't get caught .. and even when they are caught nothing really changes and nothing much happens to them ... half the businesses in Perth and Western Australia are built up with drug money and when the businesses get big enough then they become legitimate and are too big to attack and bring down ... Perth is a hideaway for many people that need to hide as protected witnesses ...and if they do not say what the powerful people want them to say they get up on false charges by corrupt Western Australian Police and prosecutors and their false convictions are helped with corrupt magistrates and judges in Western Australia ..."
Dr. Karl Joseph O'Callaghan (born 1956 in England) is an Australian police officer serving since 2004 as the Commissioner of the Western Australia Police.
O'Callaghan was born in 1956 in England. In 1970 he moved with his family to Australia where he attended Kalamunda Senior High School.[1] After completing year 12 he joined the Western Australia Police Service as a Police Cadet in 1973 and in November 1975 was inducted into the Western Australia Police Academy. In January 1976 he graduated as Dux of his Academy class. O’Callaghan’s policing career has encompassed Police Communications, Port Hedland Police Station, Accident Inquiry Section, Perth Traffic Branch, Manjimup Traffic and General Duties, Community Education, and the Police Academy.
He was promoted from Senior Sergeant to Superintendent in 1996 and was transferred to the Internal Investigations Unit and later ran both the Wheatbelt (formerly Northam) and South East Metropolitan (formerly Cannington) policing districts.
O'Callaghan later attended Curtin University of Technology in Western Australia and completed a Bachelor of Education with 1st Class Honours and in 1998 he became the first police officer in the history of the Western Australia Police to complete a PhD.
In 2001 he was promoted to Assistant Commissioner, Strategic and Corporate Development (formerly Policy, Planning & Evaluation) assuming responsibility for major change, reform and information technology projects in the Western Australia Police. He later relieved in the positions of Executive Director (Corporate Services) and Deputy Commissioner (Reform). This role included responsibility for the Strategic Plan and Annual Business Planning process, legislative reform, major IT-based business re-engineering projects, replacing the Radio Communications infrastructure (PMRN) together with management of Corporate Projects and major Corporate Reform and implementation of Royal Commission recommendations.
In 1997 O'Callaghan was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study ethics training and education in policing. In 2004 he was awarded the Australian Police Medal (APM). In 2006 he was made a Rotary International Paul Harris fellow for his work with communities in Western Australia. In 2011 he established Bright Blue (The Commissioner's Charity for Sick Kids) and became the inaugural chair.
Policing Career
In 1973, after finishing year 12, he joined the Western Australia Police as a cadet. A year later he joined the WA Police Academy where he graduated as dux of his class in 1976.
O'Callaghan was promoted to Commissioner in 2004.
Dr Karl Joseph O’Callaghan, the Western Australian Police Commissioner’s son,
Russell Joseph O'Callaghan's son charged over 'meth lab' explosion
Date: March 22 2011
To:
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minister.roberts@dpc.wa.gov.au,
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minister.cook@dpc.wa.gov.au,
Midland@mp.wa.gov.au,
Sat, May 6, 2017 at 4:45 AM
Fwd: West Australian Govt is Corrupt to its Core - Max Igan and Brendon O'Connell - YouTube
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Cop spills all on WA police “Welcome To Hell …. !"
“..it is easier to be shot by a Western Australian Police Officer than be eaten by a shark in Perth, Western Australia …”
Anthony DeCeglie, The Sunday Times - December 8, 2012
Officer A states in his book The Crime Factory detailing his experiences as a Police Officer in Western Australia, after been invited from the London Police Force ( MET) to work in Western Australia with his wife who is also a police officer, in the chapter “Welcome to Hell”.. that is easy to be shot by a Western Australian Police Officer than eaten by a shark..” SEXIST, racist and trigger happy.
A former police officer has written a graphic account of life as a Perth cop in a new book that claims to blow the whistle on what really goes on behind the blue line.
The book, written under the pseudonym "Officer A" and called The Crime Factory, details several years the author spent in the WA Police after coming over in 2006 as part of a recruitment drive to lure British cops.
The book contains accusations of racism, brutality, bullying and binge drinking.
"Policing in Western Oz was like policing in the 1970s in the UK, but more violent, racist and sexist, and the cops had free use of guns and Tasers," it said.
Officer A, who worked in WA until early 2008, said local cops were trigger happy especially when it came to Tasers.
The chapter about his arrival in Perth is called: "Welcome to Hell".
"I'd quickly learnt that in Australia you were much more likely to be shot dead by a cop than get eaten by a shark," he said.
"A significant minority of officers tasered anybody that pissed them off, which was usually anyone with a different skin colour.
"I saw two officers attack a pair of harmless sailors. They were a bit drunk but were completely inoffensive."
He also recounts how his then wife who also came over to work in the force was sent out to execute an arrest warrant on a potentially violent criminal just moments after she told her manager she was pregnant.
The book alleges senior police made it clear the recruits were just a "doctor's quick fix". "The local cops hated us," the author says.
The book traces Officer A's career in WA, starting out at a suburban police station before winning a transfer to a secretive intelligence division as a "covert officer" rounding up informants to take out the "baddest guys in the country". He resigned in 2008 following an incident at a Perth pub, where he says a drunken officer verbally abused him,
then returned to Britain to work for the Surrey police force.
A WA Police spokesman said: "The claims in the book about policing in WA are hard to fathom and probably say more about the author than they do about WA Police.
"There is nothing in the book that gives WA Police any concern."b He said that between 2006 and 2009, 657 overseas officers were recruited in a "highly successful international recruitment campaign". Just over a quarter of those recruits have since quit. Last night, The Sunday Times spoke with the author of The Crime Factory who admitted to having a nervous breakdown after his return to the UK which he claims insiders were trying to use to discredit his book. The breakdown led to a 2010 incident in which he made a drunken phone call from his police station to a colleague claiming that he was going to shoot himself. It caused the station to be stormed by police. He was fined 500 pounds, but the court heard that during his police career he had won several awards. "I had a breakdown," he said. "It happens. Prior to that I had an excellent service record." He said the book had been a steady seller.
Immediate removal or resignation of the current Commissioner of
Police Karl Callaghan and Deputy Commissioner Stephen Brown
and
other matters are demanded by
The Give Back Western Australian To The People Action Group
WA Police Commissioner Karl O'Callaghan (pictured) said the three officers were stood down 'for the safety of the community and their frontline partners'
The samples are yet to be analysed and confirmed by the Chemistry Centre WA.
There remains a zero tolerance for any police officer found with illicit drugs in their system, Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan said in a statement.
‘Officers make critical decisions under duress and they must not be affected by illicit substances or alcohol,’ he said.
‘Monday's day of action by Internal Affairs should send a sobering warning to any officer using illicit substances at any time.’
Regulations to allow random and target drug and alcohol testing were introduced in December 2011.
During the four years of testing, a further 11 officers have exceeded 0.02% blood alcohol levels and a further seven officers have tested positive to illicit drugs, police said.
Excluding the most recent three officers, two officers have tested positive to cannabis, one to methamphetamine, two to MDMA and one to anabolic steroids.
‘Officers make critical decisions under duress and they must not be affected by illicit substances or alcohol,’ Commissioner O'Callaghan said (stock of WA Police car pictured)
Around 200 police at five suburban stations on Monday were tested for alcohol and drugs by officers from the WA Police Internal Affairs Unit. Three constables tested positive to ice and amphetamines and have been stood down (stock photo)
Six resigned prior to the conclusion of a Loss of Confidence Process, and it was accepted that the seventh may have unwittingly ingested a steroid in an exercise supplement.
Since 2012, almost 9,500 tests have been conducted on WA officers and less than one per cent (0.07%) have tested positive to illicit drugs.
But Commissioner O’Callaghan said it was important to identify the few.
‘However small the number of officers affected, we remain committed to identifying these people and taking swift action against them for everyone's safety,’ he said.
It was recently reported that artificial, synthetic urine has been sold across West Australia
It was recently reported that drug dealers have been selling artificial urine as a package deal with methamphetamine.
However, Safework Laboratories can identify synthetic urine.
On average, it has been identified once a month throughout Australia, but six positive tests were recorded in WA alone in October by Safework Laboratories.
In September, 320kg, worth $320 million, of ice was seized by police in the state, Nine News reported.
It was the biggest haul ever recorded in Western Australia, with the equivalent of 3.2 million individual hits of the drug.
Retrial over Axe murder
Donald Victor Matusevich_aka Donald Victor Morey
Canberra Times
Retrial over Axe Murder
Thursday, 23 June, 1977 P.10
Sydney:
Donald Morey, aka Matusevich
Donald Victor Morey, aka Matusevich
A Victoria prisoner sentenced to life imprisonment for the axe murder of a cellmate was, granted a new trial by the Full High Court in Sydney yesterday.
The Full Bench set aside the conviction and life sentence of Mr Donald Victor Matusevich and order the case to be remitted to the Victorian Supreme Court for retrial.
The unanimous decision was given by Mr Justice Gibbs, Mr Justice Stephen, Mr Justice Mason, Mr Justice Murphy, and Mr Justice Aickin.
In his judgement, Mr Justice Gibbs said certain evidence at the trial of Mr Donald Victor Matusevich had not only been inadmissible but was prejudicial to Mr Donald Victor Matusevich.
Mr Justice Murphy said Mr Donald Victor Matusevich 26, was a prisoner at Pentridge Jail in Victoria, who had applied for parole.
Mr Donald Victor Matusevich was placed in a cell in the prison hospital wing with Mr Claude Joseph Thompson, a prisoner with a history of insanity, and Mr Graeme John Whateley, who had been moved from Ararat Prison for his safety after he had informed the authorities there of an escape.
On the night of November, 12, 1974, Mr Whateley had been killed with an axe in the cell.
Mr Donald Victor Matusevich and with Mr Claude Joseph Thompson were jointly tried and both were convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. Both men appealed to the Victorian Court of Criminal Appeal against the conviction.
The court ruled the verdict against with Mr Claude Joseph Thompson be set aside and a new trial ordered, with Mr Claude Joseph Thompson was found not guilty on the ground of insanity.
The Court of Criminal Appeal, in the same judgement, dismissed the appeal by Mr Donald Victor Matusevich.
Vaso Ulic, 50, is a major player in the dangerous game of international crime.
Name: Sarah Anne McMAHON, Age when missing: 20 years, Eyes: Green, Hair: Auburn, Height: 173cms, Build: Slim
Circumstances: Sarah McMahon has not attended work since Wednesday 8 November 2000. Sarah was last seen driving her vehicle, a 1986 White Ford Meteor Sedan, registered number 7FO-731 in an easterly direction on Great Eastern Highway, Greenmount.
Sarah Anne McMahon was last seen wearing dark jeans, black turtle neck sweater and black suede jacket. Concern is held for her safety and welfare.
Fears for the safety of a 20-year-old woman missing for 13 days
have increased following the discovery of the woman's car at a hospital carpark.
Sarah McMahon was last seen leaving her workplace in suburban Claremont on November 8, although there have been a number of unconfirmed sightings of her since then. She has made no contact with her family. Ms McMahon's white Ford Meteor sedan was found last night in the emergency department car park of Swan District Hospital. Police today refused to say who discovered the vehicle or whether anything of significance
had been found inside.
Sarah McMahon was 20 when she disappeared after leaving work in the Perth suburb of Claremont on Wednesday, November 8, 2000. She lived with her parents Danny and Trish and younger sister Kate. Ten days later, her white Ford Meteor sedan was found in the car park of Swan Districts Hospital. A bag containing personal items was on the front seat, her empty wallet was in the boot and her mobile phone was on the ground nearby. Her mum Trish tells her story ...
"We haven't seen or heard from Sarah since November 8, 2000, when she left for work in the morning. Apparently she received a call at work from a friend who was "suicidal" and intended to visit the mysterious caller. The police believe she's been murdered and we have all tried to accept this as a possibility, but in our hearts we know she is out there somewhere. At the time of Sarah's disappearance she was depressed ... a romance had soured, university had lost its appeal and she had a mobile phone bill for $800 she hadn't mentioned to us. Sarah felt as though she was in rough waters being tossed this way and that, and she had mentioned to a family friend that she wished she could just "go away and start again". We thought a visit to her older brother Paul and his family, who live near Melbourne, might break the cycle, but unfortunately that wasn't so. I visited Melbourne and Sydney putting up posters, giving out photos and talking to anyone who was willing to listen. Two years ago, a couple who had taken a photograph of Sarah rang to say they had distributed it at a youth seminar. The father of one of the children worked in security at Newcastle nightclubs, and he came across a young man who recognised her and confirmed her name when shown the photograph. But that was it. There have been no further sightings or news. We, Sarah's family, believe with all our hearts that our darling daughter, sister and granddaughter is out there. We will never believe otherwise. We love you, Sarah, please let us know you're all right. May the sun shine warm on your face, and until we meet again may God hold you in the palm of His hand."
If you have any information, call Crimestoppers on 1800 333 000.
Man (Donald Morey) was 'too interested' in missing girl (Sarah McMahon:
sister speaks out...
Rania Spooner
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/man-was-too-interested-in-missing-girl-sister-20121210-2b5rg.html
Man was 'too interested' in missing girl: sister
Rania Spooner
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/man-was-too-interested-in-missing-girl-sister-20121210-2b5rg.html
Amanda Smith, Sarah McMcMahon's sister
outside Western Australia's Coroner's Court.
Sarah McMahon was 20 when she was last seen in November, 2000.
Sunday Times article with Sarah McMahon's younger sister Kate asking for her sister Sarah to just come home..
The sister of a Perth girl who vanished more than ten years ago after developing a friendship with an older man who has since been convicted of attempting to murder a prostitute has told the inquest into her sister's suspected death she always found the man "creepy".
Sarah Anne McMahon was 20 years old when she disappeared on October 8, 2000.
The last phone call Ms McMahon answered was from Donald Morey, then 45, who has since been convicted of attempting to murder a prostitute in 2003.
Counsel assisting the coroner at the inquest into the suspected death of Ms McMahon told the court Morey's attempt to strangle the woman to death came days after a fellow sex worker from the same Highgate strip had gone missing.
Ms McMahon's sister Amanda Smith giving evidence to the Coroner's Court on Monday said Morey met her sister at her house a couple of years before her disappearance.
When Ms Smith returned from living in regional Western Australia after a period of months she discovered "Don" and her sister were speaking on the phone "all the time", something that worried her, she said
"He was very interested in her – too interested," Ms Smith said.
"He was always trying to charm her."
Ms Smith said she found Morey "creepy".
Morey has never been ruled out as a suspect in the suspected death of Ms McMahon, Detective Darryl Cox told the Coroner's Court.
A special police unit that manages WA's cold cases reopened the case of Ms McMahon's disappearance last year and reinterviewed several witnesses.
One witness – a prostitute whose name has been protected – changed her original statement to make shocking claims that she saw the naked body of a woman she believed to be Ms McMahon in Morey's bedroom with a robe looped around her neck, counsel assisting the coroner Philip Urquhart told the inquest in his opening submissions.
The inquest is expected to hear the woman claimed she helped clean up the house after something wrapped in a quilt was removed from the bedroom.
The woman told police she wanted to "tell the whole truth" about what happened to Ms McMahon last year because she believed she was suffering from a terminal illness, Mr Urquhart told the inquest.
Donald Victor Morey, aka Matusevich,Australia Claremont Serial Killer, 1996 - 1997, Perth, Western Australia - #6
Donald Victor Morey, aka Matusevich crabstick said:10-28-2016
There is enough reports to suggest he is ex army. Im not sure how old he is. Yes, there is a few guys around that use the Im ex SAS as a shield when they fear someone might give them a clobber. He might have been a mechanic? selling $10,000 bundles
of amphetamine is organised crime connections. ' the was selling Sarah McMahon $10000 blocks of amphetamine,
its not like he wouldn't have the cash for access to new vehicles, and cut and shut rebuild vehicles he could set up himself.
Built fake taxis even. Because a fake taxi didn't have to buy a taxi plate, fake taxis were a cash cow.
If Morey is SAS or ex-military, he may have been trained in all the above.
Mechanic being one of the core subjects for SAS. (SAS barracks are a stones throw from Stirling road, Claremont.)
Being SAS with a station wagon set up with a LSD diff, Morey could have driven any the back dirt tracks off the main roads up
and down to the dump points with an element of ease. Police have said, it is someone who polishes their car a lot, with care to detail.
Career Criminal and self confessed SAS killer of many people, Donald Morey ..
and has admitted he was the last person to see or talk to
26-07-2016 Ausgirl Enough Is Enough!
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law...-1226556176197
A cold case review of both investigations was launched last year and Morey said he was still in contact with Ms McMahon, who he claimed was living in Canada with her two children.
Coroner Alastair Hope said on Thursday that because Ms McMahon had not contacted her loved ones in more than 12 years, he was confident she was dead.
"The circumstances in which Ms McMahon disappeared are sinister and I have confidently been able to exclude the possibility that she died by way of natural causes, accident or suicide,'' he said.
If Morey (the murderer who was last seen with her) was in contact with Sarah all these years -- can't he provide proof she is alive? Like .. an address? Phone number? Something? And why would she speak him and him alone and not her family - for 12 years?
How is this Morey guy NOT charged with something in this case? Thank goodness he's inside, anyhow, and not roaming free.
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/prostitute-claims-missing-woman-was-murdered-20121210-2b581.html
The woman decided to "tell the complete truth," about what she knew of events on November 8, 2000, counsel assisting the coroner Philip Urquhart said in his opening address on Monday.
In her most recent statement to police, the woman claims she was called to a house where Morey was living and was told "he's killed her," by the man who owned the house, the court heard.
"She says that when she walked into Mr Morey's bedroom she saw a naked girl on the bed and that she had a piece of robe about 1 cm think looped twice around her neck," Mr Urquhart said.
Philip Urquhart said the inquest is also expected to hear evidence from several witnesses about a bag Morey carried with him containing a reel of silver gaffer tape, rope, two knives and explicit pornographic material.
Morey claimed he never saw Ms McMahon the day she vanished, but had helped her formulate a plan to flee the country illegally.
"She's overseas, she's alive and she has two children," he said.
"I have been in contact with Sarah basically ever since."
If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it.
But he refused to say where Ms McMahon was living, claiming he was protecting her and her children from danger by not revealing her whereabouts.
Morey would also not say how he has been communicating with Ms McMahon after he was imprisoned in 2005, for fear of being "locked up in maximum security indefinitely".
"Do not put her life in danger," he told Mr Urquhart when questioned about where Ms McMahon was and how she left the country.
Morey also maintained his innocence in relation to the attempted murder conviction, which he suggested he'd been set up for because of Ms McMahon's "disappearance".
"It was Sarah's decision to leave - not mine," he said.
Sarah's family have not heard from her in 12 years.
Morey met Ms McMahon at her older sister's house months before she disappeared and maintained there was never a sexual relationship between the pair.
"She could confide in me," he said. "We just talked".
Ms McMahon had intended to call her mother before she left, but had lost her phone, Morey told the inquest.
He said he was unable to contact her for more than a month after she left but sent her text messages and repeatedly tried to call.
"All I can tell you is I sent a hell of a lot of text messages," he said.
But Mr Urquhart told the Coroner there were no records of Morey trying to contact Ms McMahon by phone after November 8, 2000.
Morey then refused to answer any further questions and accused Mr Urquhart of "winding" him up when he had a "crook heart".
"Mr Morey it seems to me you just don't want to answer the hard questions," Mr Urquhart said.
Morey requested a medic and was taken back into lockup.
"If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it," he said.
Ms McMahon's sister Amanda Smith giving evidence earlier in the week described Morey as "creepy" and "too interested" in her younger sister.
The inquest has also heard evidence of a black bag found in Morey's bedroom after Ms McMahon's disappearance, which according to three witnesses contained gaffer tape, rope, knives and graphic pornographic magazines which involved fake corpses in compromising positions.
Morey accepted he had a black bag he used to carry his lunch in for work, but rejected ever buying the pornographic material.
A serious question that needs to be answered by Karl O'Callaghan, the Western Australian Commissioner of Police is:
Why did it take over a week for the Western Australian Police for come and collect a bag belonging to career criminal and convicted attempted murderer Donald Morey which the two owners of the house in Marangaroo, Mr and Mrs Gareth Allen who were the bosses of Donald Morey say contained a real of silver, gaffer tape, two knives and explicit pornograpghic material of what looked like dead women in sexual positions...
which is similar to the items that Western Australia Police officer Con Bayers, who was the former head of the prostitution taskforce said he found in Donald Morey's Commodore Holden car boot driving through Northbridge, Perth, Western Australia, that looked liked and unmarked police car
Coroner says missing woman Sarah McMahon was murder victim
http://www.news.com.au/national/western-australia/coroner-says-missing-woman-sarah-mcmahon-was-murder-victim/news-story/d64ef5cdd62f86daf5f6034797190448 JANUARY 18, 2013
Angie Raphael AAP
THE West Australian coroner has found that a 20-year-old woman missing for more than 12 years was a victim of a homicide, but has refused to rule on whether a suspect in the case was involved in the crime.
Sarah Anne McMahon disappeared on November 8, 2000 after telling a colleague she was meeting a friend at 5.30pm and then failing to pick up her sister at 8.30pm that evening.
Donald Victor Morey, 57, has long been considered a suspect in her disappearance and was the last person to speak to Ms McMahon before she disappeared.
After the initial police investigation drew a blank, a further investigation was launched after Morey was convicted of the attempted murder of a Perth prostitute in 2004 and sentenced to 13 years in prison.
He had also been a person of interest in the death of another prostitute the previous year.
However, police were again unable to substantiate enough evidence against Morey, who has consistently denied any involvement in Ms McMahon's disappearance.
A cold case review of both investigations was launched last year and Morey said he was still in contact with Ms McMahon, who he claimed was living in Canada with her two children.
Coroner Alastair Hope said on Thursday that because Ms McMahon had not contacted her loved ones in more than 12 years, he was confident she was dead.
"The circumstances in which Ms McMahon disappeared are sinister and I have confidently been able to exclude the possibility that she died by way of natural causes, accident or suicide,'' he said.
"In my view, the evidence points overwhelmingly to the proposition that she died by way of unlawful homicide.''
Mr Hope said there was no evidence that Ms McMahon left the country and there were no records held in Medicare, Centrelink, the Australian Taxation Office, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade or her bank that would suggest that she was alive in Australia after that time.
A key piece of evidence examined at the inquest was a statement from Natasha Tracy-Ann Kendrick, dated November 11, 2011.
In her statement, Ms Kendrick said she walked into Morey's room and saw a bloodied naked girl on the bed with an "old fashioned rope'' around her neck.
Ms Kendrick claimed that she later saw Morey carrying ``something wrapped in a quilt over his left shoulder'' and said she knew it was McMahon's body.
However, Mr Hope noted that police were unable to find evidence to corroborate her account.
He said there was also evidence capable of supporting a conclusion that Morey lied to police about his movements on November 8, 2000 and falsified documents to support those lies.
"It is always possible that some further evidence may come to light which could result in criminal charges being laid at some later date,'' he said.
"In that context, I do not propose to make any finding in relation to Mr Morey's involvement.''
Originally published as
Missing woman 'a murder victim'
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/sarahs-still-alive-living-overseas-morey-20121214-2beir.html
Sarah McMahon was 20 when she was last seen in November, 2000.
A convicted prisoner told an inquest into the disappearance of Perth woman Sarah McMahon more than a decade ago she's still alive and living overseas with two children.
The last confirmed sighting of Ms McMahon, then 20 years old, was on November 8, 2000.
She was seen driving away from her Claremont workplace while talking on the telephone, the inquest into her suspected death heard in Perth this week.
Before leaving work she had mentioned she was going to "see a bloke" in the Bassendean area that afternoon, the Coroner's Court heard.
The last person she took a call from was Donald Morey, a man 25 years her senior, who has since been convicted of trying to strangle a prostitute to death in 2003.
Currently serving 13 years' jail for the attempted murder, Morey, now 57 and in poor health due to a heart condition, appeared at the Perth inquest into Ms McMahon's suspected death on Friday.
According to a work log he kept for his job with a trucking company at the time, Morey had been cleaning and refuelling trucks at his workplace when Ms McMahon "disappeared".
But Counsel Assisting the Coroner Philip Urquhart accused Morey of fabricating the entry.
Mr Urquhart said there was no record of him using his fuel card, while phone tower records placed his mobile near the Bassendean area that afternoon.
Morey claimed he never saw Ms McMahon the day she vanished, but had helped her formulate a plan to flee the country illegally.
"She's overseas, she's alive and she has two children," he said.
"I have been in contact with Sarah basically ever since."
If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it.
But he refused to say where Ms McMahon was living, claiming he was protecting her and her children from danger by not revealing her whereabouts.
Morey would also not say how he has been communicating with Ms McMahon after he was imprisoned in 2005, for fear of being "locked up in maximum security indefinitely".
"Do not put her life in danger," he told Mr Urquhart when questioned about where Ms McMahon was and how she left the country.
Morey also maintained his innocence in relation to the attempted murder conviction, which he suggested he'd been set up for because of Ms McMahon's "disappearance".
"It was Sarah's decision to leave - not mine," he said.
Sarah's family have not heard from her in 12 years.
Morey met Ms McMahon at her older sister's house months before she disappeared and maintained there was never a sexual relationship between the pair.
"She could confide in me," he said. "We just talked".
Ms McMahon had intended to call her mother before she left, but had lost her phone, Morey told the inquest.
He said he was unable to contact her for more than a month after she left but sent her text messages and repeatedly tried to call.
"All I can tell you is I sent a hell of a lot of text messages," he said.
But Mr Urquhart told the Coroner there were no records of Morey trying to contact Ms McMahon by phone after November 8, 2000.
Morey then refused to answer any further questions and accused Mr Urquhart of "winding" him up when he had a "crook heart".
"Mr Morey it seems to me you just don't want to answer the hard questions," Mr Urquhart said.
Morey requested a medic and was taken back into lockup.
"If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it," he said.
Ms McMahon's sister Amanda Smith giving evidence earlier in the week described Morey as "creepy" and "too interested" in her younger sister.
The inquest has also heard evidence of a black bag found in Morey's bedroom after Ms McMahon's disappearance, which according to three witnesses contained gaffer tape, rope, knives and graphic pornographic magazines which involved fake corpses in compromising positions.
Morey accepted he had a black bag he used to carry his lunch in for work, but rejected ever buying the pornographic material.
"Common sense tells you I'm not into that sort of garbage for starters," he said.
"Man, if I'm supposed to be this mad serial killer running around, why would I be carrying this bag around with me."
The state coroner Alastair Hope will hand down his findings on January 17. It is not known whether they would involve recommendations to the DPP.
Please click her for Important Vital clues missed in hunt for Claremont Serial Killer/s
West Australian Newspaper
With Important Vital clues missed in hunt for Claremont Serial Killer/s
Witness to Donald Morey murder of Sarah Mcmahon Natasha Tracey-Ann Kendrick leaves court.
In the statement Ms Kendrick, she had claimed she helped clean up Mr Allen's house after seeing a woman's body in Morey's room the night of Ms McMahon's disappearance.
The special crime squad of the WA Police force, tasked with investigating unsolved cases, finally appeared to have unearthed new information in November 2011.A former prostitute,Natasha Tracey-Ann Kendrick, now 50, who had already been interviewed twice over the disappearance, Natasha Tracey-Ann Kendrick, now 50, allegedly told police she had been called to a friend's house the night Ms McMahon disappeared in November 2000 and saw the body of a woman she believed was Ms McMahon.
The pair had met some weeks earlier at the same house where her friend - the homeowner - had taken on a lodger who would later be convicted of attempted murder over an unrelated case, the Coroner's Court heard Ms McMahon who lived with her family in Parkerville in Perth's Hills, was last seen leaving her Claremont workplace on November 8, 2000.
Sarah McMahon had enrolled in a Bachelor of Arts at Murdoch University that year but by September had suspended her studies as she battled with depression and drug use, her sister Amanda Smith told the inquest.
She was also dealing with a difficult break-up, according to her sister.
Through the church where her parents were long-standing members Ms McMahon had secured a part-time job working in administration - she disappeared after finishing her second shift.
As Sarah McMahon drove away from work, the last phone call Ms McMahon ever answered was from Donald Morey - a man 25 years older her senior who has since been convicted of attempting to strangle a prostitute to death, the inquest heard.
At the time, Morey was living with his boss Gareth Allen in Marangaroo - although he had a home in Chidlow he shared with this de facto partner on the weekends, the Coroner's Court heard.
In the statement Ms Kendrick, she had claimed she helped clean up Mr Allen's house after seeing a woman's body in Morey's room the night of Ms McMahon's disappearance.
The last phone call Ms McMahon answered was from Donald Morey, then 45, who has since been convicted of attempting to murder a prostitute in 2003.
Counsel assisting the coroner at the inquest into the suspected death of Ms McMahon told the court Morey's attempt to strangle the woman to death came days after a fellow sex worker from the same Highgate strip had gone missing.
Ms McMahon's sister Amanda Smith giving evidence to the Coroner's Court on Monday said Morey met her sister at her house a couple of years before her disappearance.
When Ms Smith returned from living in regional Western Australia after a period of months she discovered "Don" and her sister were speaking on the phone "all the time", something that worried her, she said
"He was very interested in her – too interested," Ms Smith said.
"He was always trying to charm her."
Ms Smith said she found Morey "creepy".
Morey has never been ruled out as a suspect in the suspected death of Ms McMahon, Detective Darryl Cox told the Coroner's Court.
A special police unit that manages WA's cold cases reopened the case of Ms McMahon's disappearance last year and reinterviewed several witnesses.
One witness – a prostitute whose name has been protected –made shocking claims that she saw the naked body of a woman she believed to be Ms McMahon in Morey's bedroom with a robe looped around her neck, counsel assisting the coroner Philip Urquhart told the inquest in his opening submissions.
The inquest is expected to hear the woman claimed she helped clean up the house after something wrapped in a quilt was removed from the bedroom.
The woman told police she wanted to "tell the whole truth" about what happened to Ms McMahon last year because she believed she was suffering from a terminal illness, Mr Urquhart told the inquest.
CHRISTIANA JONES rthe West Australian Newspaper - Tuesday, 11 December 2012
https://thewest.com.au/news/australia/mcmahon-suspect-said-he-had-killed-before-ng-ya-285803
McMahon suspect Donald Morey 'said he had killed before'
A man once suspected by police of being involved in the disappearance of Sarah McMahon told a friend he had killed before and offered to do the same again, an inquest has been told.
Marta Allen gave evidence at a coronial investigation into the disappearance of Sarah McMahon, 20, who was last seen leaving her Claremont workplace on November 8, 2000.
The inquest has heard that police carried out two investigations and a case review over the last 12 years, one of which had focussed on the possible involvement of career criminal Donald Victor Morey - a man 25 years older than the missing woman who formed a close friendship with her and allegedly supplied her with drugs.
The investigations had raised suspicions of his involvement but no evidence that could substantiate a charge, the inquest heard, with police hoping an inquest would yield further information.
Today, Ms Allen described Morey as a "strange man" and said she had immediately wondered if he was linked to Ms McMahon's disappearance when she saw the young woman's image in missing persons reports.
"I thought then and there I wonder if Don had something to do with her disappearance," she said.
Morey - who had worked for her husband and is now in jail after being convicted in 2005 of an attempted murder of a sex worker - has denied any involvement in Ms McMahon's suspected death and is expected to give evidence in the inquest.
Ms Allen said Morey, who had lived with her husband during parts of the week in 2000, had claimed he had killed people and once asked if she was scared of him.
"He told me that he was in the SAS... that's where he was taught to kill people," she said. "He told me that he has killed before."
Ms Allen said Morey made an effort to charm women and had once offered to kill her husband Gareth Allen after eavesdropping on an argument while living at Mr Allen's home.
"He was not joking, he was deadly serious," she said.
Ms Allen said she had once been in a vehicle with Morey when he left her "petrified" and "shocked" after saying to her: "It's just you and me now, are you scared?"
She also described her shocked husband showing her a bag found in Morey's room that had contained ropes, knives, gaffer tape and pornography including images of bound and gagged naked women who "looked dead".
Ms Allen said she called the police but that Morey's partner had collected the bag before they arrived.
Ms Allen also described seeing Morey once cleaning the floor of his truck out with hot water.
"This would have been just after (Ms McMahon) appeared on TV," she said.
The inquest has heard that a person known as "witness A" told police they had been called by a frantic Mr Allen to the home he shared with Morey and was shown Miss McMahon's naked body in Morey's bedroom.
The witness claimed that Ms Allen had helped clean the home afterwards but today Ms Allen vehemently denied the claim and labelled the allegation a fabrication.
The inquest continues
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/sarahs-still-alive-living-overseas-morey-20121214-2beir.html
Sarah McMahon was 20 when she was last seen in November, 2000.
A convicted prisoner told an inquest into the disappearance of Perth woman Sarah McMahon more than a decade ago she's still alive and living overseas with two children.
The last confirmed sighting of Ms McMahon, then 20 years old, was on November 8, 2000.
She was seen driving away from her Claremont workplace while talking on the telephone, the inquest into her suspected death heard in Perth this week.
Before leaving work she had mentioned she was going to "see a bloke" in the Bassendean area that afternoon, the Coroner's Court heard.
The last person she took a call from was Donald Morey, a man 25 years her senior, who has since been convicted of trying to strangle a prostitute to death in 2003.
Currently serving 13 years' jail for the attempted murder, Morey, now 57 and in poor health due to a heart condition, appeared at the Perth inquest into Ms McMahon's suspected death on Friday.
According to a work log he kept for his job with a trucking company at the time, Morey had been cleaning and refuelling trucks at his workplace when Ms McMahon "disappeared".
But Counsel Assisting the Coroner Philip Urquhart accused Morey of fabricating the entry.
Mr Urquhart said there was no record of him using his fuel card, while phone tower records placed his mobile near the Bassendean area that afternoon.
Morey claimed he never saw Ms McMahon the day she vanished, but had helped her formulate a plan to flee the country illegally.
"She's overseas, she's alive and she has two children," he said.
"I have been in contact with Sarah basically ever since."
If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it.
But he refused to say where Ms McMahon was living, claiming he was protecting her and her children from danger by not revealing her whereabouts.
Morey would also not say how he has been communicating with Ms McMahon after he was imprisoned in 2005, for fear of being "locked up in maximum security indefinitely".
"Do not put her life in danger," he told Mr Urquhart when questioned about where Ms McMahon was and how she left the country.
Morey also maintained his innocence in relation to the attempted murder conviction, which he suggested he'd been set up for because of Ms McMahon's "disappearance".
"It was Sarah's decision to leave - not mine," he said.
Sarah's family have not heard from her in 12 years.
Morey met Ms McMahon at her older sister's house months before she disappeared and maintained there was never a sexual relationship between the pair.
"She could confide in me," he said. "We just talked".
Ms McMahon had intended to call her mother before she left, but had lost her phone, Morey told the inquest.
He said he was unable to contact her for more than a month after she left but sent her text messages and repeatedly tried to call.
"All I can tell you is I sent a hell of a lot of text messages," he said.
But Mr Urquhart told the Coroner there were no records of Morey trying to contact Ms McMahon by phone after November 8, 2000.
Morey then refused to answer any further questions and accused Mr Urquhart of "winding" him up when he had a "crook heart".
"Mr Morey it seems to me you just don't want to answer the hard questions," Mr Urquhart said.
Morey requested a medic and was taken back into lockup.
"If you want to put her life in danger you f..king wear it," he said.
Ms McMahon's sister Amanda Smith giving evidence earlier in the week described Morey as "creepy" and "too interested" in her younger sister.
The inquest has also heard evidence of a black bag found in Morey's bedroom after Ms McMahon's disappearance, which according to three witnesses contained gaffer tape, rope, knives and graphic pornographic magazines which involved fake corpses in compromising positions.
Morey accepted he had a black bag he used to carry his lunch in for work, but rejected ever buying the pornographic material.
"Common sense tells you I'm not into that sort of garbage for starters," he said.
"Man, if I'm supposed to be this mad serial killer running around, why would I be carrying this bag around with me."
The state coroner Alastair Hope will hand down his findings on January 17. It is not known whether they would involve recommendations to the DPP.
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/prostitute-claims-missing-woman-was-murdered-20121210-2b581.html
Sarah McMahon was 20 when she was last seen in November, 2000.
A prostitute who believed she was dying of a terminal illness has made new claims about what happened to Perth woman Sarah McMahon who disappeared from Claremont more than a decade ago, a Coronial Court has been told.
Ms McMahon was only 20-years-old when she was last seen driving away from her Claremont workplace while speaking on the phone on November 8, 2000.
Sarah McMahon'scar was found two weeks later at the Swan District Hospital.
Sarah McMahon was never heard from again.
The last phone call Ms McMahon answered was from a man who has since been convicted of trying to strangle a prostitute to death, Donald Morey, the Coroner's Court of WA heard on Monday.
Ms McMahon was reported missing by her parents the following day after failing to pick her younger sister up from church on November 8.
The inquest into Ms McMahon's disappearance was told it is expected to hear how she was friends with Morey - who was 45-years-old at the time.
Although there was a 25-year age difference between the pair, the court was told witnesses were expected to claim Morey had strong feelings for the young woman.
Despite three extensive police investigations conducted in the years following her disappearance Ms McMahon's fate has remained a mystery and her body has never been discovered.
But a coronial inquest was launched in Perth this week after her case was reopened by cold case detectives who have reinterviewed several key witnesses.
One witness, whose identity has been suppressed, changed her statement in November 2011 believing she was suffering from a terminal illness, the Coroner's Court heard.
The woman decided to "tell the complete truth," about what she knew of events on November 8, 2000, counsel assisting the coroner Philip Urquhart said in his opening address on Monday.
In her most recent statement to police, the woman claims she was called to a house where Donald Morey was living and was told "he's killed her," by the man who owned the house, the court heard.
"She says that when she walked into Mr Morey's bedroom she saw a naked girl on the bed and that she had a piece of robe about 1 cm think looped twice around her neck," Mr Urquhart said.
Philip Urquhart said the inquest is also expected to hear evidence from several witnesses about a bag Donald Morey carried with him containing a reel of silver gaffer tape, rope, two knives and explicit pornographic material.
Donald Morey has consistently denied any involvement in Ms McMahon's disappearance.
He is currently serving a 13-year term of imprisonment for the attempted strangulation murder of a female sex worker in December 2003.
The court also heard that less than nine months prior to the attack a friend and fellow sex worker of the woman disappeared from the same Highgate area where Donald Morey's victim was picked up from.
The inquest continues.
Sarah Anne McMahon 20 holds little sister Kate, then 13, in 1999 before Sarah went missing.
Perth woman Sarah McMahon has been missing for 15 years
FIFTEEN years ago Sarah McMahon, then 20, who was by all accounts happy and healthy, left her workplace to meet someone in Bassendean and was never seen again.
An inquest into her disappearance on November 8, 2000 found she had fallen victim to a homicide.
Despite two police investigations, a special crime squad review of the case file in 2011 and a 2012 inquest, her killer has not been held to account and her body has not been found.
As far as her younger sister Kate is concerned, time does not heal all wounds.
“It never gets any easier and time does not heal or lessen the heartache that we have,” Kate McMahon told The Sunday Times.
“This time of year, coming up to Christmas, is especially hard for us, as a precious member of our family won’t be joining us for the 15th year.”
Kate McMahon’s message to those who hold vital information about what happened to her big sister is simple.
“If anyone has any information regarding Sarah’s disappearance, please don’t let us go on for a 16th year without knowing what happened to our Sarah,” she said.
What exactly happened to Sarah McMahon on the day she disappeared remains a mystery.
The only thing found belonging to her in the days after she vanished was her phone and car. Twelve days after she went missing, her Ford meteor sedan was found at Swan District Hospital.
Her mobile phone was later found on the Great Northern Highway, near the hospital.
The State Coroner who oversaw the inquest into her suspected death was Alistair Hope.
“The circumstances in which Ms McMahon disappeared are sinister and I have confidently been able to exclude the possibility that she died by way of natural causes,” Mr Hope said in his findings.
“In my view, the evidence points overwhelmingly to the proposition that she died by way of unlawful homicide.”
Shortly before her disappearance, Sarah McMahon began working part time at an irrigation company in Claremont.
She was last seen leaving the business about 5.15pm on November 8.
Her colleagues at the time remember her saying she had to be somewhere about 5.30pm. They believed she was heading to the Bassendean area.
Mobile telephone data, revealed at the inquest, found Sarah McMahon received four calls on her mobile on the day she went missing.
coverage of Sarah’s disappearance in The Sunday Times in December, 2000.
The Sunday Times December 10, 2000 edition featured Sarah's disappearance on the front page.
One was from a friend, another was from her sister and two were from a man called Donald Victor Morey.
He has been interviewed by police on several occasions and was among those to give evidence at the inquest.
In 2005, he was convicted of the attempted murder of a sex worker and jailed for 13 years.
Morey, now aged 60, has always denied involvement in Sarah McMahon’s disappearance.
During the inquest, he claimed she was alive.
In interviews with police he has claimed she has two children.
But during the inquest, he also admitted most of the information he’d given police was “mumbo jumbo.”
“Quite a lot of things that I said to the police were obviously mumbo jumbo. But as far as Sarah being alive, she is alive,” Mr Morey said at the inquest.
Mr Hope did not make any adverse finding in relation to Morey’s involvement in the case.
“In this case, the evidence is complex and there are many credibility issues which would need to be resolved in making any such determination,” he said.
The special crime squad said this week it was still keen to hear from anyone who had new information about Sarah McMahon’s disappearance.
Detective Senior Sergeant Rohan Ingles said: “This matter remains under investigation at the special crime squad and anyone with any information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers.”
The Crime Stoppers number is 1800 333 000.
Callers can remain anonymous.
Brendan Lee O'Connell, 40, jailed for posting anti-semitic video online
Angie Raphael - JANUARY 31 2011
The Jewish victim of a verbal racial attack that was posted in a video online says a three-year prison term given to the man who called him a "racist, homicidal maniac" outside a Perth supermarket is not enough.
Brendan Lee O'Connell, 40, was sentenced in the District Court in Perth yesterday after being found guilty on Friday of six racial hatred charges.
Chuckling and smiling as the counts were read out to him, O'Connell appeared unaffected by the sentence handed down by Judge Henry Wisbey.
O'Connell represented himself before a jury after firing the lawyer who had been defending him against an accusation that he posted an anti-semitic video online.
Brendan Lee O'Connell faced seven charges related to the posting of a verbal altercation he had with Stanley Keyser and Timothy Peach, who are Jewish, and was found guilty on six.
An argument broke out between the three men at an IGA supermarket in South Perth on May 2, 2009, where a Friends of Palestine group was holding a protest against Israeli oranges.
O'Connell was using a video camera at the event and in a video he later posted online, he labelled Mr Keyser a "racist, homicidal maniac".
"You have a religion of racism, hate, homicide and ethnic cleansing," he said in the video.
Brendon Lee O'Connell appearing in the video posted online.
During the trial, O'Connell refused to acknowledge Judge Wisbey when he entered the court and, instead, rose to bow to the jury.
Judge Wisbey said O'Connell showed no remorse and his behaviour "was that of a bully".
About a dozen supporters in the court cheered when O'Connell labelled the proceedings "a kangaroo court" and gave a long, repetitive rant about the King James Bible and the Constitution.
As he was led out of court, O'Connell shouted: "Don't forget about the Gazans!"
Outside court, Mr Keyser said O'Connell had forced him to "suffer" for 18 months.
"I wish he was in [prison] for longer," he said as he rushed passed reporters.
Family friend Steve Lieblich told reporters it was a "very distressing" time for the Keyser family who were happy to have it over.
"I think it was a victory for decency and against bigotry and prejudice," he said.
"On this occasion it was the Jewish people who were the target of this bigotry but on future occasions it could be Muslims or Asians or any group, so we we should all be happy about this result."
Mr Lieblich said he hoped O'Connell would have time to reflect on his views during his prison term.
He said the internet made it easy to "spread hatred" and it was important to address the issue.
"This has got nothing to do with free speech," Mr Lieblich said.
"There's clearly a limit to free speech, there's a limit to all freedoms we have in society because we have to consider others.
"Words can hurt and cause a lot of damage and people need to recognise that they have to watch their words."
O'Connell's sentence has been backdated to January 24 and he will be eligible for parole, but a date for that period was not specified in court.
AAP
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1F4dFuV8s8&app=desktop
Frank Drebin
Frank Drebin
'It's time for religious hatred laws'
Lucy Rickard
http://www.smh.com.au/wa-news/its-time-for-religious-hatred-laws-20110203-1aewp.html
The sentencing of a Perth man under the racial hatred laws means that now is the perfect time for the state government to introduce religious vilification laws, it has been claimed.
A former president of the Ethnic Communities Council, Suresh Rajan, said the jail term handed down to Brendan Lee O'Connell recently put the issue of racial and religious intolerance back in the public eye, and he hoped it would prompt a movement in religious vilification laws.
O'Connell was sentenced to three years jail for unleashing a verbal racial attack on two young Jewish men who attended a Friends of Palestine group protest outside a South Perth supermarket.
O'Connell filmed his verbal tirade of Stanley Keyser and Timothy Peach and later posted the video online. In the video, he labelled Mr Keyser a "racist homicidal maniac".
Mr Rajan was one of the main forces behind the introduction of the racial hatred laws in 2004 while also pushing for similar criminal charges for religious vilification in the public domain.
In 2004, then-premier Geoff Gallop supported the changes to laws - however Dr Gallop's Labor Party opposed the religious laws, which Mr Rajan believes is due to support from the Catholic Church, who were against the legislation changes.
"The Catholic Church's argument is that we need to have education programs, not legislation. I need the legislation," he said.
"I need to protect the little Muslim girl who has her veil ripped off her face while walking to the local train station.
"I want religious vilification laws. Unfortunately, I don't think I have any hope of getting it through with this state government."
"I just don't think there's enough there to get us over the line at the moment, but I think it's the perfect time to be pushing this through."
Mr Rajan said the new laws could make the criticism of other religions during church services illegal.
He said similar laws in Europe related to cultural vilification, and said the introduction of a religious equivalent in Australia would bring us into line.
"I think this is the absolute opportune time for us as a community to revisit that whole issue of religious vilification," he said.
Mr Rajan said that since the racial hatred laws were passed in 2004, he had taken a number of issues to police where Muslims had been vilified, however police were not prepared to take them on.
"The Director of Public Prosecutions said that this was religious vilification, not racial," he said.
He said this further confused the line between what defines a race and a religion, as highlighted in the O'Connell case where he believed that Judiasm is a religion and not a race, as it was ruled by the court in this instance.
Mr Rajan said the religious vilification law would allow anyone who felt they are denigrated for either race or religion would have the same rights in a WA court.
Attorney General Christian Porter said all anti-vilification laws raised complex questions of the nature and extent of free speech, and religious vilification laws in particular had in some jurisdictions not operated as they were intended.
"The state government would view any proposals for expansions of this area of the law with a cautious eye," he said.
Follow WAtoday on Twitter @WAtoday
Ice in Australia: overseas crime gangs, not bikies, are the threat
March 30, 2015
http://theconversation.com/ice-in-australia-overseas-crime-gangs-not-bikies-are-the-threat-39313
Methylamphetamine, in particular crystal meth or ‘ice’, has been the subject of much scrutiny in Australia in recent times. AAP/David Crosling
The Australian Crime Commission (ACC) report into the methylamphetamine market in Australia makes for sombre reading. Released this week, it reveals that more drugs are coming into Australia and certain forms of drug usage are increasing. A variety of crime groups are playing a role in the drug trade.
Methylamphetamine, in particular crystal meth or “ice”, has been the subject of much scrutiny in recent times and concern is growing among Australian authorities. The Victorian parliament held an inquiry in 2013-14 into ice’s impact in the state and the government recently released an “Ice Action Plan” in response.
So, how does the ACC intelligence document help inform the debate around ice? What practical lessons can Australian society and law enforcement draw from it?
According to the 2013 National Drug Strategy Household Survey(NDSHS), 7% of Australians aged 14 and above reported using amphetamine or methylamphetamine at least once in their lifetime and 2.1% reported recent use. This has remained consistent with 2010 figures.
What has changed, and significantly so, is the type of methylamphetamine Australians are using.
Users now prefer crystal methylamphetamine. This produces more powerful physical and psychological reactions than powder forms of the drug. Users of powder forms decreased from 51% to 29% while ice use more than doubled from 22% to 50% between 2010 and 2013. National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre findings from 2014 support this conclusion.
The increased addiction/dependence potential for ice as the purest form of the drug is also evident. A great proportion – 25% of regular ice users – are using at least weekly. This is a much higher rate than the 2.2% of regular powder users who use weekly.
Increased demand for the higher purity of ice results in Australian users in particular being prepared to pay premium prices for this form of the drug. Figures suggest that the Australian price per kilogram of crystal methylamphetamine is A$320,000, whereas in the United States it is A$100,000. In China, a country flagged by the ACC report as a key player in transnational organised drug crime, the cost is as low as A$7000 per kilogram.
The business of illegal drugs shares some elements with the business of selling legal products. Common features include lots of working capital, a steady supply of raw materials, manufacturing facilities, reliable shipping and distribution and marketing networks. But it is knowing what criminal networks are operating at what level that is the key to an effective law enforcement response.
ACC data indicates that detections of clandestine laboratories decreased by approximately 6% in 2012-13. The weight of precursor material being detected at the border has also decreased, despite the number of detections increasing.
Conversely, the weight and amount of amphetamine-type substance (ATS) detections at the Australian border, in particular detections of ice, continue to increase. This suggests that the outstanding threat is increasingly coming from abroad. Small-time Australian players are growing reliant on transnational crime groups.
The ACC’s Illicit Drug Data Report flags increased seizures, border detections and associated arrests for ATS (excluding MDMA) at record highs. This echoes the findings of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime 2014 World Drug Report, which identified global trends of record-high seizures of methamphetamine as compared with other ATS.
The ACC report indicates that transnational organised crime involvement in high-volume precursor importation and trafficking remains at high levels. Its concern about illicit importations concealed by legitimate markets is clear, particularly from a law enforcement perspective.
Various governments in Australia have made much of the role of outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs) and their involvement in the methylamphetamine trade.
Tellingly, in this week’s report, they rate only two mentions. One is as a part of the wider criminal gang picture; the other as a case study for involvement in the drug trade in a small rural Victorian town.
Nowhere was the critical evidence of their dominance of this particular drug market put forward, despite what many law enforcement agencieshave been claiming in recent years. The report outlines the following crime groups as being active in the meth market:
… members of Australian-based outlaw motorcycle gangs, Australian organised crime groups as well as persons of Middle Eastern, Eastern European and West African backgrounds, and Vietnamese, Chinese, Canadian, US and Mexican serious and organised crime groups.
As has been previously shown, while OMCGs no doubt have some involvement in the drug trade, they are not the kingpins.
Transnational organised crime (TOC) groups are the most concerning threat to Australia when talking about organised and serious crime. They are clearly involved in the methylamphtamine market. More than 60% of Australia’s highest-risk criminal targets, including transnational targets, are involved in the methylamphetamine market.
The UNODC looked at 40 TOC groups and identified a number of their typologies and characteristics.
Of these TOC groups, 70% carried out criminal activity in three or more countries. Most were involved in multiple criminal enterprises. They were actively involved in corruption and routinely employed violence and engaged in money laundering.
Unfortunately, the ACC’s report has a broad base and lacks detailed or overly new evidence. One issue that does seem to bear consideration is the rising role of transnational crime groups. With so much focus on domestic gangs as the peak criminal threat, perhaps we have taken our eye off the ball of the real criminal threat outside Australia’s borders.
Hunted Kizon stays 'bulletproof'
GARY ADSHEAD and SEAN COWAN - The West Australian on May 23, 2010,
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7276033/hunted-kizon-stays-bulletproof/
John Kizon, left, with Fabian Quaid and Troy Mercanti
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/video/-/watch/19926587
John Kizon has a reputation for using phone boxes all over Perth, which might explain why his fancy-dress costume of choice on at least one occasion was a Superman outfit.
The 48-year-old, who once featured in a newspaper story about unexplained wealth laws under the headline "Catch me if you can", is one of WA's most recognisable men.
The 2001 headline, complete with a photograph of Kizon belting a punching bag in his private gym, was soon on display in a police conference room and became a source of motivation for senior detectives hunting him.
"Keep your eyes on the prize," Assistant Commissioner Tim Atherton would say while gesturing towards the article. "Keep your eyes on the prize, boys."
But after two decades spent eyeing off the "prize", the WA Police, Federal Police, National Crime Authority and Australian Crime Commission have seen it disappear out of sight time and time again.
Since 1986, operations Hydrogen, Barrator, Interstice, Harpy, Red Emperor, Sweet Lip, Self-Lock, Radix, Shell, Synecdoche, Sweep, Blade, Schumacher, Cyclamen, Swampy, Slalom, Turkana, Mascot and others have all been aimed at Kizon, his associates or both.
Police have looked at his business connections to Indonesia, which included dealings with a man named Eddie Dharma and family members of the former Suharto regime. They've bugged his phones, his cars and even his bedrooms. Detectives who have entered his properties secretly or otherwise still chortle about the photo on Kizon's lounge room wall of New York mafia "boss of bosses" John Gotti. Kizon doesn't find it funny.
"Kids in children's hospitals don't have facilities, old people have been thrown out of their homes by this Government because of a personal vendetta against me," Kizon said after walking free on drug conspiracy charges in 1999. "There are police officers in the Federal Police and the WA Police who have sinister motives in targeting personalities."
He has made similar comments in the years since, most recently in March when he beat insider trading charges from an ACC investigation. "I was the one who was hunted," he said. "Now, Mr Kizon's going to be the hunter."
He has been pursued because police believe he is at the very top of what they refer to as the Kizon Group or Kizon Network. Drug dealers in the network were said to be turning over more than $1.4 million each a year just in amphetamines. Much of it has come from Sydney on furniture trucks and a particular Northbridge nightclub has been a key hub for the distribution of speed and other illicit drugs.
To Kizon it's all lies, and the many investigations into him are a waste of taxpayers' money. Operation Barrator found in 2003 that he was not involved in the day-to-day trafficking of illicit drugs but was closely aligned with people who were.
Like Superman, he has become seemingly bulletproof. The same can't be said for two of his closest confidants, who posed with him for the superheroes snap.
Under the Batman cowl is Fabian Quaid, also a good mate of footballer and self-confessed drug addict Ben Cousins. Behind the Spiderman mask is former Coffin Cheater-turned-Fink bikie Troy Desmond Mercanti. Both are now behind bars, reportedly in Casuarina Prison's highly restrictive special handling unit.
Mercanti, who dodged a sniper's bullet in 2008 as part of the fallout from his Coffin Cheaters expulsion, could be out next year after doing a three-year stretch for assault.
Quaid is "on a long holiday", as one of his relatives was recently overheard saying, until at least 2018 for his part in importing 60kg of MDMA powder - enough to make at least 350,000 ecstasy pills and make between $14 million and $24 million in drug deals.
But the so-called network is made up of more than just a handful of people and its influence reaches into the upper echelons of business, politics and sport. It also stretches much further than Australia's borders and, for the first time, The West Australian will reveal details of the network's international connection and the identity of the "Mr Big" behind it.
John Kizon hasn't always been Teflon. As a teenager, he had brushes with the law, including driving offences that culminated in his licence being suspended when he illegally parked his panel van in Supreme Court Gardens.
In October 1981, police found cash in a yellow sports bag hidden in his bedroom wardrobe at the family's Balcatta home. An analysis of the money and the bag revealed traces of heroin. On his lawyers' advice, he would plead guilty to possessing money from the sale of heroin and resisting arrest and be jailed for 15 months, but only after he had been arrested and jailed over a separate drug bust.
A promising middleweight boxer, already with a State title under his belt, who hoped to make the Brisbane Commonwealth Games in the same year of his incarceration, Kizon and associate Craig Patrick Martin had bolted from a Triumph TR-7 sports car at a Morley intersection when police pulled alongside them.
The pair left behind $900 in cash from a drug deal done nearby. Kizon was nabbed when a detective fired a warning shot, but Martin kept running and was arrested several weeks later. This week, Kizon said he had been waiting in the car listening to Jimmy Barnes when Martin went into a Morley house, returning a few minutes later with the money. But he wouldn't tell that to the cops at the time because it went against his code. "My old man told me you are responsible for your own actions - if you are in trouble, you cop it on the chin," he said.
Watching his son a week short of his 20th birthday being sentenced to five years jail was an emotional experience for Kizon's father, George, a Greek-Macedonian migrant. "He is only 19," George Kizon said at the time of the court case. "He would not know what heroin looked like."
These days John Kizon, or JK, as he is widely known, fumes when his criminal history gets aired in the media. He argues that it's unfair to drag up his past over and over.
"Hey, what are ya doin' ya f...in' rat," he screamed down one reporter's mobile phone in 2006. "Who you f...in' baggin' you c...-suckin' c.... F...in' c..., f...in' c...-sucker. Wanna bag me in the f...in' paper and talk to me, ya f...in' dog."
The Kizon clan migrated to Perth in 1949 aboard a passenger ship which sailed from Egypt. The ship's manifest had the family listed under the name of Kizov. John Kizon was born in Melbourne and was 16 when his family, originally from Florina in present day northern Greece, returned to Perth from the rough-and-tumble streets of Fitzroy. He finished his schooling at Balcatta Senior High School. Kizon had close friends who also went to Balcatta, including his younger mate Raimond Fazio, a quality boxer with some powerful connections.
Disgraced former premier Brian Burke was a good friend of the Fazio family and sponsored Rai at his Catholic confirmation. As the MP for Balga, Mr Burke met Rai's father Joe, who trained boxers at his Balga gymnasium. When Rai finished school he got a job in the Burke Government's car pool.
By 1984, Burke was running WA and John Kizon was running foul of the law again. He had only been out of prison for a matter of weeks and was still on parole when he and his brother Victor brawled with brothers Wayne and John Stampalia, former friends who had fallen out over a horse. According to Kizon, the brothers had an altercation with his father at Gloucester Park while he was in jail. "When I got out of jail, I confronted them and they came out second best," he said.
The Stampalias spent four nights in hospital with broken bones while the Kizon brothers spent up to two years in jail from 1985. On Perth streets, detectives were starting to hear more and more about the boy from Balcatta and the circles in which he moved.
A notorious photograph taken around this time shows Kizon, Craig Martin and a man called Doug McAllister standing side-by-side and armed to the teeth. McAllister, in the middle with a handgun and a machine-gun, died in 1991 of a heroin overdose.
In late 1988, Kizon's father had his own experience of being enmeshed in WA's drug trade. George Kizon was arrested at a marijuana crop in Gingin with Balcatta associate Ivan Jack Marinovich - one of Perth's cannabis kings - and boxer Tony Pitassi. Marinovich and Pitassi went down for the crime, but George Kizon was found not guilty and John Kizon was at his side when he walked free from court in late 1989.
Shortly after his father's acquittal, Kizon took an overseas holiday before returning to launch a boxing promotion business with his good friend Rai Fazio towards the end of the year. But it would emerge that Kizon was also busy with his next illegal enterprise - opening bank accounts in false names to channel what prosecutors said in court was about $300,000 of crime proceeds.
"Of course, we are talking about drug-related monies," the prosecutor said in court. Kizon said the money was gambling profits he was holding on behalf of a syndicate for which he was a bagman.
The seven bank accounts couldn't have been set up without the help of an attractive R&I Bank employee, Lana Scaturro, who had once been Kizon's girlfriend, and a list of aliases, which included the names of movie characters like Tony Montana - the tempestuous cocaine drug lord played by Al Pacino in Scarface. Other false identities police have recorded against Kizon's name over the years include John Conti, John Dixon, John Gotti and John Ritz.
Before pleading guilty to 16 bank account charges, Kizon and the bank employee admitted making false declarations by using fake names during a prison visit in January 1989 to see Marinovich. For that offence they were fined.
But for the more serious crimes, the bank worker was given another fine and a good behaviour bond while Kizon went back to jail in 1990 - this time for a year.
Within days of his release in August 1991, Kizon was hit with a tax bill of almost $800,000 from the Australian Taxation Office. Another government agency, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, wanted to confiscate the $300,000 held in the fake bank accounts under proceeds of crime laws. The DPP also wanted the $126,000 the money had already earned in interest. It was a classic double dip into Kizon's cash assets. Remembering that Kizon had already claimed the cash was from gambling wins, the Supreme Court said there was no evidence the proceeds were from drug deals and only allowed the DPP to take $50,000. It would be four years before Kizon negotiated an agreement with the ATO.
From there, he turned his entrepreneurial talents to the nightclub game and by November 1993 he had formed Elevation Holdings with Rai Fazio. The pair opened an underage nightclub on Roe Street, Northbridge, but interestingly it was Kizon's mother Marika (aka Mary) whose name appeared on the company documents.
For the record, Kizon has never owned a property under his moniker except for a short time when his grandfather gave him and Victor a family home in Balcatta, citing his "natural love and affection" for them as the price paid on the transfer document. Only one private company with which he's been associated, All Mediation Services, has carried his name as a director or shareholder. Even his cars and phone lines have a history of being registered in other names.
Leading up to the Elevation nightclub project there was a slight distraction which stemmed from a punch-up at a different Northbridge club called The Freezer. Kizon had been charged in June 1992 with one his closest friends, Craig Anthony Christian, over the assault of dancer Glenn Stannard. Rather than hanging around Perth and sulking about the charges, Kizon, Christian and friend Michael Francis Rippingale headed overseas to the Greek island of Mykonos for a holiday. Trouble followed and in the town of Syros a nightclub bouncer had his jaw broken during a dispute with Kizon, apparently over the club's cover charge. The Australian tourist was convicted of causing dangerous bodily injuries and satisfied his sentence by paying about $20,000.
Back in Perth, Christian and Kizon pleaded not guilty to assaulting Stannard and were acquitted in November 1993, when a doorman gave evidence that he was the one who punched Stannard for acting aggressively towards Christian. Magistrate Ivan Brown said Stannard's credibility had been destroyed after he admitted taking five lines of amphetamines.
Months later, Kizon and Rai Fazio were accused of breaking the jaw of a teenager outside Elevation. The charge against Fazio was later dropped and at Kizon's trial a club doorman said that he, and not Kizon, threw the damaging punch.
Kizon walked free and the doorman, Gavin Hanley, became known as "Gateway Gav". Hanley denied he was taking the rap for Kizon. "I would not take the rap for him and would not expect him to take the rap for me," he said.
To this day, detectives who worked on that assault case remain bewildered by the fact Kizon was sitting next to his Melbourne-based lawyer George Defteros at Northbridge's Valentino's Cafe when they moved in to arrest him. It was as though he knew the cops were coming.
'My horde of colourful mates draws cops to me'
John Kizon says police know he is not involved in the drug business and says he draws so much attention because of his choice of friends and his upfront manner.
Read the full story
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/7289119
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/7289119
NEALE PRIOR - Yahoo7 on May 25, 2010,
John Kizon having coffee in Northbridge
John Kizon says police know he is not involved in the drug business and says he draws so much attention because of his choice of friends and his upfront manner.
The leading Perth crime target said he was involved in an array of business activities in Australia and Indonesia, including mining deals, and authorities knew they were legitimate.
"If I wasn't, they would have arrested me a long time ago," he said. "The police know I don't do drugs and they have known it for a long time."
With a Greek-Macedonian heritage, he was born and raised in the tough Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy before moving across to Perth at age 16 and emerging as a promising young boxer.
Instead of gaining international renown as a pugilist, the seeds of a different fame were sown when he was jailed in 1982 for heroin offences and in 1990 for charges related to setting up bank accounts in bogus names.
Prosecutors alleged the accounts were set up to channel drug money. He has since been a major target of Federal and State law enforcement authorities but has beaten an array of charges, including insider trading and assault.
Kizon said his 1982 convictions were the result of him being young and naive. He said his first conviction arose from him agreeing to drive a boxing gym acquaintance, Craig Patrick Martin, to a house in Morley and Martin emerging from the house with $900.
Kizon said Martin ran off when they were pulled over by armed police shortly after and left the cash in the car, jammed under the passenger seat window winder.
Citing the rules of Fitzroy's streets and the teachings of his immigrant father George never to dob on anyone, Kizon refused to tell the officers whose money it was and ignored his lawyer's advice at the trial to testify that it was Martin's money.
"My old man told me you are responsible for your own actions — if you are in trouble, you cop it on the chin," he said. "I would not even say 'Craig picked the money up from the house'."
He was jailed for five years in March, 1982, after being convicted of selling/supplying heroin.
He was also facing charges arising from police finding a sports bag in his bedroom wardrobe containing cash with traces of heroin.
After being convicted of the Martin-related charge, Kizon said he accepted his lawyer's advice to plead guilty to the sports bag charges so his sentences could be served concurrently.
"I was 18 years old, a bit naive and copped it in the arse," he said.
Kizon said law enforcement agencies had wasted millions of dollars over the past two decades trying to get him just because he had a colourful group of friends.
He said he built relationships with people regardless of their race or religion and had extensive business interests in Indonesia, including mining-related investments.
"I have a lot of friends — Muslim friends, Christian friends and I am Orthodox myself," he said. "When people say what religion are you, I say Fitzroy."
The 48-year-old said he got on with all the bikie "crews", many of whom he counted as friends, and was willing to help when tensions came to the surface.
"I like everyone to live in harmony," he said. "I don’t stick my head in bikie business but if I see a couple of friends who don't get on, I say, do you need the help of an older head."
Perth's dark underbelly
GARY ADSHEAD and SEAN COWAN
Monday, 24 May 2010
https://thewest.com.au/news/australia/perths-dark-underbelly-ng-ya-211420
Hunted Kizon able to stay 'bulletproof'
John Kizon has a reputation for using phone boxes all over Perth, which might explain why his fancy-dress costume of choice on at least one occasion was a Superman outfit.
The 48-year-old, who once featured in a newspaper story about unexplained wealth laws under the headline "Catch me if you can", is one of WA's most recognisable men.
The 2001 headline, complete with a photograph of Kizon belting a punching bag in his private gym, was soon on display in a police conference room and became a source of motivation for senior detectives hunting him.
"Keep your eyes on the prize," Assistant Commissioner Tim Atherton would say while gesturing towards the article. "Keep your eyes on the prize, boys."
Untouchable, unassailable cult figures
Greg Morrison attends the memorial match for his son Phillip. Pic: Lee Griffith
The death of 21-year-old Phillip Morrison in 1994 put the so-called Kizon group squarely in the public eye, as did the death of a man named Andrew Petrelis a year later.
The unpretentious southern suburbs of Thornlie and Armadale are a 40-minute drive and poles apart from the trendy inner-city cafe strip of Leederville where Phillip Morrison was killed in 1994.
For the past 16 years, two groups of men have gathered at a cricket ground in one of the two locations to pay homage to their fallen mate. Before taking to the pitch to do battle in memory of the talented first-grade cricketer, the men rally in the changing room where an ode to "Morro" is read aloud. Phillip’s father, Greg Morrison, proudly passes his son's bat over for this year’s recital. His eyes fill with tears.
"Now, we'd all like to take turns to piss on a jerk called Christian and the hood John Kizon," it reads. "But the day is not about hatred or vengeance, it's for the greater alliance and Phillip's remembrance."
Overlord runs drugs trade from afar
Few in Perth would know his name, but police say Vaso Ulic is a Mr Big behind hundreds of kilos of drugs shipped to
WA.
He traffics hundreds of millions of dollars worth of illegal drugs into WA and the Eastern States. He poses such a serious security threat that law enforcement agencies would need a military plane to transport him to Australia. He has been suspected of the attempted assassination of a political leader.
The funeral of Vince Italiano.
The vanishing act and subsequent not guilty verdict for Christian on a manslaughter charge sparked community outrage and a memorable speech from
the newly appointed police commissioner Bob Falconer — a veteran Melbourne cop with a clever turn of phrase.
Vaso Ulic, 50, is a major player in the dangerous game of international crime.
'My horde of colourful mates draws cops to me'
John Kizon says police know he is not involved in the drug business and says he draws so much attention because of his choice of friends and his upfront manner.
Drugs cross borders while crime squads watch, wait
Police intelligence about Vaso Ulic, Fabian Quaid and another John Kizon associate, Craig Christian, had been gathered during a range of operations before Taskforce Schumacher kicked off in late 2003.
Each operation identified the national and international connections relied upon by the WA group.
For instance, investigators working on Operation Barrator looked at the long-term association between Kizon, former NSW detective Roger Rogerson and Melbourne underworld figures Angelo "Fat Ange" Venditti and Mick Gatto - both of whom have been cleared of Melbourne gangland murders in recent years.
Gambling and heroin pave road to riches
It's 1938 and Italian migrant Giuseppe Rocco Rispoli is eyeballing a Northbridge building as a possible illegal gambling club.
The location is perfect but there's a problem. The bank which owns it told the dapper 27-year-old from Calabria he can rent 155 James Street on one condition: he must open a food store rather than a club. The last tenant tried to run a gambling den until police raided it so often it was forced to close. The bank didn’t want history repeating.
"It was a good spot for my club, though," Rispoli wrote in his memoirs before his death in 2005, "so I went to see if a friend of mine could help me."
Heroin kings crowned, mules executed
Heroin pusher and gambler Paul Musarri didn't trust banks and would keep his ill-gotten gains stashed in his mattress. By early 1983, the padding was again feeling thin.
But a middle-aged driving instructor who moonlighted as a marijuana dealer would be his saviour. Her name was Glenys Bennett and she would become one of his drug mules.
On her first trip to Malaysia, in May that year to pick up 2kg of heroin, she was accompanied by the middleman who connected Musarri with the Golden Triangle.
Girolamo "Gerry" Maio made millions out of those connections until he was finally jailed for 18 years in Melbourne after being nabbed with two Malaysian men and $9.7 million worth of heroin.
A three-headed dog sets out on a Fox hunt
Cerberus was the name of a three-headed dog which guarded the gates to the underworld in Greek and Roman mythology.
It was also the perfect title for a National Crime Authority operation aimed squarely at Italo-Australian organised crime and, more specifically, members of the Calabrese crime group L'Onorata - the Honoured Society.
First legal bugs bring down cannabis ring
Operation Synecdoche was the first time listening devices had been used in WA. The State police put one in the backyard of cannabis king Ivan Jack Marinovich's Balcatta home, but it never worked. They also inserted a bug in his living room couch, which recorded him passing wind before providing more valuable information.
By listening in to Marinovich and dozens of criminals who visited his home, police were able to build a picture of Perth's drug scene in the mid-1980s and some of the interesting connections within, including then State Labor MP Graham Burkett.
But the biggest coup was the discovery of three separate cannabis crops in Gingin with a total of 48,000 plants. The main crop was planted inside the RAAF Pearce restricted flight zone to minimise the risk of detection from the air.
Violent times in the reign of bikies
The 1974 bikie funeral of a man they called "The Preacher" attracted a wide cross-section of the community.
Nuns wearing their crisp, white habits stood shoulder to shoulder with outlaws dressed in trademark scruffy jeans and check shirts at Karrakatta Cemetery in Shenton Park. The sisters had crucifixes around their necks. The brotherhood was cloaked in sacred club patches.
One of the men in the funeral cortege would go on to become the biggest name in WA motorcycle gang history. He is Coffin Cheater Edward Horace Withnell.
The vicious fight that ignited bikie bad blood
Underworld observers did a double-take when an intriguing apology appeared in a newspaper under the name of Raimond Fazio.
"With respect to the reported matter outside a restaurant in Subiaco: The facts are that I provoked an incident over a personal issue and I acknowledge that everyone involved in resolving that incident acted with integrity and honour. On reflection my actions were entirely inappropriate and have created unnecessary and untruthful reports in many quarters. I apologise to all who may have been affected by my conduct."
Fazio, a Golden Gloves champion boxer, was not usually the sort of person to take a backward step. But this one appeared to be a matter of life or death.
The Ones That Got Away
http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/s160338.htm
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
FOUR CORNERS
Investigative TV journalism at its best
The Ones That Got Away
Exploring accusations of police corruption in Western Australia.
WARNING: The language used in sections of this transcript may offend some people.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The fight against organised crime in Western Australia has all the appearances of being a shambles.
Detectives, criminals and government watchdogs can agree on only one fact -- there is corruption in the police service.
TERRY O'CONNOR, CHAIRMAN, ANTI-CORRUPTION COMMISSION: I suppose you've got to expect that there's always going to be some bad eggs in the barrel.
We would say that there are more bad eggs in the Western Australian Police Service barrel than one might expect.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The trouble is nobody can agree on who the corrupt officers are or what constitutes corruption.
LES AYTON, DEPUTY POLICE COMMISSIONER, 1994-1996: There is no way you can effectively catch criminals by sticking strictly to the letter of the law.
Good detectives have to take the law to the knife's edge.
BOB FALCONER, POLICE COMMISSIONER, 1994-1999: If you're skilled in detecting and presenting evidence, well, clearly, if you want to turn to the dark side of the force -- to use an Americanism -- then you can easily use those same skills and knowledge as a countermeasure.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The beneficiary of this accusation and counteraccusation is organised crime.
Western Australia has seen failed prosecutions, the mysterious death of a star witness in a drug trial and a high-tech police operation called off without notice.
Tonight, Four Corners goes to the dark parts of Perth where police and criminals go and where corruption seems to be prosecuted selectively.
STEPHEN McDONELL: There's a side to Western Australia not often talked about, a side of life not bound up in sun and sailing.
Western Australia has thousands of kilometres of largely unwatched coastline.
Facing out and up to Asia, it's the ideal back door for drug importation, like ecstasy, amphetamines and heroin.
Western Australia's remote cattle stations are used to establish considerable marijuana crops.
This has attracted sophisticated growers from the east.
Then there's the capital, Perth.
Its burgeoning population has provided a growing demand for hard drugs.
Slowly, and without the rest of the nation noticing, organised crime has been moving into Western Australia.
ROBERT COCK, DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS:
Every day in the courts, matters that my office prosecutes either involve the direct distribution of serious drugs -- heroin, amphetamines -- or are a consequence of people being addicted to those drugs.
And that high level of distribution that reveals itself in the courts can only be a consequence of some fairly high-level criminal activity.
And yes, I am very concerned about that level of criminal activity.
STEPHEN McDONELL: According to police intelligence, Western Australia's organised criminals can be found in Northbridge, the nightclub and cafe district just to the north of the CBD.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS, HEAD OF RED EMPEROR: Northbridge has always had a criminal element involved in it.
It's changed its face now.
But one of the old restaurants here -- without mentioning names -- was subjected to heroin importations and a murder.
Yes, it's always a hub of criminal activity.
This is where they come.
The is where they wine, dine, and unfortunately it attracts the drug trade.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Northbridge businessman John Kizon is recognisable to most Western Australians.
At one time, his girlfriend was Rose Porteous's daughter, Joanna Laxon.
He's a hip dresser and is seen around the city with his distinctive ponytail.
He invests in restaurants, nightclubs, bars, the automotive industry and mining.
According to intelligence compiled by police and the National Crime Authority, John Kizon is the leader of a major criminal syndicate.
For this, he's received a bit of attention from the authorities.
JOHN KIZON, NORTHBRIDGE BUSINESSMAN, NOVEMBER 9, 1999: At the moment, as we stand here now, they'd be spending another $1 million.
I know of that the National Crime Authority and the Federal Police still at this moment have an investigation on me.
From very reliable sources, I know that at the moment, they're still spending that money, that the taxpayers paid taxes.
I don't mind.
If you want to keep paying your taxes and they spend the money on me, they can keep doing it.
I believe these people go home and lose sleep over me.
Now, how sad can they be?
Go home, feed your family, take your wife or your girlfriend for a walk in the park.
But they worry about me night and day.
They're sick people.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Mr Kizon says the police constantly harass him and that this includes expensive surveillance.
JOHN KIZON, DECEMBER 12, 1997: They were bugging things in my bedroom.
There were intimate conversations or actions with whoever.
I find that a disgrace.
These people are sick people when it comes to that.
STEPHEN McDONELL: As a teenager, John Kizon was a star boxer.
He grew up in Perth's northern suburbs, training with many of his current business associates.
Mr Kizon has served three jail sentences.
He was convicted of heroin trafficking in 1982, assault in 1985 and opening false bank accounts in 1990.
According to police intelligence documents, the so-called Kizon Group is a large-scale importer of heroin, ecstasy and cannabis and that as of 1997, Mr Kizon did not hold any bank accounts in Australia under his own name.
The same documents state that over a six-year period, his average stated income to the Tax Office was $3,000.
Yet police intelligence says shortly after, he was making investments worth over $3 million.
Police say Mr Kizon has considerable criminal connections right around Australia.
He was a pallbearer at the funeral of Melbourne crime boss Alphonse Gangitano.
Police intelligence documents link him not only to Gangitano, but also to others, including Sydney underworld figure Tom Domican.
NEWSREADER, NEWS ARCHIVE: It's alleged Mr Domican threatened to break his neck.
STEPHEN McDONELL: But for the past 10 years, all charges against John Kizon have failed.
He says he's become a legitimate businessman.
JOHN KIZON, MAY 28, 1997:
Now, how can anyone have a business meeting after reading that on the third page of the 'Western Australian'?
How can my mother wake up in the morning and read, "Kizon linked with some drug case"?
Now, that's disgraceful.
When trash like that is publicised in the third page of the 'Western Australian', it just affects any sort of business dealings I'm trying to do in Australia, overseas, you know, in a lawful, legitimate way.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: It's not a 9:00 to 5:00 job, 8:00 to 4:00 or Monday to Friday.
Most of the business happens when people are asleep.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Detective Sergeant Peter Coombs has had a long interest in John Kizon.
Coombs is a highly decorated police officer known for his innovation.
LES AYTON, DEPUTY POLICE COMMISSIONER, 1994-1996: 'Entrepreneurial' is the word that I'd use.
He was prepared to use all methods at his disposal and take the law to the knife's edge to catch a criminal.
And I support him in that.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS, '7:30 REPORT', SEPTEMBER 8, 1992: Organised crime is a network that puts itself above the law.
REPORTER, '7:30 REPORT', SEPTEMBER 8, 1992: And who is at the top?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS, '7:30 REPORT': In regards to this trial in this operation, a fellow called Bruno Romeo, also known as the Fox.
REPORTER, '7:30 REPORT': Tell us a bit about him.
STEPHEN McDONELL: For the past 20 years, Coombs has built a career attacking organised crime.
In the early '90s, he arrested Mafia boss Bruno Romeo after chasing him across the country.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: This investigation involved every State in Australia, every law enforcement agency in Australia and well over 250 detectives.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Coombs also worked undercover.
This surveillance video shows a heroin dealer offering to sell him drugs.
DEALER (Police surveillance video): That's good.
Because I'm getting it from Italy.
I'm getting it cheaper myself, you understand?
I'm getting it myself cheaper.
I give it to you cheaper so you can --
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Yeah.
DEALER: One there, one there.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Sounds good.
NEWSREADER, NEWS ARCHIVE, 1994: Explosives experts have expressed concern about what they say --
STEPHEN McDONELL: In 1994, his partner was killed when one of their targets bombed the National Crime Authority.
Coombs thought he'd be next.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: When you're bringing in large quantities of any illicit drug, that needs a lot of organisation.
STEPHEN McDONELL: A lot of criminal organisation?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Yes.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Five years ago, while seconded to the National Crime Authority, Coombs masterminded his boldest operation yet.
He put together a team to go after the syndicate allegedly headed by John Kizon.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: The main function of organised-crime policing is to disrupt them.
If that means to remove their power base, that's what you do.
STEPHEN McDONELL: What do you mean by remove their power base?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Destroy their ability to launder their profits, to clean their money, to destroy the people who are --
act as their accountants, who act as their lawyers when they are apprehended, destroy their frontpeople -- for the sake of a better word, their lieutenants -- basically everything around them.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Coombs would retain command of the operation when years later it switched to the control of the West Australian police.
It was codenamed Red Emperor and used high-level surveillance.
On one occasion, seen here, a police officer with a video camera was buried under a mound of dirt and leaves at a marijuana crop.
Sometimes, they got closer to their targets than they expected.
POLICE SURVEILLANCE VIDEO, POLICEMAN (Whispers into radio): Oh, fucking hell.
Yeah, Roger, he's just dropped a bag right next to our OP.
Yeah, he's put a bag right under a black boy, fucking, not a metre from me.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The most daring move in Red Emperor involved an undercover officer recruited from Victoria.
He infiltrated the target group for a period of three years.
The officer, who worries about his safety, spoke to Four Corners.
He explained how he got involved with the syndicate.
For his protection, an actor will read his lines.
UNDERCOVER OFFICER, RED EMPEROR: It was like any infiltration, really.
Softly, softly pat the monkey.
Be seen around and don't push too hard.
Definitely, to get close to them was very, very hard.
They have longevity on their side.
I mean, they've known each other for 15, 20 years.
You're battling the new face in town syndrome.
You've got to be out and about and seen all the time.
STEPHEN McDONELL: But an infiltration going the other way was about to expose serious police corruption.
It begins with a police sting involving a man named Andrew Petrelis.
There are no public photos of Petrelis but he grew up in a well-off family.
He was drawn into the Northbridge scene, becoming a heroin user, and he got work as a driver for John Kizon's old girlfriend.
According to police, in the early '90s, Petrelis started doing some jobs around Northbridge.
He was told to go to Perth's Kings Park and dig up a couple of bags buried there.
He then took the bags, which contained cannabis, to this self-storage unit and padlocked the door.
The storage centre owners became suspicious when they saw the padlock on a unit they thought was empty.
They broke in, found $150,000 worth of drugs and called the police.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: We, through the early part of that investigation, established that the person who rented that storage was Petrelis.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Andrew Petrelis was then offered immunity from prosecution if he'd roll over and give evidence against his alleged criminal bosses.
He agreed and became a protected witness.
Back at the storage centre, police had already set a trap using surveillance.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: That's when I came up with an idea that we'll substitute it with grass clippings.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Coombs swapped the cannabis for lawn clippings, installed a secret camera and waited to see who would turn up.
On 22 November, 1994, a close friend of Mr Kizon named Michael Rippingale was captured picking up the bags which now contained a different sort of grass.
The court was later told that when Mr Rippingale to his horror discovered the lawn clippings, he immediately rang John Kizon.
A series of conversations between the men were captured by police phone taps and a bugged car.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE, FRIEND OF JOHN KIZON, (Re-enactment of police transcript): Do you want to meet me somewhere?
JOHN KIZON: Why?
What's wrong?
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: Oh, something.
JOHN KIZON: You all right?
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: Yeah, oh, no, not really -- not really.
JOHN KIZON: Have the coppers got you?
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: No, no.
Something else.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The secret recordings seemed to indicate that John was angry that something valuable was missing.
JOHN KIZON (25 minutes later, meeting in car): Hey, Rip, he probably never put it in there in the first place.
You understand what I mean?
That cunt.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: They thought Petrelis had ripped them off the cannabis and put grass clippings in -- and not the police.
STEPHEN McDONELL: And so how were they going to respond to that?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: They responded in a very violent manner in their conversations with themselves on what they intended to do to Petrelis.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: (Later that night, telephone transcript): Cunt.
JOHN KIZON: Little arse.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: Oh.
JOHN KIZON: And when you said yeah, he's a little cunt.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: Yeah.
JOHN KIZON: I'm gonna wring his fucking neck.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: Yeah, alright.
JOHN KIZON: Alright, buddy.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE: See ya.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Police phone intercepts show that John Kizon and Michael Rippingale looked for Andrew Petrelis without luck for days.
Armed with the phone taps, police charged both Michael Rippingale and John Kizon with conspiracy to supply cannabis.
This time, they thought they had the big fish.
JOHN KIZON, 1999: I've only been charged in this offence because I've stayed close to a friend of mine.
There is no substance to this charge at all.
It's just a slur on my name and it's a personal attack on myself.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Police promised their star witness, Andrew Petrelis, that he'd be protected with a new identity.
He moved to Queensland and in the quiet town of Caloundra, planned to get his pilot's licence.
When he didn't turn up for his flying lesson one day, local police went around to his flat.
They found Andrew Petrelis dead.
He was naked and lying hunched over with a CD playing on repeat.
The door was locked from the inside and Queensland police said it was a heroin overdose.
Yet there was no tourniquet and no spoon.
He was right-handed but the injection was into his right arm and this arm was twisted up and around.
Official cause of death -- opiate toxicity.
Andrew Petrelis was to give evidence against John Kizon and Michael Rippingale in a month.
How much of a blow to the prosecution was the lack of the Petrelis evidence?
ROBERT COCK: I think it was a serious blow.
I think the case would have been stronger with his evidence.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: His evidence, in my opinion, was critical in the conviction of one, if not both, of the accused people.
STEPHEN McDONELL: A jury acquitted John Kizon and Michael Rippingale of the drug charges.
MICHAEL RIPPINGALE, NOVEMBER 1999 (Outside court): Yeah, I'm just happy it's all over now.
And this has been going for five years.
I can get on with my life.
Work the rest out for yourself.
JOHN KIZON, NOVEMBER 1999 (Outside court): I'm pleased for myself but what I'm not pleased about is they spent $1 million to $1.5 million on me.
There's kids in the children's hospital that don't have facilities.
There's old people that are being thrown out of their homes in the suburbs because this Government has a personal vendetta against me.
STEPHEN McDONELL: John Kizon had an alibi over the weekend of Andrew Petrelis's death.
He checked himself into hospital, complaining of heart problems, and was soon discharged.
Andrew Petrelis's death remains a mystery.
There was no inquest.
We don't know whether it was the result of an overdose or a hot shot from an enemy.
But his death opens the doorway to a dark cave of police corruption because before Mr Petrelis had even gone to Queensland, his new secret identity was already blown.
And it was blown by the police.
This man, Constable Kevin Davy, made an unauthorised access of the police database in May 1995.
He found Andrew Petrelis's new identity -- Andrew Parker.
The new identity had only just been given out.
Davy's excuse for looking this up on the computer was that he's an Elvis fan and he was looking for the name of Elvis's famous manager Colonel Tom Parker.
He says he found Petrelis's new identity by mistake.
What Kevin Davy did with the information is unknown.
But Four Corners has been able to establish that another officer, Sergeant Murray Shadgett, also accessed Petrelis's new identity on the police mainframe.
He passed the information on to known criminals.
They allegedly provided Shadgett with a car-registration number and he matched it with the name Andrew Parker, Petrelis's new identity.
Because Shadgett was speaking to suspected members of the Kizon syndicate, their phones were bugged and Peter Coombs heard the conversations.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: The fact is, um -- known crooks asked a police officer to obtain information off the police mainframe.
STEPHEN McDONELL: And these were known criminals?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: That's a criminal offence.
There's no, uh --
no beg your pardons, in my opinion.
It is, um -- an inexcusable.
STEPHEN McDONELL: These criminals who received information from the police mainframe computer, from police -- were they linked to the main criminal syndicate being targeted by you?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Yes.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Significant members of the group?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Yes.
CHRIS CULL, OPERATIONS MANAGER, RED EMPEROR: And those criminals are involved in the organised crime group in Western Australia.
STEPHEN McDONELL: So there's little doubt that these senior level criminals were trying to find out about Andrew Petrelis?
CHRIS CULL: Absolutely.
Everything they could.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Inspector Chris Cull was another officer on Red Emperor.
Could it mean, then, that these high-level Western Australian criminals still have spies, allies in the West Australian police?
CHRIS CULL: Yes.
STEPHEN McDONELL: It's unclear if Andrew Petrelis's death was related to the security breaches.
But the West Australian witness protection program has been hopelessly compromised.
As for those who looked up Petrelis's details, Constable Davy resigned for giving out other classified information.
Red Emperor officers told Internal Affairs about Sergeant Shadgett who'd been recorded talking to their criminal targets.
Nothing happened.
He's now very sick from diabetes and has just resigned.
Both officers refused to speak to Four Corners.
For three months, Andrew Petrelis lived in Queensland.
Though police knew his identity was compromised, they made no attempt to give him a new one.
After the blow of losing Andrew Petrelis, Red Emperor went on.
The operation uncovered more police corruption.
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST, RED EMPEROR: What we found was driver's licences in false names in the hands of members of the syndicate under investigation.
STEPHEN McDONELL: And you believe police had given these driver's licences to the criminals?
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Inquiries confirmed that they were issued by police officers to persons unknown but ended up in the hands of members of our syndicate, under investigation.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Why is it useful to have a false driver's licence?
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: You can open bank accounts, you can obtain property under false names.
There are many things you can do with a fake identification.
STEPHEN McDONELL: As Red Emperor continued, its key undercover officer gained access to senior levels of John Kizon's alleged syndicate.
UNDERCOVER OFFICER: Like, you spend hours and hours out on the piss with these lunatics.
Bored out of your brain most of the time because all you're doing is talking absolute shit.
That's really what it comes down to.
CHRIS CULL: He lived with them, drank with them, was right in with them, the whole way.
UNDERCOVER OFFICER: Someone will tell you half a bit of information about it.
You know, something that might be worth rolling over or, you know, plans to make a shitload of eccies or something like that.
So you start talking about presses and who can steal chemicals, then nothing happens with it.
Every now and then, something does.
That's the whole point.
But you also sit there and you try and work out who's who in the zoo.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Many Red Emperor detectives were close to criminal sources.
Although the officers were uncovering police corruption they also came under suspicion themselves, in a grey world of favours, secret meetings and informants.
BOB FALCONER, POLICE COMMISSIONER, 1994-1999: And informers -- guess who they are.
It won't be the archbishop or the local brain surgeon.
They're invariably the sorts of people who are deeply involved in crime, and they're cunning and they're clever and they're dangerous, but they can be useful.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Sometimes it's not clear where undercover work ends and crime begins.
Police start turning a blind eye to small crimes in return for information.
Criminals use police to attack their underworld rivals.
But Chris Cull says, "In organised crime, 99 per cent of successes come from informants."
CHRIS CULL: Manipulate the informant.
Work on his desires and his motivations.
You know, build him up when he's down.
Pretend to be a friend to him, so that you can move him toward a position where he feels some comfort with you, and he'll tell you what's going on.
'Cause he's putting his neck on the line.
There's also a very good saying in the police in West Australia, and I'm sure it's the world over, that today's informant is tomorrow's target.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Into this mix of police, criminals and those in between, came Western Australia's Anti-Corruption Commission or ACC.
It was set-up in 1997 following the Police Royal Commission in NSW.
ACC Chairman, Terry O'Connor, quickly became suspicious of police-informant relationships.
TERRY O'CONNOR, CHAIRMAN, ANTI-CORRUPTION COMMISSION: I suppose you've got to expect that there's always going to be some bad eggs in the barrel.
There is in every human barrel.
But we would say that there are more bad eggs in the West Australian Police Service barrel than one might expect.
STEPHEN McDONELL: What sort of things are these bad eggs doing?
TERRY O'CONNOR: Well, we see, um -- we have some evidence to support the view that they're engaged in stealing -- stealing money, stealing drugs.
Um -- selling drugs, stealing property.
Um -- those sorts of things.
STEPHEN McDONELL: It wasn't long before the ACC itself became the subject of controversy.
It's an ultra-secretive body.
There are no public hearings, there's no cross-examining of witnesses by the accused and the law even prohibits anyone mentioning publicly that the commission is examining a matter.
The ACC works closely with police Internal Affairs.
Keen to prove its mettle from the outset, the ACC went after the detectives -- including some from Red Emperor with active informants.
From this point, the investigation of police in the West becomes a bewildering world of claim and counter-claim.
Chris Cull was accused of having an improper relationship with a major heroin dealer and disclosing confidential information to him.
Mr Cull says he was trying to save the man's life.
TERRY O'CONNOR: What Cull had done was that he had gone to a major heroin dealer to, as he describes it, to provide him information that his life or well-being was under some threat.
He said that he had the authority of a senior officer but not his senior officer.
He had subsequent meetings with that heroin dealer.
He says he was offered money by the heroin dealer which he refused.
He made no report of being offered money and appears not to have contemplated charging him with bribery or something like that.
CHRIS CULL: We analysed the situation and saw that the possible target of an abduction and a beating and possibly even worse.
STEPHEN McDONELL: What do you mean by worse?
CHRIS CULL: Torture.
Possibly death.
Possibly murder.
STEPHEN McDONELL: And who was to be the target of this?
CHRIS CULL: The person that the ACC alleged I had a relationship with.
STEPHEN McDONELL: To confuse things, Chris Cull's story has changed.
Originally, he said the meeting to warn the man was near the dealer's home with just him and the dealer present.
Now Mr Cull claims the meeting took place in a superintendent's office and that this senior officer was present as well.
What would you say to critics, I suppose -- especially the ACC -- might say to you, well, why should we believe you if you can't even remember where this crucial meeting took place?
CHRIS CULL: Oh, I can remember the second occasion.
STEPHEN McDONELL: No, the first one though.
CHRIS CULL: Um, well, I don't know.
I mean, we're only human beings.
We aren't super computers --
STEPHEN McDONELL: It's a big difference between meeting him near his house and meeting him in a police building, isn't it?
CHRIS CULL: Yeah.
No, I mean, I -- often we go through this process and I don't remember everything that has gone on.
You only remember key issues of matters.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The Anti-Corruption Commission and Internal Affairs also turned their attention to the head of Red Emperor, Peter Coombs.
Internal Affairs prepared a damning report into Sergeant Coombs which was tabled in Parliament.
The allegations against him flowed from the 1994 raid on the home of heroin dealer, Francesco La Rosa.
During the raid, Coombs and two other officers found cannabis and drug charges would be laid.
But when a safe was opened, police found inside a pistol, a silencer and 59 rounds of ammunition.
The police took the weapon but never charged La Rosa with anything relating to the gun.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: He was to be charged on that day.
He wasn't.
And then when it came to light a few months down the track -- after some information was obtained -- he was sanctioned by our superiors for him not to be charged.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Former deputy commissioner and head of Internal Affairs Les Ayton, supports Peter Coombs.
LES AYTON: This person was being used to provide information.
Coombs decided not to charge him because there was more value in not charging him.
And the end result was that an amphetamine factory was located and dismantled and people charged.
In my view, it's the old sprat to catch a mackerel theory.
But in my view perfectly justified and a job well done.
Should've received a commendation instead of a brickbat.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Peter Coombs was also being accused of inadequate accounting of police money used for controlled drug purchases and rewards to informants.
He's also said to have underreported the amount of drugs seized during a raid so as to minimise the charges on an informant.
Coombs and Cull were under a cloud themselves.
Yet during Red Emperor, they say they consistently handed over potential corruption cases to Internal Affairs.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: I remember during the heyday of 1997 where Internal Affairs might visit my offices -- the office in charge of organised crime -- three or four times a week.
On one particular day I would have the white hat on, for the sake of a better word, and the next particular day I would have the black hat on.
So it kind of left me, which way am I going with all this?
And how can I be trusted one day and not the next.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The officers from Red Emperor were forced to hand over their documents to the ACC.
But before the corruption commission finished its investigation into Cull and Coombs, the top brass acted.
In November 1997, Deputy Commissioner Bruce Brennan issued an official order that Red Emperor be closed immediately.
In a confidential memo, he said that any future investigations into the operation's primary target, John Kizon, would have to be cleared by him personally.
What did you think when you first heard they were going to shut down Red Emperor?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: Certainly, disbelief.
A lot of work and time and energy and commitment by a lot of officers was put into it.
CHRIS CULL: Disheartened.
Had no confidence in the top end of the organisation.
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: No reasons were given at the time as to why it was shut down.
No reasons were ever given as to why it was shut down.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The current Police Commissioner says telephone intercept tapes indicate the criminals knew that police were onto them.
BARRY MATTHEWS, WA POLICE COMMISSIONER: The indications are that the target or targets were aware of something going on, not necessarily who it was or exactly what it was.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The detectives, of course, feel that they were getting very close to the target.
BARRY MATTHEWS: Oh, yes, I've heard that before.
Look, can I say I've overseen covert operations that people have said that week after week after week and in the end you just say stop because they just don't get close enough.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The operation's closure meant the undercover officer was withdrawn after spending three years infiltrating Kizon's alleged syndicate.
UNDERCOVER OFFICER: I'm pissed off with the way things panned out.
It was a waste.
And it's the people of Western Australia, the Western Australian taxpayers, that will suffer for some pretty bad decisions.
No-one will get close to him for years.
It was an absolutely golden opportunity.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Ultimate responsibility for shutting down Red Emperor rested with former commissioner Bob Falconer, who retired last year.
Can you understand though, why the undercover officer might feel let down by all this?
BOB FALCONER: Steve, Steve.
As a supervisor and a manager of police -- at one stage in the second biggest policing agency in this country, before I ever went to Western Australia -- I have heard and seen many disgruntled people.
When the bosses pull the plug on something because it ain't working, everybody is a little bit like -- and I would not dare use those colourful words of this unknown person -- something offed about it.
That's human nature.
STEPHEN McDONELL: But they then misunderstood the situation from within it?
BOB FALCONER: Steve, when you're down in the mud and the blood and the beer, very close to operations, people are always disappointed and often overreact when a managerial decision is made they don't like.
That's life.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The Anti-Corruption Commission also supports the decision to shut Red Emperor.
TERRY O'CONNOR: The operation was hopelessly compromised.
The reality is that the identity of the undercover agent was known to everyone in the circle or most people in the circle.
STEPHEN McDONELL: And how was that known?
TERRY O'CONNOR: I don't know.
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: There's no indication that the undercover was compromised in any way.
He would be invited out to dinner with them, he'd go to their parties.
Um -- he was directly involved in drug acquisitions from them.
STEPHEN McDONELL: What do you think that these criminals would've done if they found out that this undercover officer was indeed a police officer?
INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, I believe they would've killed him, without question.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The conflict was about to get worse.
The ACC's first report slammed two Red Emperor detectives and four others from the Drug Squad for serious misconduct.
Chris Cull was summoned to Detective Headquarters.
CHRIS CULL: Basically, they told me I was gonna be sacked.
They asked for my, um -- identity card, my firearm, my handcuffs and all those sorts of things.
And my mind was in a spin.
It wasn't reality for me -- I didn't understand what was going on.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Detective Sergeant Peter Coombs was also named in the report.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: The situation I find myself in in regards to the Anti-Corruption Commission is just not supported by any fact or any truth.
Um -- and I -- I would totally deny any -- any corruptions or wrongdoing.
CHRIS CULL: I mean, I still didn't understand what was happening to me.
And Bob Falconer decided to release our names to the press and make a big show of it.
And my 10-year-old daughter was watching the news that night and just broke down in tears.
Sorry.
Just hang on a minute.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Chris Cull says the names shouldn't have been released because ACC matters are supposed to be secret under the law.
He believes he was part of a show trial to prove that action was being taken against corrupt police in the West.
BOB FALCONER (Press conference): Morning, ladies and gentlemen.
I'm sorry I'm a little bit late, but I've been making a few phone calls, as you might imagine.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The decision to name the police officers at a press conference was taken by the former police commissioner.
BOB FALCONER: I do not withdraw from that decision.
I did it for good reasons, they were articulated at the time, and I do not resile from that decision -- and the necessity and the need for it at that time -- that was naming the officers.
STEPHEN McDONELL: All six detectives faced the sack.
This led to mass rallies of police and a motion of no-confidence against the then police commissioner.
But the ACC's case fell apart when the Supreme Court found it had exceeded its powers.
The Commission could not make findings at all, it can only pass on evidence.
The investigation had been a fiasco.
Chris Cull has quit the West Australian Police, citing disillusionment with the leadership as a reason.
Detective Sergeant Coombs remains on suspension and he's fighting to be reinstated through the courts.
Your reputation itself -- can it ever be rebuilt?
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: I don't believe so.
I think the last three years it's been going on has been hell and I wouldn't wish it upon my worst enemy.
You've got to remember that I've never been charged with anything.
The issues are no more than, at the very worst, some policy or a procedure for proactive policing and decisions made at the time.
STEPHEN McDONELL: None of the original six officers was charged, but the ACC has remained energetic.
At least two dozen officers have been suspended.
Now every Tuesday at the Police Union there's a gathering over tea and cake known as the Suspended Officers Club.
The meeting is a symbol of confusion.
Are they all corrupt or are some victims of naive zealotry?
How do you tell difference?
BOB FALCONER: There seems to be a feeling, certainly amongst some police and their spokespersons, who generally come from unions, that if a person is competent, charismatic and sometimes be able to be shown as very clever and bringing in lots of arrests and so on, which they often can if they're competent, then, therefore, how could they possibly be corrupt?
It's a little bit like Hansie Cronje.
You know, he's a nice guy, smiles a lot, everyone loves him, a great cricketer.
Everyone wanted to line up with him.
STEPHEN McDONELL: Until --
BOB FALCONER: Until it was proven they were wrong.
STEPHEN McDONELL: As confusion reigns, the Red Emperor officers are bitter about the lack of action against others, like Sergeant Shadgett, who passed on classified information to criminals.
The former head of Internal Affairs, Jack Mackaay, who wrote the unforgiving report on Sergeant Coombs, also ordered that no disciplinary action be taken against Sergeant Shadgett.
In all these cases, the police hierarchy argues that the public is not in possession of all the facts.
And the chair of the Anti-Corruption Commission says he's about to show that police corruption is as widespread as he says.
Mr O'Connor is preparing for the first time to table a series of reports in Parliament.
TERRY O'CONNOR: We do have the power, under our Act, to report to Parliament on our investigations.
And we are going to proceed to do that.
STEPHEN McDONELL: But Terry O'Connor's opponents say he's crippling the Force.
LES AYTON: When you are investigating crime at a high level, we're not investigating schoolboys pinching comics from the deli.
We're investigating serious criminal activity, people who deal in deaths and are not afraid to deal a bit of death out themselves.
You need to have experienced, hard, courageous detectives.
That experience doesn't come in five minutes, it comes with almost a lifelong dedication to investigations.
Lose that and you lose something that cannot be recovered in the short term.
TERRY O'CONNOR: Oh, I think that's a myth that certain people like to put around, that the good crime fighters somehow or other are leaving the service.
I mean, I don't doubt that there have been some good crime fighters leaving the service but I'm not sure that there's as many as people would say.
And there are many good crime fighters left.
DET SGT PETER COOMBS: I think it's very hard in a lot of regards to follow the hard, fast rule of procedures in every instance, when you're out here working in an environment --
Um -- and things, in the clear of the following morning, you might've done, in hindsight, a lot differently.
STEPHEN McDONELL: The officers involved in Red Emperor may or may not have acted improperly, but they say they want a Royal Commission to scrutinise the whole affair.
Meanwhile, one interested party must be finding quite some amusement in all of this.
JOHN KIZON, NOVEMBER 1999: There's corruption in senior ranks in the police department and has been for years.
They've just moved them sideways.
It's an absolute disgrace.
You've got the public that sit at home and believe that --
There is some honest coppers.
And I do respect honest police officers.
Your normal police officer that does his job, goes home, and is by the book, I respect him.
But in this State, without a Royal Commission, it's a complete disgrace, let me tell you.
STEPHEN McDONELL: How do you feel at the end of all this?
You've spent many years working on this operation.
What are you left with at the end?
UNDERCOVER OFFICER: A sense of waste.
A sense of dismay that it could've come to that.
A sense of questioning about the motives of the people who shut it down.
Most of all, I guess, I'm concerned that the syndicate is now stronger than it was before.
Dead witness's parents seek cold-case review
PAIGE TAYLOR AND AMANDA O'BRIEN- The Australian - October 26, 2006
ELEVEN years after the death of protected witness Andrew Petrelis,
his parents are desperately hoping a cold-case review will answer questions about a system of safeguarding informants they consider "a joke".
West Australian police commissioner Karl O'Callaghan told a parliamentary committee yesterday he would consider a review into
the death of Petrelis on the Sunshine Coast in 1995, just weeks before he was due
to star for the prosecution in a drug case against Perth men Michael Rippingale and John Kizon.
The pair were acquitted, and Queensland coroner Michael Halliday announced this year there was
no evidence to suggest Petrelis's fatal overdose was anything other than self-inflicted.
Opposition legal affairs spokeswoman Sue Walker used parliamentary privilege last week to claim Mr Kizon and Mr Rippingale were involved in Petrelis's death.
They have strenuously denied the allegations.
Nick and Lesley Petrelis welcomed Mr O'Callaghan's pledge to consider a review of the case when he received details of the coroner's investigation. Mr O'Callaghan said: "The best way to handle this and decide whether there can or will be a cold-case review of this is to firstly get the advice from the Queensland coroner about where he's got to with it all."
Mr Petrelis said he and his wife were angry about the failures they believe led to their son's death.
Under parliamentary privilege, Ms Walker said there was a contract out on Petrelis when he died.
"No one can read the coroner's report and think John Kizon and Michael Rippingale were not involved in the murder of Mr Petrelis in some way. I do not agree with the findings of the Queensland coroner," she said.
"The state did not pay for a safe house for Mr Petrelis, even though it knew he would be giving evidence in an organised crime trial against John Kizon.
"There was no one with him in Queensland. The state sent him to Queensland knowing Mr Kizon and Mr Rippingale knew his identity, knowing they had intimidated his family, nowing that police officers had accessed the mainframe computer, discovered his identity and given it to Mr Kizon and Mr Rippingale, and knowing that he still had the same name."
Mr Kizon responded to Ms Walker's comments, saying: "If she has the guts to say that outside parliament, I would sue her for defamation."
Andrew Petrelis
The crouching and naked body of Petrelis, 25, was found in the Caloundra flat his parents rented for him about three days after the right-hander died from a heroin overdose administered to his right arm. A syringe was on the floor next to him, but the needle was never found.
Mr O'Callaghan agreed to consider moving the witness protection unit to the state's Corruption and Crime Commission.
Mr Petrelis said: "That is along the lines we have been wanting.
The witness protection program that was supposed to help Andrew is a joke ... They didn't provide him with anything."
The vicious fight that ignited bikie bad blood
Rai Fazio
Underworld observers did a double-take when an intriguing apology appeared in a newspaper under the name of Raimond Fazio.
"With respect to the reported matter outside a restaurant in Subiaco: The facts are that I provoked an incident over a personal issue and I acknowledge that everyone involved in resolving that incident acted with integrity and honour. On reflection my actions were entirely inappropriate and have created unnecessary Selectand untruthful reports in many quarters. I apologise to all who may have been affected by my conduct."
Fazio, a Golden Gloves champion boxer, was not usually the sort of person to take a backward step. But this one appeared to be a matter of life or death.
setting the record straight, again. By Rai Fazio
Setting the record straight, (again)
http://perthrockcity.ryanalbrey.com/archives/000232.html
(editor's note: some of you may have seen Rai Fazio's paid ad in the Sunday times last Sunday in which he made a public apology. I received the following statement from mr. fazio via email, in which he continues this apology. he asked me to post it on this site for him, so I have. from a legal standpoint, and also in case anyone is thinking of beating the shit out of me, I would like to point out that I did not write this, I merely received it via email from an anonymous source who MAY OR MAY NOT be the real Rai Fazio. Frankly, I really couldn't care less whether it is or not, having better things to do with my life than keep abreast of the career of Mr. Fazio. It is for the interest of the Perth community at large that I cut and paste this statement.-MZ)
setting the record straight, again. By Rai Fazio
Just as I, Rai Fazio, attempted to set the record straight, with regard to the reported matter outside a restaurant in Subiaco, in a paid ad in the Sunday times last Sunday, I would also like to set it straight once again here.
I came across this Perth based website and realised that it is an excellent forum in which to make such statements, far better in fact than the Sunday times, which frankly overcharged me for my ad. It is great to be able to post stuff here for free, cos it means I can crap on endlessly about how sorry I am about the whole thing. (Oh God, this was clearly a mistake- MZ)
So I have (or rather my lawyer, who has a slightly larger vocabulary than me, has) written another long confusing apology.
I would like to say that the Coffin Cheaters are really cool, they are very big and tough and strong. Especially Troy Mercanti, who really beat me good. He clearly punished me like the little bitch I am, and any statements I made when I was lying in hospital bleeding like a pig, that the Honourable Mr. Mercanti Esq. was a big stupid coward, were of course completely motivated by the fact he had cracked my skull open and I was feeling a bit miffed about the whole thing.
I hope Troy, who is a fabulous and very tough, clever and handsome guy, forgives me for saying he had "no balls," and does not get any Coffin Cheaters to beat me into a thick gravy. As I said, the Coffin Cheaters are great guys, very cool and much tougher and sexier than me. I am just a little poser pussy compared to these guys.
I used to be an arrogant and vain arsehole, I thought I was the Jean Claude Van Damme of Perth, posing away in the West Australian and the Sunday times, promoting my stupid gym and hanging out with all the rich try-hard gangsters of Subiaco. They are all pathetic posers and wankers who are in no way as hard as the coffin cheaters, except of course for John Kizon who is actually a real gangster and a very cool and lovely guy, he is a mutual friend of me and the Cheaters, in fact he introduced us, and I thank him for that, cos he gave me some of the best and toughest friends of my life.
As I said, I was a complete poser idiot bimbo wanker. I thank the Coffin Cheaters for changing all that. Now my life has changed, I am a different person. After I got several types of shit beaten out of me, I had to learn to be humble. Apologising so profusely in public is just the first stage of my new life. I am also embracing Krishna. I am giving up boxing. I do not want to hurt anyone now I know how much it can hurt to be pounded like a woman. I thank the Coffin Cheaters for this revelation. When I had the shit kicked out of me, it was like a cathartic experience, almost religious. It was like all the negative parts of me which had built up inside me were being released, along with a lot of blood.
Whoever it was who fire bombed my stupid Northbridge gym, I again thank you. It is thanks to you I had to give up boxing and am now virtually bankrupt. You gave me the chance to start all over again, a chance to begin my spiritual journey. Oh by the way, I am not saying it was the Coffin Cheaters who did it. We all know it was probably terrorists or something. But even if it was them, WHICH I'M VERY SURE IT WASN'T, I would thank them, for saving me from myself, even though, as I said, it obviously wasn't them.
When I was in hospital, hurting like a badly beaten girl, and I heard my gym had been blown into tiny pieces, it was another revelation. It was like that cool movie Fight Club, I was now free from all my material stuff. Its as if God was saying, Okay Rai, now you're free.
Now you're free from your stupid gym where international celebrities come to work out and drink cappuccinos with you. Now you're free from your identity as a Perth hard man. Now you're free from your money. Now you're free from your great clothes and very high quality drugs. Now you're free from admiration and respect. Now you're free from girls blowing you in your private sauna...GODDAMNIT!
Er...sorry, I mean, thank God. Anyway, I am thankful to my personal spiritual saviours, the coffin cheaters, for showing me the way to salvation and Krishna.
Now I would like to repeat the apology I put in last week's Sunday Times.
The facts are that I provoked an incident over a personal issue, and was a stupid slag for doing so. I was behaving like an irrational woman and deserved the beating I copped, fair and square. I acknowledge that everyone involved in resolving the incident acted with integrity and honour, even the guy who kept kicking me in the back of the head as I lay there unconscious with some other guy's foot on my windpipe. He was just carrying out his chosen profession with integrity and honour.
On reflection, my actions were entirely inappropriate and have created unnecessary and untruthful reports in many quarters, including statements to the effect that the Coffin Cheaters are just a bunch of girls, which was actually a complete misquotation made by the West Australian. I actually said the Coffin Cheaters GET a whole bunch of girls, cos they are so cool. Not that they WERE a bunch of girls, which is quite clearly untrue, as anyone who knows them knows, as they are very strong and masculine. But anyway, I digress.
I apologise to all who may have been affected by my conduct, including the guy who kicked me in the back of the head. If my skull injured his foot in any way at all, I am most sorry.
So thankyou, Perth rock city, for letting me post an apology here, and that is all I have to say. Again I thank the Cheaters for saving me from becoming an ageing Subiaco bimbo. I would love to stay in Perth and continue to hang out with the great John Kizon, and my new friends The Coffin Cheaters now that we have resolved that tiny little misunderstanding which was entirely my fault. But unfortunately, as I am now a Hare Krishna, I must move to Sydney to open up a new Hare Krishna restaurant there.
I have had fun living in Perth all these years, and I thank everyone, esp. the Cheaters, for all they have taught me.
Thankyou, Rai Fazio.
PS: The Coffin Cheaters rock forever! They are so great. They are the best. I am crap. I am shit. I am a little girl. They really kicked my arse good!
Posted by Martin Zygote at September 5, 2003 04:43 PM
Perth Rock City is the Jean Claude Van-Damme of websites! Always taking on the big boys and kicking arse. Keep it up!
Comment posted by: Some Guy at September 7, 2003 12:30 AM
Is there going to be any more episodes of Rai Fabio versus the Corn Chips. Rai is such a nice guy to cop it on the chin like that and so eloquent .Troy Mercury from the corn chips (freddies brother-rumour has it). What did happen to that nice young boy who used to get dropped off at school by his mum in a gold rolls?
Comment posted by: Tarangau at October 21, 2003 11:16 PM
Funny how these things can reach round and bite ya on the nuts Ryan be seein ya shortly muhuhahaha
Comment posted by: Breakinzeeballs at December 28, 2003 10:06 AM
What the fuck? ok if any of you had the balls to face any of these men in question then you might have the write to talk shit but since you dont shut the fuck up i wonder if the corn chip comment would go down well face to face and to fake fun of a man who has had an life altering experience and might even be mental scared is horrible stop trying to b hard when in reality these are the big boys and the only way you have the guts to say anything is on the net
Comment posted by: sally at May 21, 2004 09:23 AM
Yes Sally. I'm sure Rai is a paragon of virtue. I'm sure he cries himself to sleep at night. I'm sure he could kill me in a fight. I'm sure that makes him a better person then me. I'm sure blah blah and blah.
The care factor meter is struggling to lift off from zero.
Why don't you print all of this off, and the next time you at Mr Fazio's house to fellate him, you might like to show him what we have written here. Actually you might be better off reading it out aloud to him. You dont want to embarrass him.
Comment posted by: Wangst McPants at May 21, 2004 01:27 PM
again wangst. stop trying to get us killed. please! Rai Fazio is a lovely man.
Comment posted by: mz at May 21, 2004 05:08 PM
Rai is hard, smart and a warrior. CC, what ajoke. Bash ther mates, take care of junkies and look like try hards. Many hollow points reserved for these ..... Cant be fucked taking the time to name them. Hope you have eyes in the back of your heads. Waiting, waiting. Get measured up for the pine box. and say good buy to your beloveds. Its gonna be a love job. The storm is coming. Go alone you cowards.
Comment posted by: Knowledge at July 18, 2004 08:44 AM
Jugs bashes ed. troy is ok actually. hubbard is a dog. matter of time lads. do it myself or give a junkie 2 points to wreak havoc. always watching. families come next. I'm excited.
Comment posted by: at July 18, 2004 08:51 AM
Half of you, if not more, are on the pick, pipe or crystal in some form. good to see your values are rock solid. sleepless nights. You boys are slipping hard. Melbourne is beckoning. Must be good to be kings of the shit heap. What an achievement. so easy to bring you down. Get out while you can. Biding my time.
Comment posted by: Brother at July 18, 2004 09:00 AM
Anyone else connected to the Perth crime underworld who would like to make strangely cryptic and illiterate death threats on our site, please send them to martinzygote@yahoo.com.au. We charge a fee of $50 per death threat.
Comment posted by: mz at July 19, 2004 03:34 PM
... How many times can one say sorry... before, during and after being beaten???
... Just ask Joe.
[:O)
Comment posted by: jopall at July 23, 2004 10:46 PM
Yes, but your still a sexist pig
Comment posted by: at February 28, 2005 04:40 PM
Thanks for the laughs!!
Comment posted by: Janie J at March 29, 2005 09:02 PM
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7332387/the-vicious-fight-that-ignited-bikie-bad-blood/
The vicious fight that ignited bikie bad blood
GARY ADSHEAD and SEAN COWAN - The West Australian on June 2, 2010,
Underworld observers did a double-take when an intriguing apology appeared in a newspaper under the name of Raimond Fazio.
"With respect to the reported matter outside a restaurant in Subiaco: The facts are that I provoked an incident over a personal issue and I acknowledge that everyone involved in resolving that incident acted with integrity and honour. On reflection my actions were entirely inappropriate and have created unnecessary and untruthful reports in many quarters. I apologise to all who may have been affected by my conduct."
Fazio, a Golden Gloves champion boxer, was not usually the sort of person to take a backward step. But this one appeared to be a matter of life or death.
On Friday, May 3, 2003, four months before the apology was published, Fazio had been in a fight at the popular Subiaco restaurant Funtastico. It started well for Fazio. After colossal Coffin Cheater Darren "Juggsie" Whittaker refused to shake his hand at the restaurant counter, the pair had a punch-up and it wasn't long before Fazio had put the big man down. But it would end badly for Fazio when the fight spilt outside.
Drug dealer Fabian Quaid attacked Fazio and also came off second best before Fazio turned his attention to another Coffin Cheater, Troy Mercanti. It was then that Fazio's lifelong friend John Kizon put himself between them yelling "No, Ray, no, Ray".
Fazio's response was to tell Kizon to get out of the way and, as he did that, Quaid again went at him from behind. Fazio turned toward Quaid and was then set upon by Mercanti, Whittaker and Quaid.
Within minutes Fazio had been stomped, kicked and punched and left oozing blood on the Rokeby Road pavement. Only the sound of police sirens halted the violence.
Fazio suffered broken cheekbones, multiple fractures to both eye-sockets, broken teeth, a broken nose and needed up to 60 stitches to his face. He had been beaten so badly that some onlookers vomited.
A week after the fight, Fazio made some public comments about the incident which led to the written apology. "He's (Mercanti's) got no balls," Fazio said. "I can hold my head up high. I put one of their biggest guys (Whittaker) on his arse in front of 200 people."
It wasn't long before rumours were rife that Fazio and Kizon were mates no more because, in Fazio's mind, Kizon didn't do enough to save his friend from the Coffin Cheaters and Quaid, with whom he had been dining.
Twenty-four hours after Fazio's public remarks, his Northbridge gymnasium was firebombed causing $80,000 damage. The comments had affronted the entire bikie gang and, feeling the heat, Fazio eventually flew overseas to lay low. First, he went to Italy and later to the Greek island of Rhodes. As good as he may have been with his fists, he couldn't fight an army.
While he was away the pressure shifted to his friends and family. It is believed one close mate was king-hit and a business belonging to a relative received a "visit". There is also a story that Fazio's father Joe - a no-nonsense Sicilian who taught his sons to box - had a knock on the door from Kizon who wanted to ease the tension. Apparently Joe Fazio wasn't interested in speaking to Kizon and made his feelings clear.
Worried that the violence might escalate, police set up Operation Radix and Fazio headed back home for a sit-down meeting with his adversaries.
Held in an ethnic community centre in the northern suburbs, the meeting was attended by a large delegation of Coffin Cheaters, Fazio and his mate who had been king-hit. The gathering was mediated by speedway identity Geoff Kendrick with Kizon looking on. It is understood the more senior Cheaters, many of whom had trained with Fazio over the years, wanted an end to the bad blood.
Emotions had overtaken the reality. If Fazio, now 42, wanted to live in this town a compromise was needed. Once everyone had had their say an agreement was reached which included the apology.
It's a shame that Fazio didn't use some of the 2003 drama in his 2009 movie Two Fists, One Heart, which was based on his relationship with his father, Joe. Then again, Razor, as he is sometimes known, may appreciate the benefit of letting sleeping dogs lie.
The word around town is that Kizon and Fazio are no longer on speaking terms, but none of those involved will talk about what happened that night, especially Fazio.
Mercanti, who is in jail for assault, was no stranger to restaurant showdowns in 2003. In December that year he was sitting in an upmarket West Perth eatery when he spotted then attorney-general Jim McGinty at a neighbouring table and decided he would say hello.
It is understood the solidly built bikie tapped the Labor powerbroker on the shoulder, made an unnerving comment and returned to his seat. Having had a couple of wines and not wanting to be mistaken for a shrinking violet, Mr McGinty stood up, walked over to the Mercanti party, sat down and struck up a conversation. There's nothing like a bit of Dutch courage when eyeballing someone whose motto was DEFWAC - don't ever f... with a Cheater.
Troy Mercanti, right, with a Norwegian Coffin Cheater and Paul Martino, in Norway.
In 2004, Mercanti helped pioneer the Coffin Cheaters' move into Europe when the gang took over the Forbidden Few Motorcycle Club in Norway. He was an outlaw entrepreneur, something not lost on the police watching him. Extremely cautious when using telephones, Mercanti would meet associates in various open-air locations while inventive detectives thought up ways to plant listening devices in park furniture. Mercanti was once observed whispering in the ear of an associate to avoid any external microphones - static or mobile.
Perhaps Mercanti had learnt a valuable lesson from an encounter with the law in 1998, when he was arrested with Coffin Cheater Kevin "Mad Mick" Woodhouse over a cannabis deal at the Alexander Hotel in Dianella.
Back in 1998, both Mercanti and Woodhouse were convicted of supplying 400g of cannabis. As the drug deal went down, and a girlfriend of Woodhouse, Bernadette Joy Hurley, drove away carrying a bag, the police were watching and listening to telephone calls. Mercanti had his suspicions.
Mercanti: Are they (police) still around?
Woodhouse: I don't know, mate. I think they got me dirty girl though.
Mercanti: Did they?
Woodhouse: Yeah. She hasn't answered her phone since she's left.
Mercanti: Yeah, they followed her there, mate.
While careful not to say too much, a subsequent telephone conversation with Woodhouse was enough to convince a magistrate of Mercanti's involvement.
Woodhouse: Mate, well, things aren't so bad champ. We're still here aren't we?
Mercanti: Yeah, there's no drama there.
Woodhouse: It could be a lot f...... worse, couldn't it, mate?
Mercanti: F....
These days, Mercanti denies having ever been involved in the importation of drugs, while the family of Woodhouse, who was shot dead in 2004, admit Mad Mick was a thug but deny he was ever an amphetamines cook.
In April 2001, Elbow's Cafe in Inglewood, owned by Hurley, was bombed. A month later, Mercanti's Duncraig home was also bombed. There was talk at the time that members of the Rebels bikie gang were responsible because of an incident at a South-West pub.
But compared to what was to happen on January 23, 2005, the Dianella drug deal and the fire bombings were small potatoes.
During a violent flashpoint at Metro City nightclub in Northbridge, Mercanti was slashed with a knife across his chest before firing five bullets into the legs and arms of his opponent - Scorpion Boys gang member Nabil Dabag. No one was convicted of anything, but some big names became caught up in the police investigation which followed. They included West Coast stars Ben Cousins and Michael Gardiner.
The troublesome footy players were already known to be in thick with some of WA's best known organised crime targets so when their mobile numbers turned up on the phone records of one man suspected of being an accessory after the stabbing and shooting, the pair was pulled in for questioning in May.
As they left the detectives' base at Curtin House later that day, they looked gobsmacked when they spotted a newspaper photographer capturing the moment with a long lens. They knew the Eagles, already concerned about their dynamic duo's reputation, would be furious at their link to the Metro City bloodshed.
Michael Gardiner and Ben Cousins leave Curtin House.
Being under pressure from police was nothing new for Kizon, who was close by when the nightclub violence flared, and was accused of ensuring the gun used by his mate Mercanti disappeared. Kizon said he had only picked up the gun to ensure it wasn't used in any further violence. "I was not leaving no gun on no floor with these gentlemen," Kizon said in evidence at his trial.
The entire incident was captured on the club's surveillance tapes, but after two court cases the juries found the five men charged, including Coffin Cheater Paul Kenneth Martino who was accused of trying to wipe gun shot residue from Mercanti's hands, not guilty. The headline in _The West Australian _the next morning was a no-brainer: Untouchable.
From the time Mercanti became a Coffin Cheaters nominee in 1997, he had been seen as "staunch" by his new band of brothers. But by the mid-2000s some veterans were concerned his antics might damage the club.
A clear split was starting to emerge in the ranks, partly because of the bad blood between Mercanti and Fazio, who had always got along with the gang. Some older Cheaters were worried about Mercanti's younger brigade.
Many of the more senior Cheaters seemed to have moved on. Howard John Wignall, for instance, had a bit of a history - 55 criminal convictions, to be exact. He once tried to bribe a drug squad cop and had kept a few weapons in his time. But those days were gone. Wignall became more interested in the business world. Less risks, more reward.
In 2006, Wignall and another gang associate bankrolled mystery UK businessman John Kelly, who had emerged from obscurity to purchase $30 million of iconic WA properties in the space of just a few months. Most of the deals failed, but there was never any danger of the Cheaters not being repaid.
Similarly, Wignall's name popped up in connection with the failed fuel technology company Firepower. The company's former chief, Tim Johnston, claimed in the Federal Court that Wignall had been brought in as muscle to ensure businessman Warren Anderson got his way. Wignall certainly held Firepower shares at one point.
So, the senior Cheaters didn't need the heat that Mercanti was bringing. Nor did Mercanti's old mate from the infamous Funtastico fight, Juggsie. The pair fell out and Juggsie threatened to tell other Cheaters all Mercanti's secrets.
But Mercanti, meanwhile, had his own dirt on Juggsie and would eventually win the battle of wits. Whittaker left the Cheaters, blacked out his club tattoos and returned to his office inside the Doll House strip club in North Perth. He also had a strange partnership in a disputes mediation company called Davdar with former Town of Vincent deputy mayor David Drewett, who had never hidden his friendship with the bikie.
The strip club was frozen as part of an assets investigation by police in 2006. Officers believed the owners of the club were the Coffin Cheaters, but eventually the club was returned to its registered owner Tony Gurgone.
By late 2007, dark clouds were forming over Mercanti's head, even if he hadn't noticed. In the early hours of November 11, a large storage area inside the Coffin Cheaters' Bayswater compound was firebombed. The gang convened an urgent meeting of its "security council" to discuss where the offensive might have come from and what could be done about it. There were plenty of blank faces around the table that day, but the threat was right under their noses.
With the help of the Sword Boys - a Perth street gang with more than a Lebanese flavour - the Cheaters learned that Mercanti had been doing deals with another gang of Lebanese influence, bikies from NSW called the Comancheros. When one deal, which also involved the Finks bikie gang, turned sour and ended in a Sydney shootout, the Cheaters copped the wrath.
Mercanti had to go and by the end of January 2008 he had been expelled from the club on the grounds of "bad standing" after being lured to a Moore River goat farm via text message to what he thought was a get-together to mark his first 10 years as a Coffin Cheater. It turned out he was in for a flogging and would be stripped of his Coffin Cheaters memorabilia, right down to the brick paving at his home which formed the letters CCMC.
Determined to remain a major force in the bikie world, Mercanti soon set up shop in WA for his new outlaw family, the Eastern States-based Finks. Girlfriend Tammy Kingdon paid $335,000 for a Balga clubhouse for the gang and a new company was formed called Mercondo Investments - a combination of the names Mercanti and Condo. Kingdon is now facing charges of stealing funds from trust accounts set up for the children of both slain bikie Marc Chabriere and Mercanti's friend Richard Vickers.
Francesco Condo, also known as "Sweaty Frank" or "Franky Fink", is a senior member of the gang's South Australian chapter. He welcomed Mercanti with open arms, but in October 2008 a sniper lying in wait near the Great Eastern Highway at Wooroloo had other ideas about the new union.
Mercanti was on a ride with three Finks or associates of the gang when bullets started flying. The shooter missed his mark and struck new recruit Stephen John Wallace in the shoulder. It looked like the start of a new bikie war.
But on top of being shot at, Mercanti had other worries when a jury found him guilty in December that year of assaulting a man at a Northbridge nightclub. He was no longer untouchable and was jailed for 14 months. The good news for the 42-year-old - due for release in April next year - is that it is difficult to shoot at someone who is in prison.
There will be plenty of competition when he does get out. Apart from his own Finks, two other bikie gangs have recently set up shop in WA. The Comancheros and the Rock Machine join the already established six outlaw clubs.
The underbelly is getting fatter.
Violent times in the reign of bikies
Remnants of car belonging to Don Hancock, who was killed in a car bomb attack with friend Lou Lewis.
The 1974 bikie funeral of a man they called "The Preacher" attracted a wide cross-section of the community.
Nuns wearing their crisp, white habits stood shoulder to shoulder with outlaws dressed in trademark scruffy jeans and check shirts at Karrakatta Cemetery in Shenton Park. The sisters had crucifixes around their necks. The brotherhood was cloaked in sacred club patches.
One of the men in the funeral cortege would go on to become the biggest name in WA motorcycle gang history. He is Coffin Cheater Edward Horace Withnell.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7325297/violent-times-in-reign-of-bikie-gangs/
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7325297/violent-times-in-reign-of-bikie-gangs/
Violent times in reign of bikie gangs
SEAN COWAN and GARY ADSHEAD - The West Australian on June 1, 2010,
The 1974 bikie funeral of a man they called "The Preacher" attracted a wide cross-section of the community.
Nuns wearing their crisp, white habits stood shoulder to shoulder with outlaws dressed in trademark scruffy jeans and check shirts at Karrakatta Cemetery in Shenton Park. The sisters had crucifixes around their necks. The brotherhood was cloaked in sacred club patches.
One of the men in the funeral cortege would go on to become the biggest name in WA motorcycle gang history. He is Coffin Cheater Edward Horace Withnell.
There was another significant figure there that day to farewell John McGinty, who died in a crash. It was his brother, James Andrew McGinty, who would become the State's attorney-general in 2001 and take the fight up to the bikie gangs.
DPP Robert Cock and Attorney-General Jim McGinty astride a confiscated motorbike
When Jim McGinty trumpeted the first seizure of a Harley-Davidson under new criminal asset confiscation laws in 2002, he and then Director of Public Prosecutions Robert Cock posed for a photograph on the $20,000 motorcycle. The Preacher, a bikie who liked to quote from the Bible, would have been turning in his grave.
He would be equally disturbed at the way sophisticated organised crime has permeated the good old boys who were happy in their clubs with booze, bongs and birds.
According to police intelligence reports, the modern-day bikie gangs are either active in or linked to the "distribution of narcotic drugs, vehicle and motorcycle theft, the interstate transportation of stolen property, extortion and the illegal importation of firearms".
In the past two years, the clubs have become so offended by adverse publicity, police attention and new laws to control them that they have set up a national union and hired a public relations and lobbying company.
It's hard to imagine how the gangs can complain when one of them, the Gypsy Jokers, was involved in the car-bombing murder of a retired WA police commander and his friend in 2001. Don Hancock, aka the Silver Fox, was killed as payback for the unsolved shooting death of Joker Billy Grierson in Ora Banda, where Hancock owned a pub. Hancock's mate Lou Lewis was collateral damage. Only one Joker, supergrass Sidney "Snot" Reid, was convicted of the crime - on his own admission. He gave evidence against Graeme "Slim" Slater, who was cleared by a jury in 2003. The bombing took the already fearsome reputation of bikies to a new level.
Nevertheless, the gangs haven't been so self-conscious about their image and reputation in the wider community since the days of the iconic Coffin Cheaters-organised Bindoon Rock Festival.
The rollicking annual weekend event, which ran from 1986 to 1995, involved some collaboration with the WA Police to ensure things went as well as possible for the tens of thousands of people who converged for two days of grog and music. One copper accused his colleagues of turning a blind eye to crime and wrote a stinging report, which found its way to his superiors in 1991.
"Once again Bindoon Rock was held on the weekend and once again the police are patting themselves on the back on a job well done," wrote Sgt. Frank Scott. "Each year we have officers … gathering intelligence and informing the department of the smorgasbord of drugs that are supplied and sold at these concerts. It is difficult to reconcile how the department can allow such hypocrisy when dealing with laws relating to liquor and drugs."
Under considerable stress, Scott was discharged from the department after a 22-year career and took on whistleblower status, appearing in a series of media reports. But his claims are rejected by the Coffin Cheaters to this day.
Withnell, now retired from the gang, wrote in a submission to the Liquor Licensing Commission of WA last year that Scott had "thrown a tissy fit" at that concert, but "real coppers knew we had no drugs".
"I will not deny that later all kinds of bikies became involved in crime; some organised, some totally disorganised, (but) certainly not more than any other social, governmental, ethnic, religious or cultural group," he wrote.
It was during the Bindoon Rock era that the bikies took on a bigger profile than ever before. The 1970s and 1980s had seen WA's four established gangs expand almost unhindered. The God's Garbage, based in Albany, held the South-West, while Bayswater was the home of the all-powerful Cheaters, the stoush-loving members of the Gypsy Jokers were based in Maddington and the largely anonymous Club Deroes headquarters was in Cloverdale. The Cheaters also established chapters in Bunbury and Fremantle. Before The Preacher met his maker in 1974, there was a variety of smaller clubs.
Back in the day, the Cheaters, Deroes, Jokers and Garbage proudly rode their bikes alongside members of Satan's Commandos, Epitaph, Devil's Disciples, Filthy Few and Gutter Rats. It was only after one particularly messy all-in "run" through the South-West that many of the smaller clubs were folded into - or patched over by - the bigger clubs.
By the late 1980s, the big four were strong. Police believed they were also moving into organised crime, using their traditional love of a fight to form strong gangs capable of carrying out substantial drug deals. Police were especially worried about the Coffin Cheaters and the power that would come with the money and connections they had made at Bindoon - especially in the year or so before the festival ended.
Yet police would soon come to appreciate the strength of the Cheaters and the other WA clubs when an interloper from across the Tasman set up shop in Perth.
Eddie Withnell
The Mongrel Mob had a reputation for untold violence in New Zealand and the WA gangs were unhappy when they opened a chapter in Perth and moved into minor areas of organised crime. The Mongrel Mob was fencing stolen electrical items and selling drugs. But not for long.
During a week of bloodshed in late 1989, several WA gang members were arrested. Their main target had been Perth Mongrel Mob chapter vice-president Selwyn Wharepapa, who owned a Midvale motorcycle repair shop. First, his business was firebombed by Gypsy Joker David Roy Kirby and then he was shot outside his Swan View home by Gypsy Joker Paul James Hugo, who was in a car being driven by God's Garbage bikie Ronald Mark Scott. The Mob didn't want it to be a case of third time unlucky. The four gangs, who were fronted by Withnell as spokesman, claimed they were the good Samaritans when they acted. Asked at the time if he condoned the shooting of Wharepapa, Withnell said: "We live in very real times, and some people are thrust to the front line of a very real situation."
The gang left town after key Kiwi member Michael "Pixie" Moke negotiated the terms of the surrender with Withnell.
But whatever spin the Mongrel Mob tried to put on things, it was obvious they didn't have the stomach for the fight so far from home.
"Gang members going from here to Australia are like babes coming into an adult world," one New Zealand police officer said cheekily after hearing of the backdown.
Eventually, the existing gangs relaxed their so-called "four gang policy".
In 1996, a gang called the Rebels moved into Perth and Busselton and were quickly in trouble for drug dealing, while both the Gypsy Jokers and Club Deroes expanded into Kalgoorlie in the following year. Five God's Garbage members became suspects in a gang rape of a Quinninup woman who later committed suicide. They got away with it after maintaining their code of silence.
But bikie gang violence escalated and police pressure on the gangs grew by the day. It was only a matter of time before another war started and this one wouldn't end so quietly.
The remnants of Don Hancock's car in which he and friend Lou Lewis died.
In the years which followed Bindoon Rock, the Coffin Cheaters had made the most of their success. Their clubhouse, which stretched across two blocks in Raleigh Road, Bayswater, was decked out like a dream bachelor pad, despite a courageous petition from local residents.
"For years, the activities of the Coffin Cheaters club have been a source of annoyance to those living nearby, due to their complete disregard of nearby residents," the petition read.
It was water off a duck's back to the Cheaters, who had invested in a company called Compri-Tube which looked like making a fortune out of new pipe-cleaning technology. The other clubs, meanwhile, were still operating in the shadows, especially the Club Deroes.
When the Deroes kicked Kevin "Mad Mick" Woodhouse, a nominee and suspected amphetamine cook, out of the gang and the Cheaters took him in, war was inevitable. The bikie code forbids such treachery and Woodhouse owed the Deroes money. The Cheaters had been warned by a Gypsy Jokers member that Woodhouse was not to be trusted and had been informing on fellow gang members while in jail.
Mad Mick wasn't to be taken lightly and had a reputation for violence. In the mid-1990s, he and three other Club Deroes hogtied and beat one-legged Pingelly man Martin Devaney after Devaney had quit the gang. They claimed they had just gone around to get his Deroes memorabilia back when things got out of hand.
It was May 1998 when the first public target of the bikie war was chosen. Withnell was attacked by Club Deroes bikies at the Broken Hill Hotel in Victoria Park and had his head cut open. Four days later, Coffin Cheater David Whittaker was admitted to Swan District Hospital with a gunshot wound to the left leg.
A few weeks later, a Club Deroes bikie had both legs broken by a gang of masked men armed with baseball bats in a carefully planned raid on a Bayswater factory. The scale of the war became abundantly clear when a Cheater was caught by police just metres from the home of a Deroes member in Balga. He was nursing a loaded illegal automatic shotgun, commonly known as a street sweeper. The police strategy designed to minimise the bloodshed was named Operation Gallipoli.
But the battles raged on. Club Deroes member Ian Gangell was dragged out of his van by four men and beaten with clubs and iron bars outside his home in South Guildford. Two weeks later, Mad Mick himself was shot in his car in Beechboro. He managed to drive to the Cheaters' clubhouse in Bayswater before being taken to hospital.
In September, the war spilt into Perth Magistrate's Court where a Club Deroes member was punched in the face by a Coffin Cheater while sitting in the public gallery. Days later, 20 rounds of ammunition were fired from three weapons at a house in Lion Street, Carlisle, and Raymond Washer, a former Club Deroes member who had joined the new Rebels bikie gang, was lucky to escape unscathed.
A month later, the violence was reaching its fatal crescendo. Club Deroe Mark Doyle was ambushed on his way to work by a shooter waiting in bushes near a Roe Highway on-ramp. His car was sprayed with bullets as he drove past and he was taken to hospital with gunshot wounds to his spine.
The next day Coffin Cheater Marc Raoul Lucien Chabriere was shot dead in his car in Welshpool while fellow gang member Mick Anderson was shot in the arm. Baby-faced Club Deroe Andrew Wayne Edhouse was eventually charged with murder, but on June 27, 2001, he was acquitted at trial.
The trigger for the war, Mad Mick Woodhouse, would eventually join Chabriere on May 12, 2004. A man on a motorcycle drove up and shot him dead while he stood waiting for the Bayswater Waves aquatic centre to open. A security guard told police Woodhouse used his dying breath to name his killer as "Johnny Montoyo". In the end, a friend of the bikie called Johnny Montani, was charged. He was tried three times for murder, the first was a hung jury and the final an acquittal.
During the Cheaters-Deroes war, the Deroes had to cope with unwanted police attention over the disappearance of 28-year-old Lisa Joanne Govan. She had vanished after last being seen outside the Deroes' Kalgoorlie-Boulder clubhouse at 7.30am on October 8, 1999, where she had arrived earlier from a nightclub in a taxi.
Govan was believed to be dead, dumped down one of the thousands of mineshafts dotting the Goldfields, and members of the bikie gang were murder suspects. The Deroes stayed true to their code of silence and much to the anguish of Govan's family, the disappearance remains unsolved.
The Cheaters, too, had problems when one of their high-profile members became involved in a murder investigation. On February 25, 2000, Jacqueline Margaret Neville knocked on the door of a house in suburban Mirrabooka. Little did she know that a high-tech security camera was recording her every word and every move.
"How are you going, mate," she asked the 30-year-old who answered the door. "What do you want," he asked. Neville answered, "You", before pulling out a gun and firing seven shots through the flyscreen door. One of those shots hit the man, Michael Wright, in the chest and he died within minutes.
At the time, Neville was the wife of Coffin Cheaters bikie Mark Raymond Hinchliffe. She had had an affair with Wright, which had enraged her husband, who bashed Wright and demanded $50,000 from him. He also bashed Neville with a Cheaters belt, poured boiling water over her and forced her to shave her head. But the final insult was his demand she get a tattoo around her waist which read "Property of Mark Hinchliffe".
Wright complained to police and Hinchliffe was charged. But Neville, who had suffered years of abuse, saw herself as a traitor to her husband and decided to kill Wright to make amends.
Hinchliffe, whose phone was bugged by police still investigating the bikie war, made the mistake of telling a friend he had bashed his wife so hard that "she just keeps bouncing off my fist". He was sentenced to six years jail. Neville will not be released from jail until at least 2015, but while in jail she has claimed compensation from the State for the injuries her husband caused. The taxpayer will also foot half the bill for the removal of her tattoo.
Drugs cross borders while crime squads watch, wait
John Kizon, a pallbearer at the funeral of Alphonse Gangitano in Melbourne in 1998.
Police intelligence about Vaso Ulic, Fabian Quaid and another John Kizon associate, Craig Christian, had been gathered during a range of operations before Taskforce Schumacher kicked off in late 2003.
Each operation identified the national and international connections relied upon by the WA group.
For instance, investigators working on Operation Barrator looked at the long-term association between Kizon, former NSW detective Roger Rogerson and Melbourne underworld figures Angelo "Fat Ange" Venditti and Mick Gatto - both of whom have been cleared of Melbourne gangland murders in recent years.
Read the full story
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7297889/drugs-cross-borders-while-crime-squads-watch/
Drugs cross borders while crime squads watch
GARY ADSHEAD and SEAN COWAN - The West Australian on May 26, 2010,
John Kizon, a pallbearer at the funeral of Melbourne identity Alphonse Gangitano in 1998
Police intelligence about Vaso Ulic, Fabian Quaid and another John Kizon associate, Craig Christian, had been gathered during a range of operations before Taskforce Schumacher kicked off in late 2003.
Each operation identified the national and international connections relied upon by the WA group.
For instance, investigators working on Operation Barrator looked at the long-term association between Kizon, former NSW detective Roger Rogerson and Melbourne underworld figures Angelo "Fat Ange" Venditti and Mick Gatto - both of whom have been cleared of Melbourne gangland murders in recent years.
The connection to Melbourne couldn't have been more obvious than at the 1998 funeral of the man known as "The De Niro of Lygon Street" - Alphonse Gangitano. Gangitano was shot dead by drug dealer Jason Moran shortly after speaking to Kizon by phone. Fighting back tears as a pallbearer at Gangitano's funeral, Kizon's bond with the slain gangster was on show.
But Barrator found Kizon was not involved in the day-to-day trafficking of illicit drugs.
Operation Slalom, meanwhile, was focused on a crime gang that was trafficking thousands of ecstasy tablets and kilograms of amphetamines from Sydney to Perth. There were connections between the Perth principal of that gang and Kizon's friends. The Sydney principal can't be named because he was extradited to Perth earlier this month to face charges after the seizure of more than 1.5kg of speed under a joint police operation codenamed Maplesville.
Operation Turkana came from left field. Its main target was the Sing Ma Chinese crime syndicate in Sydney, led by convicted drug dealer and former Northbridge karate instructor Steven Wing Yuen Sui. Known as "Karate Steve", he was back and forth between Perth and Sydney in the 1980s to settle some of the disputes between rival illegal gambling operators. He also liked to visit his old friend Kizon.
When the Federal Government tried to have Sui deported from Australia in 1996, NSW police told the court he was "well known in heroin trafficking circles in Sydney with a large number of criminal associations".
In October 2002, Sui again visited Perth and was reunited with Kizon and his associate Christian at a business in Balcatta. After the meeting, he was driven around the city by convicted drug dealer David Atholwood and had a meeting with another convicted drug dealer and Argyle diamond scammer Lindsay Gordon Roddan, where the pair exchanged parcels.
Then there was the mystery connection between Atholwood and convicted drug dealer Kenny Choon Keong Lee, who flew into Perth in 2002 from Sydney with 1kg of drugs. He was arrested but refused to speak to police. However, they discovered he owed a gambling debt to Sui and was supposed to call Atholwood's mobile number on his arrival. That number was registered to Christian's home address in Stirling.
Christian, too, faced drugs charges after police found 41.5g of ephedrine, almost $12,000 in cash and a loaded handgun at his gym in May 2003. A search of his home found a loaded handgun, while police also found 600g of methylamphetamines, three handgun magazines, a silencer and 97 rounds of ammunition at Christian's Colours in Glass business. At Christian's trial in 2006, his lawyer pointed the finger at Atholwood and others for the drugs. "There were lots of blowflies with dubious backgrounds hanging around the office," he said. Christian was acquitted by a jury.
Armed with all this information and hundreds of police intelligence files, the officers in Schumacher had a good idea what angles to chase.
Quaid, they believed, would deal with Ulic to set up a drug importation over the phone or by facsimile, albeit in code, and would then send money overseas through Western Union and other wire services. The package would arrive in Sydney by ship and would be driven across the country for distribution. Once in Perth the drugs were the responsibility of Coffin Cheater Troy Mercanti. His friend and now fellow Fink bikie Stephen Silvestro would keep them secure and the high-level dealers would pick them up. Those dealers included Paolo Sinagra-Brisca, Mohamed "Shaan" Evans and a man known only as Anderson.
Even before Schumacher got off the ground, Sinagra-Brisca, a plasterer and former waiter at Fremantle's Old Papa's restaurant, was arrested with 10,100 ecstasy tablets. More drugs were found stashed at rented houses and the total haul included 6.1kg of speed and 2.5kg of ecstasy. He was sentenced to WA's longest drug-related jail term - 20 years and six months. To the WA group, he was just one arm of the syndicate and easily replaced. To police, it meant rebuilding the flow charts on their walls.
Through a web of information from listening devices, surveillance, phone taps and informants, the police discovered the high-level dealers supplied drugs to men such as tanning salon owner Tama Ripi, Leslie Stevens and Robert William Morris, who supplied cocaine to Ben Cousins and other footballers. Limousine company boss Murray Joseph Cohen was also supplying coke and ecstasy to Perth A-listers, until he was busted and jailed in 2005.
Another interesting character in the mix was Angelo "The Butler" Chillemi. He was a gofer for the Perth crew and would be woken to go out and get cigarettes or snacks. On one occasion, Quaid sent him to a well-known Perth restaurant to pick up their signature dish. He was told to deliver it to Quaid's good friend West Coast Eagles player Michael Gardiner, who was having an operation at the Mount Hospital. The football star paid tribute to one of his underworld mates shortly after his comeback in the 2005 Wizard Cup grand final. He brought his wrists together as though handcuffed in a signal to Mercanti, who was in custody at the time.
With eyes and ears on all of the players, it didn't take long before officers from Taskforce Schumacher had put the jigsaw puzzle together. By the time the massive Australian Crime Commission operation was up and running, Quaid was already out of the country on business.
He had flown to Rome to meet Ulic in December 2003 and would not come home until February. Upon Quaid's return to his new life in Sydney, he spent a lot of time with Ulic's associates and employees of the Manly property development company Meldeep Pty Ltd. Among them was a close friend of Cousins, an accountant who police believe is involved in the distribution of commercial quantities of drugs in the Manly area. We can't name him here because he doesn't have a criminal record.
Before long, money started pouring into the Harbour City from the west. Men such as Mario D'Alessandro and Jason Mercanti - Troy's brother - carried money across the country. Quaid's friends and associates in Sydney then wired more than $1 million to Ulic in lots of less than $10,000 each - to avoid raising alarm bells with Australia's money-tracking authorities. But the Australian Crime Commission was watching anyway.
In November 2004, a ship arrived from Belgium via Hong Kong. The crime commission pounced, transferring one container into a holding facility, where they opened it and discovered in coffee bags 800,000 ecstasy tablets, worth an estimated $40 million on the street, along with a pile of furniture.
About 60 people were charged during Schumacher and among those convicted were D'Alessandro, Jason Mercanti and Fabian Quaid's brother Marc, all of lying to the crime commission at secret hearings. There is no evidence any of those men were knowingly involved in anything other than the movement of money. The Sydney man who facilitated the furniture shipment got 16 years, but Fabian Quaid got away. Before switching off the phone taps, investigators were buoyed to discover Quaid had lost a subsequent shipment of 50kg of ice from Indonesia in the December 2004 tsunami.
There were also a few unexpected scalps claimed by Schumacher. One was South Australia's Mr Untouchable, Domenic Vottari. He had attracted plenty of attention across the border over the years, but his paranoia about using phones and his religious use of public transport had made him difficult to snare.
Police investigate the scene at the murder of Alf Piano in 2005.
But during the course of Schumacher, he had suddenly appeared in Perth in the company of Fabian Quaid and Troy Mercanti. He had a few meetings with Kizon and met hairdresser Alf Piano. Piano, who was married to Perth model Nicole McKendry, was shot dead while sitting in his car during an early morning meeting in Wangara on July 19, 2005. His murder remains unsolved, but there is no suggestion Vottari, Kizon or any of their associates were involved.
Vottari also struck up friendships with Perth men Srdjan Cecez and Milan Tomasevic, before being jailed for possession of cannabis and attempted possession of speed while in Perth. Cecez, on the other hand, is serving a life sentence for murdering Tomasevic during a speed-fuelled fit in late 2004. He stabbed his best friend in the neck, severing his carotid artery, and in his back with a big butcher's knife during a drug deal in Balga.
When sentencing Cecez, Justice John McKechnie said the apparently motiveless murder exposed a "dark underbelly" in society.
At the time of his arrest, Quaid was one of Kizon's closest confidantes. Kizon has had many, including boxer-turned-actor Raimond Fazio, who parted ways with Kizon after a notorious 2003 restaurant brawl in Subiaco between Fazio, Quaid, Mercanti and another former Coffin Cheater - Darren Scott Whittaker, or "Juggsie" to his mates.
Long before that infamous night - one which would seriously test WA's underworld alliances - the National Crime Authority started looking closely at the financial affairs of members of the Kizon group during Operation Barrator.
Back in 1996, a stocky former Burswood Casino pit boss named Nigel Cunningham Swift Mansfield had suddenly appeared and been spotted during routine surveillance with many of Kizon's associates.
Unemployed, but with some handy business connections around Perth, Mansfield didn't fit the mould. He was a middle-aged married man with a daughter. Unfit and with a thick English accent, he looked out of place with the ponytail brigade. Investigators believed he was laundering drug money for the group and on that basis Operation Barrator was set up. Led by WA detective Chris Cubbage, whom Kizon still refers to as "Gabbage", Barrator used the usual methods to put together a complex picture of Mansfield's financial dealings and the financial connections between Kizon, Gatto, Rogerson, Sydney criminal Tom Domican and a long list of businessmen across the country.
During the investigation, officers followed many different money trails. There was a mobile phone deal that was to have been facilitated by union figures, the purchase and sale of property and shares and, of course, the movement of money overseas. Investigators wondered just what was going on when Kizon was photographed with former US president Bill Clinton after the pair shared a flight to Sydney from Perth in February 2002. They needn't have worried. It was a chance meeting and obvious souvenir opportunity for Kizon.
But six months later, Mansfield was arrested and charged with defrauding the Commonwealth, conspiring to defraud the Commonwealth and money laundering. He was put in protective custody in prison and his family moved overseas. He gave many days of evidence to the Australian Crime Commission and everything he owned was frozen under WA's tough criminal property confiscation laws.
The original 16-page police statement of material facts for those charges reads like a John Grisham novel. Company managing directors, brokers, lawyers, accountants, overseas and interstate businessmen - half of Perth was believed to be involved in the conspiracy. They used shelf companies, tax havens, tax effective schemes and frontmen to do their dirty work. But, in the end, the allegations proved to be too complex and didn't ring true. There were reasonable explanations for the trades or deals. Investigators found nothing that indicated any of the money had come from drugs or any illegal activity. Kizon's investment had come from a $250,000 lotto win. The charges were dropped.
During the investigation, another witness gave the crime commission his take on where Kizon sits in the scheme of things.
"My assessment is that John is the common denominator to every single individual that I have seen or met," he said. "John deals with Roger Rogerson. John deals with all those in Melbourne and John deals with Tom Domican. John deals with the Coffin Cheaters. My view is if you ask me who is close here in WA, (it's) John and that Coffin Cheater mate (Mercanti)."
In 2004, more than 300 charges were thrown at Kizon and Mansfield, including insider trading and nine of laundering $4.1 million. They, too, were doomed to failure.
After a nine-week hearing this year, the judge threw out 48 of them - a decision being challenged by the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions. Just four charges remained against Mansfield and none against Kizon. Three days later, a jury took just an hour to find Mansfield not guilty.
The pair have lodged complaints about the running of Operation Barrator with several oversight bodies.
The State Director of Public Prosecutions has agreed to release Mansfield's property and pay him damages. The case cost him many of his personal relationships and affected his health. He expects a payout in excess of $6 million.
As for John Kizon, it was just another battle he had won in an ongoing war.
Balkan-based drug cartels run by Australians
A lengthy News Corp Australia investigation has found the Balkan-based gangs — led by some of Australia’s most wanted men — have established “entrenched infiltration” of almost every level of Australian society and according to Australian Federal Police are now waking “sleepers” of young criminals to aid in the shipments of tonnes of illicit drugs into Aussie ports.
The cartel is run by a core group of notorious gangsters who once controlled Kings Cross’ Golden Mile but have now formed offshore bases in Montenegro, Spain and Holland to move the drugs, guns and cash about.
“Balkan Organised Crime is now the biggest threat to Australia, so entrenched and disciplined and influential in local communities it has made it a serious challenge to crack,” one law enforcer said.
“They no longer just operate along ethnic lines, they are forming new alliances all the time, they are outsourcing jobs and it has been hard to cultivate community sources to help in the fight.”
One confidential assessment by the Australian Federal Police read by News Corp has warned the systemic Balkan crime network was moving to the next level now awakening “sleepers” or extended “family” members to groom them into taking over the multi-million dollar enterprises through “effective succession plans”. Those families are described as being either direct relatives or from well-established and historical Mafia-like clans from the former Yugoslavian states who moved to Australia in the “second migration wave” from the Balkan region in the 1980s and 1990s in State-sponsored infiltration of Australia by the former regimen of Serbian Slobodan Milosevic.
It concluded Balkan criminals were now likely to have had “more drug successes than failures” in their enterprises in Australia.
But it is not just crime families that has raised concerns with several ongoing covert police surveillance operations, one of which had confirmed several notorious crime figures thought retired in the 1990s had gone on to lead global drug operations from fortified bases in Montenegro, Serbia and Spain.
Base ... Montenegro is one of the offshore meeting places for Aussie gangsters shipping drugs around the world. Picture: Alamy
The mostly Australian nationals run group, led by former Kings Cross identity Vaso Ulic who left Australia in 2005 never to return, was now networked to become one of the biggest transnational crime groups in the world importing six tonnes a year into Australia alone but many more to and from other destinations from South Africa to Europe, China, Nigeria and the Americas with law enforcers from notably the United Kingdom, United States and Italy involved in their pursuance.
It has been confirmed the prosecutions office in Montenegro has an extensive file on Ulic and other figures in the country as part of an international arrest warrant to break the cartel up.
But the office has been considering the extensive brief now for almost one year despite being under pressure from other European nations Montenegro wants to impress as it moves toward being formally inducted into the EU. While no extradition treaty exists with Montenegro, both police there and in Serbia have been actively working with AFP agents to establish if the source of the global crime was perpetrated locally and therefore the arrest warrants can be pursued and prosecuted locally.
The AFP has formally declined a request by News Corp to discuss the broad issue of Balkan crime or individuals involved.
The Balkan drug cartel has tentacles the world over.
In another case file, it has been learned a collection of multinational crime bosses including ex-Kings Cross figures met in a Melbourne restaurant with notorious Melbourne-based identities to discuss further carving up of Australian drug importation and distribution and specific jobs in Queensland. The men were all previously well known but had not been seen in each other’s company.
“The AFP has witnessed the growing influence of various criminal entities and groups from the Balkan region,” one police intelligence report concludes.
“These entities have come to notice across a large number of AFP narcotic and money laundering investigations.”
One dire internal police assessment relayed to the Federal Government claims their criminality now extended worldwide with direct Australian-Balkan organised crime links to notorious Mexican and Colombian clans and cartels and Asian triads including the 14K group, South African crime lords and Italian and Dutch criminal groups targeting predominantly Melbourne, Sydney, Queensland and South Australia using Macedonian expats from NSW and the motorcycle gangs as part of the national distribution network. Darwin has also been deemed a port of opportunity by criminals to smuggle goods in.
How they do it ... Undercover police draw the latest “Balkan Route” for narcotic and weapons smuggling used by various multinational criminals.
State-based and federal police have pieced together a comprehensive picture of the burgeoning extent of the criminality from extensive undercover surveillance operations stemming from up to a dozen overlapping case files.
It is understood police have established that members of other heavyweight crime groups in Serbia, Colombia and Mexico have held meetings in Spain, Thailand and Australia to establish formal links and to create criminal parameters to operate and discuss travel routes, mostly through a well known cargo and cruise shipping line and using paid crew members and stevedores at ports to move bulk consignments off the wharves to hand to Outlaw Motorcycle Groups. The Bandidos have specifically been named in connection with the criminal enterprise as well as specific motorcycle identities in Queensland and South Australia. Perth is also named as a targeted drop off point for the drugs as is Botany Bay in Sydney. Also worrying is that police have identified their contacts, mostly on ethnic lines, are well placed in transport and logistics about the country both maritime, air and on road and use a businesslike approach with in-house money remitters, accountants, legal advisers and lawyers to track payments, purchases and distributions routes and advise on laws to avoid detection.
Europe’s law enforcement agency Europol told News Corp Australia the western Balkans were rife with serious and organised crime affecting the EU but also other member states including Australia. Their criminal activity sourced back to the region is also touching continents including West and South Africa, the Caribbean and South America in all forms of crime.
One officer said the crime groups did operate in cells however they were “well connected with each other and their members are very mobile, financially powerful”.
“The Western Balkans region is not only used as crossroads for trafficking of illicit commodities, but also as a stash and distribution area for some illegal commodities, but mainly for drugs and weapons,” he said.
In recent times he said it had been noted by police that Outlaw Motorcycle Groups (OMCG) had established themselves in the region to specifically work in with the Balkan crime groups.
HATCHING BATTLEPLAN
In a smoky, nondescript cafe on Svetog Petra Cetinjskog Boulevard in the Montenegro capital of Podgorica, a group of men relax in soft-backed chairs to discuss business.
Talking business ...
The cafe in Montenegro where the main players discuss drug deliveries. Note the men in this photo are not accused of any criminal activity.
There is nothing much that distinguishes them from others in the cafe of leatherjacket clad businessmen crowding small tables and uniformed officers from the nearby national police headquarters of the south-eastern European country sitting about chain smoking and drinking strong coffee.
But some of the men at one table have slight Australian accents and talk about brown sugar and white sugar and it’s not the type you put in coffee.
Brown sugar heroin coming out of Afghanistan and the more refined white heroin selling now for as little as 30 euros per gram have in recent years been a rising narcotic in Australia and Europe.
An undercover police officer flicks his head up motioning toward the group of men, slugs back his short black and nonchalantly shakes his head.
“The men, they meet here all the time over there over here wherever it doesn’t matter, we watch and we see who comes and goes, many Australian accents, many ‘best men’ of Ulic but they no longer talk of kilos they talk of tonnes,” the local undercover officer says.
“Some shipments found is not coincidence, it’s strategy for others that come in successfully. But here is where it starts, drinking coffee, and talking with ‘best men’ about tonnes of cocaine to Belgium and the police and customs officers who will be paid to help the shipment, Spain and UK too, wherever, but Australia is main target now, the prices are unbelievable — six times more than here in Europe — so you send more, take the risk, get what you can in and this is all run by Australians.”
Vaso Ulic is a 55-year-old ethnic Albanian who migrated to Australia in 1979 and within a few years was working as a small-time foot soldier running drugs and cash along the infamous Golden Mile of Kings Cross but who is now seen as a kingpin of an organisation so big, very few drug consignments enter Australia without his knowledge or permission.
He alone has been linked to up to six tonnes of MDMA and hundreds of kilos of heroin of Balkan-sponsored drugs entering Australia each year.
According to local intelligence reports it was Ulic — a close friend of convicted underworld identity Bill Bayeh — who in 2011 had strategically brought together the various Mafia-like clans from different ethnic backgrounds within the former Yugoslavia. He is described on Podgorica streets as “smart, stable and dangerous” who now lives like a duke in a “castle” outside the capital surrounded by green fields, a private vineyard from vines imported from South Australia and from which he makes 20,000 bottles of fine red wine and a small army of heavily armed men. He fled Australia in 2005 when the Australian Crime Commission and the Australian Federal Police moved in to question him over the seizure of a haul of drugs and unexplained contract killings.
His criminal enterprise run from his fortress has now extended and involves significant money laundering, swapping weapons and ammunition for cocaine out of South America and moving vast amounts of MDMA and MDMA substitutes around the world for his cartel but also at least a dozen others including Italian Mafia groups that have allowed Balkans figures to run their empires while Italian police conduct a lengthy crackdown. His network is extensive and there are very few people he can’t call on for a favour, either from former Yugoslavian Republic migrants in Australia who operate out of fear rather than favour or others; he recently saw a money dispute over a seized haul of drugs in Australia so dispatched a local Balkan uniformed police officer to travel to Australia to return the money to the buyers.
Much of the drugs travel along the so-called “Balkan Route” once used to smuggle food and weapons during the war and now operating as a heroin and MDMA smuggling run with the heroin going from Afghanistan, Republic of Iran and Pakistan and on through the Balkans to western Europe or hitting Turkey and shooting left through Ukraine and onto Russia but also transiting via Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Australia’s haul of illicit drugs including MDMA and MDMA substitutes in recent times have come from South America via South Africa but again the name Ulic crops up in police intelligence reports for hauls.
In Australia, Ulic is linked to five key families based in Sydney who oversee local operations and is seen as “highly influential” in the national Balkan community.
“He is aware of ongoing police interest in him but he knows he is slightly out of reach where he is,” one AFP officer told News Corp. “It’s fair to say he has far-reaching influence over Australian organised crime and he’s brought in some of his mates from the old days of Kings Cross.”
A large slice of the world’s movement of cocaine is also now coordinated from the Balkans and in someway involves Ulic, the drug travelling from Colombia, Peru and Bolivia transferring through ports like Chile, Argentina and Brazil with corrupt sailors then delivering to the safe hands of corrupt officials in busy ports in Australia, Spain, the United States and Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Mostly through cargo ships but also cruise liners where they are simply walked off the vessel in luggage. Of this part of the operation is another Western Australian-born suspect (NAME REDACTED) named in police intelligence reports who turns 55 years-old next month and who fled Australia in 2003 to establish himself as a major supplier of cocaine, as well as MDMA and heroin to Australia, but who since 1998 has been the target of 14 separate AFP operations that in a decade linked him to more than five tonnes of heroin, cocaine, MDMA and cannabis shipped to Australia.
He lived in Podgorica for two years and was named by local police as Ulic’s “best man”, a term of endearment for someone close and trusted.
He was wanted for questioning over a shooting at a local casino and has been using the passport identity of a dead relative who was a drug mule and died in Serbia in the 1990s when his haul burst in his stomach. He also uses a fake Australian passport and there is a “blue notice” issued by Interpol to monitor his movements.
He is deemed by police to be “significantly connected” to Chinese and South American crime groups including the notorious 14K gang and Italian and Dutch crime groups working out of Queensland, Sydney and Melbourne. The two former Sydney men are backed by (NAME REDACTED), a 60-year-old former Kings Cross heavy involved in armed robbery and drugs on the strip in the 1980s but who now takes care of the South African end of cocaine smuggling to Australia travelling between there and a home in Montenegro.
There is also (NAME REDACTED), convicted of murder in NSW and formally linked to the Bandidos outlaw motorcycle group who, according to prison guards, his visitors when he was in prison read like a “Who’s Who” of the Balkan organised crime mileau and who allegedly was still running operations from the inside before his release.
The team is joined by another former “muscle” from the Kings Cross of the 1970s and 1980s and the era of notorious now deceased gangsters George Freeman and George Savvas. He was questioned over a number of crimes during the 1980s including a 1984 gangland shooting in Sydney’s Chinatown and the disappearance of “Mr Rent-A-Kill” Christopher Dale Flannery and by 2000 was still paying corrupt NSW cops. The Croatian-Australian dual national is based in NSW and is still known as the “enforcer” and Ulic’s eyes and ears in Australia ensuring continued Balkan community clan respect and loyalty is adhered to.
Vaso Ulic used to work as a small-time foot soldier running drugs and cash along the infamous Golden Mile of Kings Cross.
The cartel traffics heroin, marijuana, cocaine, precursors and chemicals that are used for drugs production such as Acetic Anhydride (AA), as well as weapons and cigarettes.
Originally published as The untouchable Aussie drug lord
New South Wales top secret crime fighting body says 607 kingpins rule Sydney streets. Picture: Generic image
SYDNEY’S CRIME GANGS WIN DRUG WAR
SITTING at the top of the 607 names of organised crime figures plying their evil trade in NSW was a former Hells Angel bikie called Wayne Schneider.
Schneider, until his murder, was considered by the NSW Crime Commission to be the most influential drug supplier to the state. He had risen from a lowly drug cook to become a major international kingpin whose worth was in the tens of millions until he was beaten to death in Thailand.
Like other Sydney crime figures such as Comanchero Mark Buddle, former bouncer Vaso Ulic, Daux Ngakuru and Hakan Ayak, the 37-year old had moved his operations offshore.
“There are scores of expats, particularly bikies, moving overseas for a number of reasons but the main one is they are being constantly harassed by the NSW Gang Squad, particularly Strike Force Raptor,’’ said a senior NSW police officer.
“Many take off because they think they are going to be arrested. Buddle and another associate are in Dubai because they are the number one suspects in the murder of Gary Allibon, a Sydney security guard.’’
But it doesn’t stop the flow of drugs or violence. The web surrounding Schneider’s operation and his murder show the complex labyrinth of the Sydney crime scene.
One of the most feared Sydney gangsters, Raphael Joseph, a founding member of a violent street gang called the DLAST HR, was a friend of Schnieder’s, both becoming international crime figures.
Sydney gangster Raphael Joseph’s body has never been found.
Like his mate Schneider, Joseph is now dead, although his body was never found. On the day he vanished he met with Schneider’s ex-wife then went to the casino for dinner with a comanchero before a mystery call lured him to a meeting where police say he was murdered.
Another Sydney crime figure, Antonia Bagnato, is now standing trial for Schneider’s death in Thailand. The 26-year-old kick boxer is the main suspect in the execution shooting of Bradley Dillon in Leichhardt in 2014.
“You try to work your way through that maze. There are circles within circles,’’ said one detective.
Former assistant NSW police commissioner Clive Small has seen the growth of organised crime in Sydney for more than 30 years and has intimate knowledge of the workings of crime gangs, particularly the Italian mafia.
“There are 31 mafia families doing drug importations and other crimes throughout Australia. Many are based in NSW and report to bosses in Calabria,’’ Mr Small said.
“For many years the Italians were the major source of drugs in Australia and they still are. They keep a low profile and work quietly and still have significant influence politically through businesses making donations to political parties.
“But what we have seen in recent years is a the rise of many other crime gangs such as the Middle Eastern and bikie networks with young violent men wanting to move up the ladder.’’
Mr Small, who investigated many of the gangland murders in Sydney during the 1980s,
agrees with the NSW Crime Commission findings that organised killings are on the rise.
“There are now a growing number of people, or “hit squads’’, prepared to kill for money. A lot more than there used to and that is well known in the NSW police force.
“It used to be that to organise a contract killing you had to go to a very deep underworld network and have someone vouch for you. There were a handful of people like Christopher Dale Flannery who were known to take on the job. It seems easier and more prevalent to organise now.’’
Another problem is the under resourcing of the police force, with the NSW Police Association claiming there are about 500 positions short across Sydney.
“That is 500 street cops gathering intelligence on the street to pass on to detectives to help identify new players and dealers,’’ said another source.
While the Crime Commission has pointed out the staggering profits and reach of organised crime it has gone out of its way not to appropriate blame saying the problem is one of supply and demand and Australia’s ferocious appetite for drugs.
Deep in its annual report from last year, the Commission suggests the solution is not one of arresting people but a totally different approach to the drug problem.
“The problem is not just a law enforcement issue, and requires a more holistic and co-ordinated government response,’’ it stated.
Many have read that as the commission suggesting there be some form of legislation of drugs.
“We know there are people within law enforcement agencies around the country who are subtlety advocating the legalisation of drugs,’’ said a senior NSW police officer.
“It’s not a view shared by senior police in NSW.’’
WA Police to target six worst crime families in Perth to help break cycle
EXCLUSIVE CALLA WAHLQUIST Police Reporter, PerthNow
April 23, 2014 8:39am
WA POLICE will infiltrate the six worst crime families in Perth by monitoring their day-to-day activities in an attempt to “break the cycle of crime”.
The pilot project will see authorities visiting the families in their homes up to six hours a week and forcing them to take part in programs such as drug and alcohol rehab, mental health counselling, parenting courses and anger management.
Families will even be given help to paint their houses and tidy the gardens in an effort to get them on the straight and narrow.
The “very intensive and persistent approach” will also see transport and childcare arranged so family members can make appointments.
Service workers will also observe the “breakfast routine” of the families to make sure children start the day right – going so far as to accompany kids to school to ensure they go to class.
At the end of the 12-month program, children in the family are required to have 90 per cent school attendance rates.
There must also be an appreciable decrease in police call-outs and anti-social behaviour by family members.
WA Police is advertising for a community service provider to take up the challenge. Applications for the $250,000 contract close next month.
It comes after a similar, though less intense, trial in the south east metropolitan district saw police identify and target the 20 “worst” families in the area.
That trial saw local police give their mobile phone number directly to problem families to become a permanent part of their community.
It resulted in a 43 per cent reduction of calls from those homes.
Crime rates for the whole district have fallen four per cent.
The service provider in the new program is required to visit families selected by police three times a week, as well as being permanently on call.
They have to provide weekly verbal reports to police on the family’s progress.
The identity of the families will be kept secret, but police say they need “significant support to reduce intergenerational cycles of poor outcomes, which often results in criminal behaviour.”
It will be a last resort to fix families “for whom interventions may not have been successful in the past”.
Criminology expert Guy Hall, an Associate Professor at Murdoch University, said strategies like this had been proved to have a “dramatic effect” on crime levels.
“The idea of helping people is vastly more effective than the idea of punishment and policing,” he said.
Associate Prof Hall said repainting someone’s house – which might seem trivial – actually reduced criminal behaviour by creating pride in the home and community.
And, by targeting the six worst families, police could drastically reduce the overall level of crime in an area at relatively low cost.
“It’s a very, very small number of offenders who commit the overwhelming majority of offences,” he said.
Acting Deputy Commissioner Paul Zanetti said the program was part of a move toward “proactive problem solving” in WA Police, called Frontline 2020.
The philosophy behind the movement is to free up frontline police officers to target the causes of crime, rather than just cleaning up afterward.
Australian figures linked to Calabrian Mafia revealed; experts warn more police focus needed on organised crime
BY ALISON BRANLEYUPDATED TUE JUL 07 2015
The Calabrian Mafia continues to flourish in Australia despite major police operations.
Australian authorities cannot afford to let their focus on terrorism allow them to become complacent about the reach of the Calabrian Mafia, organised crime experts have warned.
A joint Fairfax/ABC investigation into the Calabrian Mafia has further exposed the influence of the group across Australia.
It found policing authorities have failed to dismantle a "board of directors" of Calabrian Mafia heads across Australia, which has allowed them to continue illicit drug trades, form links with bikie groups, and infiltrate all levels of government.
It has prompted anti-mafia prosecutor Nicola Gratteri to warn that while police around the world focus on terrorism, the tentacles of the Calabrian Mafia could be going unchecked.
"When social alarm is provoked over terrorism, governments are forced to invest in terrorism and not in mafia ... the mafia celebrates because they know there are fewer resources," Dr Gratteri said.
"I think Australia should look at the mafia problem, the 'Ndrangheta problem, again and not measure the presence or the strength of 'Ndrangheta or any mafia by the number of people killed on the street or shootings at shop windows."
Instead, Dr Gratteri said authorities should examine the supply and control of cocaine being sold at bars, pubs and clubs.
VIDEO 0:42Australia 'in denial' about Mafia presence
"Because whoever controls the cocaine, with those earnings they buy all the property for sale. In that way they control the market, they control the economy," he said.
His view is backed by Australian experts past and present who have investigated the mafia dealings.
In the second of a two-part Four Corners series, investigative journalist Nick McKenzie examines the link between a number of Australian politicians, from local to federal government, and alleged Australian Calabrian Mafia figures.
Among them is a former mayor of an area in Perth and a Labor Party figure from Melbourne.
New South Wales police files also reveal the Calabrian Mafia has built close ties to outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs), including the Rebels and Bandidos.
"This is particularly evident with identified connections to the Sydney and North Coast Bandidos OMCG and the Canberra and Batemans Bay Rebels OMCG. There is also intelligence of links to the Finks OMCG through associates," the files state.
Victorian Labor party delegate had close ties to Mafia
The ABC has evidence Victorian Labor Party delegate Michael Teti, who is now an ALP councillor at Moreland City Council in Melbourne, spent months doing banking for and running the fruit business of convicted crime boss Frank Madafferi.
While there is no suggestion Mr Teti was involved in drug trafficking, he allegedly supplied a gun to one of Madafferi's mafia henchmen which was then used to threaten a woman.
Nick McKenzie's brush with the mafia
Mr Teti was later found guilty of carrying a loaded gun in a public place and placed on a good behaviour bond.
Documents obtained show that Mr Teti acted as an adviser and gofer for Madafferi while the mafia boss was facing serious drug trafficking charges.
Madafferi was convicted over the world's largest ever drug bust in 2007, when authorities seized four tonnes of ecstasy tablets imported in tomato cans.
During this period, Mr Teti also secured one of Madafferi's associates a job in federal Labor senator Mehmet Tillem's office.
There is no suggestion Mr Tillem, who is no longer a senator, knew Mr Teti or that his now former employee had close ties to Madafferi.
In March, despite knowledge within the Labor Party of Mr Teti's ties to a crime figure, the ALP invited him as a delegate to the party's state conference, allowing him to vote on policy and party issues.
Following inquiries from the ABC, the ALP said on the weekend it would now seek to expel Mr Teti from its Victorian branch.
Mr Teti denies any wrongdoing and said he only had a professional relationship with Madafferi.
Former WA mayor faces accusations he led mafia cell
Court documents from ongoing proceedings in Italy also show Italian prosecutors allege Tony Vallelonga, who is the former mayor of Stirling in Perth, is the local leader of a mafia cell in Perth.
Court files allege that Mr Vallelonga is responsible for "making the most important decisions, imparting orders or imposing sanctions on other subordinate associates".
The files allege Mr Vallelonga was concerned about a rival who wanted to start his own cell on Mr Vallelonga's turf with the approval of Calabrian bosses.
PHOTO Detective-Superintendent Matt Warren said the mafia was robust and difficult to defeat.
Mr Vallelonga was allegedly recorded in an Italian laundromat recounting a conversation with his competitor where he allegedly said: "As long as I'm alive, you don't get a locale [local mafia cell] ... and that's that!"
To which his rival responded: "You can't be the man any more ... enough!"
It comes after the prosecutors sought to question Mr Vallelonga over his dealings in Calabria with a notorious mafia boss.
Mr Valleonga has always denied the allegations and in a statement sent to the ABC, Mr Vallelonga's lawyer said any allegation the former mayor had ever been involved in criminal activity was "completely without any foundation".
Outside of the political arena, Italian police have identified another Australian allegedly working in Calabria who is part of the influential Alvaro family.
Some members of the family were recently subjects of an international anti-mafia operation when authorities seized tonnes of cocaine and made dozens of arrests.
Confidential Italian and Australian police files state that the Alvaro clan has arms in Australia.
They are allegedly headed by Adelaide construction figure Paul Alvaro, 64, and a New South Wales man.
The pair are among figures around the country, including in Griffith, New South Wales.
A police assessment said the individuals operate as "an executive board of directors" for the Calabrian Mafia.
Police focus on organised crime needed, say experts
Experts both local and abroad have suggested law enforcement authorities need to allocate more resources to keeping organised crime in check.
A 2013 multi-agency report warned that "'Ndrangheta Transnational Australian Groups posed a major organised crime risk to Australia".
Former New South Wales police assistant commissioner Clive Small investigated the Calabrian Mafia as part of the Woodward Royal Commission.
He said authorities had been denying for 16 years there was Calabrian Mafia in Australia and had ignored recommendations to set up a long-term anti-mafia offensive.
"If we say it doesn't exist, then we don't have to do anything because there's nothing to respond to and I think that's the problem," he said.
"It's been hidden from the public because it's too big a political problem."
Detective Superintendent Matt Warren, who led Australia's biggest mafia bust, said the mafia was robust and could regroup better than any other organised crime syndicate after major convictions.
"What we've seen is that these groups are very difficult to defeat," he said.
"In the past where they've suffered defeats at the hands of law enforcement ... through those family connections they're able to rebuild.
"They will reorganise and they'll continue to conduct unlawful activity, drug importations, white collar crime, because it's their business."
Their concern echoes a classified 2003 National Crime Authority report obtained by the ABC.
"It is suggested that they [Australia's mafia cells] will neither decline nor cease their activities in the foreseeable future due to their long entrenched history in criminality in Australia, the steady market demand for cannabis and other illicit drugs and the diversion of law enforcement efforts to other areas," it states.
Detective Superintendent Warren said the mafia would try to cultivate people from all walks of life, particularly those with influence.
"We certainly see organised crime figures cultivating sporting stars. It's no different with political figures," he said.
"They're looking to try and gain influence and gain power and use that towards potentially diverting attention away from themselves."
Mr Small was surprised by the amount of contact mafia figures had with Australian politicians.
"I can't believe our politicians are so dopey that, having known the allegations, that they continued to have a fund, to accept money from a fundraiser," he said.
"I find that so extremely difficult to understand how they could do it or how they could be so naïve."
POSTED MON JUL 06
Hunted Kizon stays 'bulletproof'
GARY ADSHEAD and SEAN COWAN - The West Australian on May 23, 2010,
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7276033/hunted-kizon-stays-bulletproof/
John Kizon, left, with Fabian Quaid and Troy Mercanti
Video Overview
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/video/-/watch/19926587
John Kizon has a reputation for using phone boxes all over Perth, which might explain why his fancy-dress costume of choice on at least one occasion was a Superman outfit.
The 48-year-old, who once featured in a newspaper story about unexplained wealth laws under the headline "Catch me if you can", is one of WA's most recognisable men.
The 2001 headline, complete with a photograph of Kizon belting a punching bag in his private gym, was soon on display in a police conference room and became a source of motivation for senior detectives hunting him.
"Keep your eyes on the prize," Assistant Commissioner Tim Atherton would say while gesturing towards the article. "Keep your eyes on the prize, boys."
But after two decades spent eyeing off the "prize", the WA Police, Federal Police, National Crime Authority and Australian Crime Commission have seen it disappear out of sight time and time again.
Since 1986, operations Hydrogen, Barrator, Interstice, Harpy, Red Emperor, Sweet Lip, Self-Lock, Radix, Shell, Synecdoche, Sweep, Blade, Schumacher, Cyclamen, Swampy, Slalom, Turkana, Mascot and others have all been aimed at Kizon, his associates or both.
Police have looked at his business connections to Indonesia, which included dealings with a man named Eddie Dharma and family members of the former Suharto regime. They've bugged his phones, his cars and even his bedrooms. Detectives who have entered his properties secretly or otherwise still chortle about the photo on Kizon's lounge room wall of New York mafia "boss of bosses" John Gotti. Kizon doesn't find it funny.
"Kids in children's hospitals don't have facilities, old people have been thrown out of their homes by this Government because of a personal vendetta against me," Kizon said after walking free on drug conspiracy charges in 1999. "There are police officers in the Federal Police and the WA Police who have sinister motives in targeting personalities."
He has made similar comments in the years since, most recently in March when he beat insider trading charges from an ACC investigation. "I was the one who was hunted," he said. "Now, Mr Kizon's going to be the hunter."
He has been pursued because police believe he is at the very top of what they refer to as the Kizon Group or Kizon Network. Drug dealers in the network were said to be turning over more than $1.4 million each a year just in amphetamines. Much of it has come from Sydney on furniture trucks and a particular Northbridge nightclub has been a key hub for the distribution of speed and other illicit drugs.
To Kizon it's all lies, and the many investigations into him are a waste of taxpayers' money. Operation Barrator found in 2003 that he was not involved in the day-to-day trafficking of illicit drugs but was closely aligned with people who were.
Like Superman, he has become seemingly bulletproof. The same can't be said for two of his closest confidants, who posed with him for the superheroes snap.
Under the Batman cowl is Fabian Quaid, also a good mate of footballer and self-confessed drug addict Ben Cousins. Behind the Spiderman mask is former Coffin Cheater-turned-Fink bikie Troy Desmond Mercanti. Both are now behind bars, reportedly in Casuarina Prison's highly restrictive special handling unit.
Mercanti, who dodged a sniper's bullet in 2008 as part of the fallout from his Coffin Cheaters expulsion, could be out next year after doing a three-year stretch for assault.
Quaid is "on a long holiday", as one of his relatives was recently overheard saying, until at least 2018 for his part in importing 60kg of MDMA powder - enough to make at least 350,000 ecstasy pills and make between $14 million and $24 million in drug deals.
But the so-called network is made up of more than just a handful of people and its influence reaches into the upper echelons of business, politics and sport. It also stretches much further than Australia's borders and, for the first time, The West Australian will reveal details of the network's international connection and the identity of the "Mr Big" behind it.
John Kizon hasn't always been Teflon. As a teenager, he had brushes with the law, including driving offences that culminated in his licence being suspended when he illegally parked his panel van in Supreme Court Gardens.
In October 1981, police found cash in a yellow sports bag hidden in his bedroom wardrobe at the family's Balcatta home. An analysis of the money and the bag revealed traces of heroin. On his lawyers' advice, he would plead guilty to possessing money from the sale of heroin and resisting arrest and be jailed for 15 months, but only after he had been arrested and jailed over a separate drug bust.
A promising middleweight boxer, already with a State title under his belt, who hoped to make the Brisbane Commonwealth Games in the same year of his incarceration, Kizon and associate Craig Patrick Martin had bolted from a Triumph TR-7 sports car at a Morley intersection when police pulled alongside them.
The pair left behind $900 in cash from a drug deal done nearby. Kizon was nabbed when a detective fired a warning shot, but Martin kept running and was arrested several weeks later. This week, Kizon said he had been waiting in the car listening to Jimmy Barnes when Martin went into a Morley house, returning a few minutes later with the money. But he wouldn't tell that to the cops at the time because it went against his code. "My old man told me you are responsible for your own actions - if you are in trouble, you cop it on the chin," he said.
Watching his son a week short of his 20th birthday being sentenced to five years jail was an emotional experience for Kizon's father, George, a Greek-Macedonian migrant. "He is only 19," George Kizon said at the time of the court case. "He would not know what heroin looked like."
These days John Kizon, or JK, as he is widely known, fumes when his criminal history gets aired in the media. He argues that it's unfair to drag up his past over and over.
"Hey, what are ya doin' ya f...in' rat," he screamed down one reporter's mobile phone in 2006. "Who you f...in' baggin' you c...-suckin' c.... F...in' c..., f...in' c...-sucker. Wanna bag me in the f...in' paper and talk to me, ya f...in' dog."
The Kizon clan migrated to Perth in 1949 aboard a passenger ship which sailed from Egypt. The ship's manifest had the family listed under the name of Kizov. John Kizon was born in Melbourne and was 16 when his family, originally from Florina in present day northern Greece, returned to Perth from the rough-and-tumble streets of Fitzroy. He finished his schooling at Balcatta Senior High School. Kizon had close friends who also went to Balcatta, including his younger mate Raimond Fazio, a quality boxer with some powerful connections.
Disgraced former premier Brian Burke was a good friend of the Fazio family and sponsored Rai at his Catholic confirmation. As the MP for Balga, Mr Burke met Rai's father Joe, who trained boxers at his Balga gymnasium. When Rai finished school he got a job in the Burke Government's car pool.
By 1984, Burke was running WA and John Kizon was running foul of the law again. He had only been out of prison for a matter of weeks and was still on parole when he and his brother Victor brawled with brothers Wayne and John Stampalia, former friends who had fallen out over a horse. According to Kizon, the brothers had an altercation with his father at Gloucester Park while he was in jail. "When I got out of jail, I confronted them and they came out second best," he said.
The Stampalias spent four nights in hospital with broken bones while the Kizon brothers spent up to two years in jail from 1985. On Perth streets, detectives were starting to hear more and more about the boy from Balcatta and the circles in which he moved.
A notorious photograph taken around this time shows Kizon, Craig Martin and a man called Doug McAllister standing side-by-side and armed to the teeth. McAllister, in the middle with a handgun and a machine-gun, died in 1991 of a heroin overdose.
In late 1988, Kizon's father had his own experience of being enmeshed in WA's drug trade. George Kizon was arrested at a marijuana crop in Gingin with Balcatta associate Ivan Jack Marinovich - one of Perth's cannabis kings - and boxer Tony Pitassi. Marinovich and Pitassi went down for the crime, but George Kizon was found not guilty and John Kizon was at his side when he walked free from court in late 1989.
Shortly after his father's acquittal, Kizon took an overseas holiday before returning to launch a boxing promotion business with his good friend Rai Fazio towards the end of the year. But it would emerge that Kizon was also busy with his next illegal enterprise - opening bank accounts in false names to channel what prosecutors said in court was about $300,000 of crime proceeds.
"Of course, we are talking about drug-related monies," the prosecutor said in court. Kizon said the money was gambling profits he was holding on behalf of a syndicate for which he was a bagman.
The seven bank accounts couldn't have been set up without the help of an attractive R&I Bank employee, Lana Scaturro, who had once been Kizon's girlfriend, and a list of aliases, which included the names of movie characters like Tony Montana - the tempestuous cocaine drug lord played by Al Pacino in Scarface. Other false identities police have recorded against Kizon's name over the years include John Conti, John Dixon, John Gotti and John Ritz.
Before pleading guilty to 16 bank account charges, Kizon and the bank employee admitted making false declarations by using fake names during a prison visit in January 1989 to see Marinovich. For that offence they were fined.
But for the more serious crimes, the bank worker was given another fine and a good behaviour bond while Kizon went back to jail in 1990 - this time for a year.
Within days of his release in August 1991, Kizon was hit with a tax bill of almost $800,000 from the Australian Taxation Office. Another government agency, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, wanted to confiscate the $300,000 held in the fake bank accounts under proceeds of crime laws. The DPP also wanted the $126,000 the money had already earned in interest. It was a classic double dip into Kizon's cash assets. Remembering that Kizon had already claimed the cash was from gambling wins, the Supreme Court said there was no evidence the proceeds were from drug deals and only allowed the DPP to take $50,000. It would be four years before Kizon negotiated an agreement with the ATO.
From there, he turned his entrepreneurial talents to the nightclub game and by November 1993 he had formed Elevation Holdings with Rai Fazio. The pair opened an underage nightclub on Roe Street, Northbridge, but interestingly it was Kizon's mother Marika (aka Mary) whose name appeared on the company documents.
For the record, Kizon has never owned a property under his moniker except for a short time when his grandfather gave him and Victor a family home in Balcatta, citing his "natural love and affection" for them as the price paid on the transfer document. Only one private company with which he's been associated, All Mediation Services, has carried his name as a director or shareholder. Even his cars and phone lines have a history of being registered in other names.
Leading up to the Elevation nightclub project there was a slight distraction which stemmed from a punch-up at a different Northbridge club called The Freezer. Kizon had been charged in June 1992 with one his closest friends, Craig Anthony Christian, over the assault of dancer Glenn Stannard. Rather than hanging around Perth and sulking about the charges, Kizon, Christian and friend Michael Francis Rippingale headed overseas to the Greek island of Mykonos for a holiday. Trouble followed and in the town of Syros a nightclub bouncer had his jaw broken during a dispute with Kizon, apparently over the club's cover charge. The Australian tourist was convicted of causing dangerous bodily injuries and satisfied his sentence by paying about $20,000.
Back in Perth, Christian and Kizon pleaded not guilty to assaulting Stannard and were acquitted in November 1993, when a doorman gave evidence that he was the one who punched Stannard for acting aggressively towards Christian. Magistrate Ivan Brown said Stannard's credibility had been destroyed after he admitted taking five lines of amphetamines.
Months later, Kizon and Rai Fazio were accused of breaking the jaw of a teenager outside Elevation. The charge against Fazio was later dropped and at Kizon's trial a club doorman said that he, and not Kizon, threw the damaging punch.
Kizon walked free and the doorman, Gavin Hanley, became known as "Gateway Gav". Hanley denied he was taking the rap for Kizon. "I would not take the rap for him and would not expect him to take the rap for me," he said.
To this day, detectives who worked on that assault case remain bewildered by the fact Kizon was sitting next to his Melbourne-based lawyer George Defteros at Northbridge's Valentino's Cafe when they moved in to arrest him. It was as though he knew the cops were coming.
'My horde of colourful mates draws cops to me'
John Kizon says police know he is not involved in the drug business and says he draws so much attention because of his choice of friends and his upfront manner.
Read the full story
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/7289119
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/7289119
NEALE PRIOR - Yahoo7 on May 25, 2010,
John Kizon says police know he is not involved in the drug business and says he draws so much attention because of his choice of friends and his upfront manner.
The leading Perth crime target said he was involved in an array of business activities in Australia and Indonesia, including mining deals, and authorities knew they were legitimate.
"If I wasn't, they would have arrested me a long time ago," he said. "The police know I don't do drugs and they have known it for a long time."
With a Greek-Macedonian heritage, he was born and raised in the tough Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy before moving across to Perth at age 16 and emerging as a promising young boxer.
Instead of gaining international renown as a pugilist, the seeds of a different fame were sown when he was jailed in 1982 for heroin offences and in 1990 for charges related to setting up bank accounts in bogus names.
Prosecutors alleged the accounts were set up to channel drug money. He has since been a major target of Federal and State law enforcement authorities but has beaten an array of charges, including insider trading and assault.
Kizon said his 1982 convictions were the result of him being young and naive. He said his first conviction arose from him agreeing to drive a boxing gym acquaintance, Craig Patrick Martin, to a house in Morley and Martin emerging from the house with $900.
Kizon said Martin ran off when they were pulled over by armed police shortly after and left the cash in the car, jammed under the passenger seat window winder.
Citing the rules of Fitzroy's streets and the teachings of his immigrant father George never to dob on anyone, Kizon refused to tell the officers whose money it was and ignored his lawyer's advice at the trial to testify that it was Martin's money.
"My old man told me you are responsible for your own actions — if you are in trouble, you cop it on the chin," he said. "I would not even say 'Craig picked the money up from the house'."
He was jailed for five years in March, 1982, after being convicted of selling/supplying heroin.
He was also facing charges arising from police finding a sports bag in his bedroom wardrobe containing cash with traces of heroin.
After being convicted of the Martin-related charge, Kizon said he accepted his lawyer's advice to plead guilty to the sports bag charges so his sentences could be served concurrently.
"I was 18 years old, a bit naive and copped it in the arse," he said.
Kizon said law enforcement agencies had wasted millions of dollars over the past two decades trying to get him just because he had a colourful group of friends.
He said he built relationships with people regardless of their race or religion and had extensive business interests in Indonesia, including mining-related investments.
"I have a lot of friends — Muslim friends, Christian friends and I am Orthodox myself," he said. "When people say what religion are you, I say Fitzroy."
The 48-year-old said he got on with all the bikie "crews", many of whom he counted as friends, and was willing to help when tensions came to the surface.
"I like everyone to live in harmony," he said. "I don’t stick my head in bikie business but if I see a couple of friends who don't get on, I say, do you need the help of an older head."
Organised crime in NSW at levels not seen previously as state loses war on drugs
MARK MORRI, Crime Editor, The Daily Telegraph - January 27, 2017
SYDNEY’S senior law enforcement agency has made the astonishing admission that they have lost the war on drugs.
The Saturday Telegraph can today reveal exclusively that organised crime in NSW is “out of control” and anti-drug agencies are failing dismally to stem the tsunami of narcotics flooding our streets.
We can also reveal the number of drug lords operating in Sydney has soared to 607, and law enforcement officers are unable to track them due to the criminals’ use of hi-tech encrypted phones.
The shocking revelations follow a recent report by the NSW Crime Commission which says “organised crime is at levels not seen previously in NSW”.
Where the drugs come from
Cocaine: Controlled by Mexican and South American drug cartels
The report found the rise of “public enemies” was “almost entirely driven by the prohibited drugs market”.
“Methamphetamine (ice) and cocaine supplies are high and prices for both are considerably lower than five years ago,” the report says.
“Offshore interests decide the volume of drugs that are imported into Australia and the domestic drug consumption market will consume whatever is available.
“When an oversupply occurs, the result is a reduction in the price of prohibited drugs, which is precisely what we are seeing at present.
“Commendable law enforcement efforts around the country have resulted in larger seizures and more arrests, but they have had little, if any, effect on the quantities of prohibited drugs available for consumption in Australia.”
The commission’s report reveals part of the problem is the number of drug lords who live overseas out of the reach of law enforcement.
Organised crime in this state and the rest of the country is
out of control and cannot be stopped
without a radical change — NSW Crime Commission
“The commission has not observed any offshore principals being prosecuted for serious drug related importations in the past 12 months,” the report says.
“The prosecution of offshore principals is complex, costly and generally beyond the capability of state agencies.”
Instead, low-level “foot soldiers” are arrested in Australia, creating good publicity for the police but not making a dent in the problem.
The report also warns that murder is becoming easier, not harder, for the drug bosses.
“The ability to raise vast amounts of cash enables organised crime groups to source weapons and employ persons prepared to undertake murder for profit,” it says.
“These types of murders are problematic as, more often than not, encrypted communications have been used by the offender or the victim, which hampers the efforts of investigators.”
Murdered: Bikie drugs boss Wayne Schneider.
The commission’s horrifying admission is at odds with claims by NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione that crime in the state is going down.
“According to statistical reporting, mainstream crime has been slowly reduced over time … however, the observed situation in relation to organised crime is considered to be the opposite,” the report says.
One senior law enforcement officer said: “The chances of having your car stolen or house broken into” may have dropped “but the chances your children will get hooked on drugs are a lot higher”.
“There is no way of sugar-coating it. Organised crime in this state and the rest of the country is out of control and cannot be stopped without a radical change.”
The shocking white flag follows a series of brazen public murders in Sydney in which gangsters have been gunned down in public, and there are warnings more murders will follow as the multibillion-dollar drugs turf war escalates.
“The money they are making is obscene. There are runners coming over here from China, Mexico, Dubai and eastern Europe. They’re picking up and laundering millions of dollars a week. And that’s only what we know about or detect.” - Crime Commission Insider
The commission recently added 20 new names to its list of drug bosses, with only two scratched because they were murdered: former Hells Angel Wayne Schneider, who was killed in Thailand, and Wally Ahmad, who was gunned down last year in a shopping centre cafe.
Since the report was compiled, mafia figure Pasquale Barbaro was executed on an Earlwood street.
About 150 of the 607 drug lords are so dangerous and erratic they are under “active investigation” to prevent bloodshed, the report says.
But many of them are not even living in Sydney. Instead, they are running drug operations from places such as Dubai and China, making it virtually impossible for local police to bring them down.
Murdered: Mafia thug Pasquale Barbaro
“They learn their trade here, make contacts and then go overseas — especially if they know we are getting close to them,” our senior law enforcement insider said.
Some members of Middle Eastern crime families such as the infamous Elmirs, Kallaches, Alameddines and the Ahmads are all part of the 607 list. There are several women too.
Senior bikies from the Hells Angels, Nomads and Comancheros are also on the list — as are Chinese crime figures from a gang known as “The Company’’.
“The money they are making is obscene,” a senior law enforcement source told The Saturday Telegraph. “There are runners coming over here from China, Mexico, Dubai and eastern Europe. They’re picking up and laundering millions of dollars a week. And that’s only what we know about or detect.”
Murdered: Drugs kingpin Walid Ahmed.
Another senior law enforcement insider agreed. “We are not losing the war on drugs, we have lost it,” he said.
The state’s Crime Commander, Assistant Commissioner Mark Jenkins, said it was vital to co-operate with overseas agencies.
“Criminals don’t respect borders, so our law enforcement relationships, both in Australia and across the globe, have to be strong and open,” he said.
“We are doing everything we can to reduce organised crime in NSW, but the most significant change we need is societal.
“While there is a demand for illicit drugs, there will be criminal groups willing to supply it. If no one wants to buy drugs, they’ll have no business.”
The Saturday Telegraph cannot reveal the names of many of the big drug players for legal reasons. However former Comanchero bikie boss Mark Buddle (who is living in Turkey) and drug dealer Hakan Ayi are believed to be on the list.
FIVE minutes. That’s how long it took The Saturday Telegraph to log onto the mysterious “dark web” this week to find a “military grade” encrypted BlackBerry mobile phone for sale — the device Sydney drug lords use to deal narcotics outside of police surveillance.
For $1400, AlphaBay users can buy the device, which boasts features such as the ability to “fully wipe if the password is incorrectly entered six times”.
“Our server has no treaty to law enforcement agencies,” the seller claims. The advertisement even says the phones are available with “free shipping” within Australia.
The dark web is a secret part of the internet available only through specific search engines, such as Thor, that can be downloaded.
Users can’t be traced and its multiple “black markets” are rife with everything from drugs to stolen goods.
Our shocking revelation comes as the NSW Crime Commission warns that “encrypted communication by organised crime continues to increase”.
In 2007, there were only about 30 BlackBerries in use in NSW. That number has skyrocketed to 5000.
“The primary communication devices preferred by organised crime are encrypted BlackBerries,” the commission warns. “The use of the BlackBerry facility costs approximately $2000 to $2500 over the course of six months.
“With such a high cost, the Crime Commission has not detected any legitimate commercial use of these devices. Their continued use and availability suggests an increased prevalence of organised crime activity in NSW.”
Commission boss Peter Hastings said the rise of encrypted devices had rendered traditional police surveillance techniques useless.
“This has a consequential effect on the examinations conducted by the Commission, which tend to be less effective when there is a lack of corroborative material, such as intercepted ... conversations, to test the veracity of accounts provided by witnesses,” he warned
Heroin kings crowned, mules executed
Tony Trajkoski and Paul Musarri in jail in 2003.
Heroin pusher and gambler Paul Musarri didn't trust banks and would keep his ill-gotten gains stashed in his mattress. By early 1983, the padding was again feeling thin.
But a middle-aged driving instructor who moonlighted as a marijuana dealer would be his saviour. Her name was Glenys Bennett and she would become one of his drug mules.
On her first trip to Malaysia, in May that year to pick up 2kg of heroin, she was accompanied by the middleman who connected Musarri with the Golden Triangle.
Girolamo "Gerry" Maio made millions out of those connections until he was finally jailed for 18 years in Melbourne after being nabbed with two Malaysian men and $9.7 million worth of heroin.
Read the full story
https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/7309017/heroin-kings-crowned-mules-executed/
Heroin kings crowned, mules executed
SEAN COWAN and GARY ADSHEAD - The West Australian on May 28, 2010,
Heroin pusher and gambler Paul Musarri didn't trust banks and would keep his ill-gotten gains stashed in his mattress. By early 1983, the padding was again feeling thin.
But a middle-aged driving instructor who moonlighted as a marijuana dealer would be his saviour. Her name was Glenys Bennett and she would become one of his drug mules.
On her first trip to Malaysia, in May that year to pick up 2kg of heroin, she was accompanied by the middleman who connected Musarri with the Golden Triangle. Girolamo "Gerry" Maio made millions out of those connections until he was finally jailed for 18 years in Melbourne after being nabbed with two Malaysian men and $9.7 million worth of heroin.
In August 1983, Bennett took her second trip to Malaysia, this time accompanied by Giovanni Garoffolo, whose pockets were stuffed with $30,000 in cash. At the Rasa Sayang Hotel on Penang's Batu Ferringhi strip, they met a man named "Charlie" and handed over the money. In return, he gave them a 2.4kg package.
But this trip would turn sour. On their arrival back in Perth, Bennett and Garoffolo were allowed straight through Customs. Bennett went home and unstrapped the heroin from her chest. Later that night, Garoffolo and Musarri arrived to pick it up despite spotting detectives hiding nearby. They grabbed the package and made a run for it before being caught when a high-speed chase came to a sudden end.
It would be a year before the trio would be sent to jail - Musarri and Garoffolo for 15 years, and Bennett for 10 years. In the meantime, they were out on bail and Charlie was still a free man. According to the 1989 book This Little Piggy Stayed Home, Charlie had kept 179g of pure heroin from that last package and buried it beneath a tree on Ferringhi Beach. He had been acting on orders from Musarri, who had never been shy when it came to cutting his partners out of the action.
Charlie's real name was Brian Geoffrey Shergold Chambers and that batch of heroin would be the death of him.
John Asciak first met Musarri in the early 1970s. Their paths had crossed in the gambling clubs where Asciak, an Italian-Maltese child migrant and lifelong criminal, spent much of his time. Later, Asciak would work at a restaurant linked to Musarri where he would watch some of Perth's first heroin importation deals being planned. Most were organised by Musarri and many were carried out by Chambers.
But just as these deals were being done, Asciak was forced to flee the State. He finally returned in August, 1983, just before Musarri, Garoffolo and Bennett were arrested, and became Musarri's hired muscle. In the weeks that followed, Musarri was out on bail and gambling big. It all added up to another run to Malaysia. Chambers was in, naturally, but they needed another courier. Enter Kevin John Barlow.
An English migrant who had escaped family life in Adelaide, Barlow met Musarri and Asciak while boarding with Asciak's girlfriend in Balcatta. He wasn't the perfect choice and Chambers knew it, but Musarri was desperate for the cash after blowing $5000 of Maio's money on a previous aborted run. The plan was to dig up the heroin Chambers had buried beneath the tree earlier that year. Chambers, a junkie, was just as desperate for a hit and Barlow, a no-hoper who owed money to his landlady and his car financier, was weakened by depression after being dumped by his girlfriend.
The trip was a disaster. Barlow and Chambers were arrested at Penang airport on November 9, 1983 and hanged on July 7, 1986 - the first Westerners to be executed in Malaysia since World War II. While Australian Federal Police seemed disinterested in investigating further, the new National Crime Authority decided to pursue the men behind the Barlow and Chambers syndicate.
The NCA had other reasons to focus on WA. Abraham Gilbert Saffron - aka Mr Sin or the King of the Cross - was spending much of his time here after buying the Raffles Hotel and was being investigated for bribing a senior NSW policeman. In 1987, Saffron was arrested at the hotel.
A year later, Asciak was convicted in Australia of conspiring with Barlow and Chambers to import 179g of heroin into Australia and jailed for 10 years.
Musarri and Maio, were both acquitted of organising Bennett's first heroin importation and served the sentences they were already facing. Musarri was never charged over the Barlow and Chambers affair.
Released from jail in 1992 on parole, Musarri went back to drug dealing and was arrested almost immediately on new heroin charges and jailed for three years. Another jail stint was added in 1993 and, after being released four years later, he was arrested again on three separate drugs charges in 2000. Codenamed Mender, a police operation snared him doing one of his deals with Lennard Mark Kirby, then the national president of the Gypsy Jokers outlaw bikie gang. One other deal was with a man who, with his brother, is behind Perth's fledgling Comancheros bikie gang. Musarri had become a big fish. But he was too greedy and easy to land.
Now 61, Musarri is not due for full release until 2018, but he has had the privilege of being able to spend plenty of time with his children while behind bars. Two of them, Aaron and Jacob, have shared his fate, as has his close friend and fellow drug dealer Tony Trajkoski.
Asciak, meanwhile, decided to align himself with long-time dealer Lindsay Treby, known as the "million dollar milko" because of the milk business he used as a front for other activities. But Treby, who had lent Musarri money for the ill-fated Barlow and Chambers trip, was jailed for heroin offences in 1986 and again in 1987. When his milk firm was pulled apart the following year - as part of a move by regulators to force undesirables out of the dairy industry - it revealed more connections to the heroin game than the milk trade.
Documents produced in court showed Treby's company had put up $30,000 to bail out associate Natale Frisina, who was on heroin charges in NSW. Frisina would later get eight years for that crime and a further three years for marijuana offences in WA. Other loans involving the business included $105,000 to Musarri, while the business received $25,000 from convicted heroin dealer Lawrence Bilick.
During the late 1980s, police locked up many of WA's big heroin traffickers. Among them were the Malkoun brothers, Amad, Elie and Joseph, who were behind Zuzu's Nightclub in William Street and a cross-country drug syndicate.
The brothers were born in Lebanon and moved to Australia with their parents in 1968, living first in Melbourne where keen bodybuilders Elie and Amad worked as nightclub bouncers.
Amad, who was also a kickboxer, later moved to WA and bought into Zuzu's as well as the Whiskey Au Go-Go nightclub in Rockingham. Despite Zuzu's inability to make money, Amad's wealth steadily grew. By the time the brothers were busted in an NCA operation in 1988, he owned a big colonial home in Bassendean, several other Perth properties, an 8.8m speedboat and a $90,000 cabin cruiser called White Falcon which was used as a chase boat during the America's Cup races off Fremantle.
The wealth came from heroin, which the brothers bought in Melbourne from Sydney-based Chinese triads for $6000 an ounce, mixed with other substances and sold for $20,000 an ounce in Perth. Some had also come in cars shipped from Lebanon.
Heroin with a street value of $5.5 million was recovered during NCA raids in Perth and Melbourne. Elie and Amad Malkoun pleaded guilty to heroin trafficking and were each sentenced to 18 years jail. Joseph was found guilty at trial and given a six-year jail term. With the likes of Musarri, Maio, Garoffolo, Treby, Asciak, Frisina and the Malkouns in jail, there were now just a handful of kingpins to be caught.
Four names were at the top of the police hit list. The first was Ralph Romeo, who would eventually go to jail in 1989. The second was sprint car driver Tony Matta, whose connections in Perth's underworld ran deep. Though he denies it to this day, police believe money was laundered through gold mining tenements, which were held in Matta's own name or the name of friend Edmundo "Capone" Censori - a violent Melbourne criminal whose brothers both had heroin convictions. The tenement holders simply used their dirty money to buy gold from brokers, then declared the gold had been discovered on their tenement and sold it to the mint. The money they received was clean.
But in 1988, Matta associate Allen Harriman was caught and jailed for 11 years for smuggling heroin through the post from Thailand. Police found Harriman had been driving a car which he once sold to Matta, buying it back again at a later date. Matta had also replaced him on the board of a public company after his arrest. Police were getting close.
It took another three years to catch Matta. He was finally arrested after he procured a friend to buy four ounces of heroin from an undercover Customs officer. He was also convicted of possessing heroin and attempting to possess heroin and was jailed for 12 years.
By that stage, the gold scam had also been exposed. The laws had been tightened and dealers could no longer use their drug money to buy bullion from brokers because the sales had to be reported. But Matta's associates had all washed plenty of cash over the years. It seems every convicted dealer had applied for a licence to prospect on crown land or for their own tenement at some stage.
Those who were funnelling dirty money through gold included marijuana growers like Tony Pitassi and Ray Yaksich.
Another duo in on the scam was Ivan Jack Marinovich and Giuseppe "Joe" Cardile - two of the most significant figures in Perth's drug scene.
Meanwhile, Asciak's life and crimes came to an abrupt end this year on February 9 when it is believed he suffered a heart attack at his Willetton house. The man whose name is permanently etched in the history of WA's underbelly only attracted one death notice.
Bert and Laurie Tudori and Carl Rispoli
https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/7302938/gambling-and-heroin-pave-road-to-riches/
Club owner Carl Rispoli of Godfathers night club.
It's 1938 and Italian migrant Giuseppe Rocco Rispoli is eyeballing a Northbridge building as a possible illegal gambling club.
The location is perfect but there's a problem. The bank which owns it told the dapper 27-year-old from Calabria he can rent 155 James Street on one condition: he must open a food store rather than a club. The last tenant tried to run a gambling den until police raided it so often it was forced to close. The bank didn’t want history repeating.
"It was a good spot for my club, though," Rispoli wrote in his memoirs before his death in 2005, "so I went to see if a friend of mine could help me."
Arthur Gallagher was a good friend to have. He was a WA police officer who had known Rispoli since their days in Wiluna, where one was the town barber and the other was the local cop.
"I talked to Arthur about the premises in James Street that I wanted to run as a club," Rispoli wrote. "Arthur was a great friend of mine so he told me he’d see what he could do."
The Rispoli memoirs, revealed in The West Australian for the first time, say the police officer visited the bank's manager.
"Arthur then came and saw me and told me to go and see Mr Clark (the bank manager) again," Rispoli wrote. "When I next see Mr Clark he said: 'Come in Mr Rispoli. You’ve got a good friend. The keys are here, you can do what you like'."
The Rispolis' infamous Roma Club was born and so, it could be argued, was Perth's underbelly.
Only World War II and the internment of migrants such as Rispoli, a member of the pro-Mussolini fascist Black Shirts, put a hold on the spread of Perth's colourful illegal gambling venues. Once the war ended, it was business as usual and by the time the swinging 60s came along, Rispoli was entrenched in his second club.
He and his brother Vince, a partner in Roma, had fallen out and Rispoli found a new James Street location to start Il Trovatore, one of a handful of clubs in Northbridge before Burswood Casino stole the market. Others were the International Club, Club 27, the Latin Quarter and the Patris Club.
Another memorable character from those lively days was Rocco "Ginger" Antonetti, the boss of Ginger's in William Street for 20 years after migrating to Australia in 1952 from Fondi, a town half way between Rome and Naples. But it was Il Trovatore which drew the biggest crowds and the most attention from police.
"I had gambling in the club but, of course, that was illegal," Rispoli recalled. "The police would raid the club. It was something that would happen regularly and it was just part of doing business.
"I had connections in the police force who would let me know about an upcoming raid on our club so we could make sure we were seen to be doing the right thing on that night."
Nowhere in his memoirs does Rispoli discuss what the police wanted for tipping off the illegal club bosses, but he gives more than a hint that money changed hands.
"I never resented the inconvenience of the raids or the arrangements with the police," he wrote. "It was a good arrangement. If they arrested us, we'd go to court and the magistrate would fine us 20 or 50 pounds, sometimes 100 pounds.
"But we were mostly protected by the police."
Stepping up from illegal gambling, by the mid-1940s, organised crime in WA had graduated to murder. Visiting Sydney standover man George "The Midnight Raider" Wallace was stabbed in a toilet outside Perth’s European Club. He died two weeks later after refusing to name his killer or the motive for the attack.
But unlike the waves of organised crime violence in the Eastern States, Perth's underbelly has only had the occasional murder, usually from turf wars, personality clashes or disputes over money. Much more common were bashings, stabbings and intimidation, especially by the local gangs who ran prostitution rackets and collected their take from the poor Northbridge shop owners.
Rispoli, meanwhile, never considered himself a criminal for simply running a gambling club.
He said in his memoirs he had always resisted Perth's "mafia", which was also referred to as the Black Hand. Of Sicilian origin, the mafia was rumoured to have been established in WA as early as 1922. The Calabrian crime organisation L’Onorata, or Honoured Society, came later.
In 1956, the murder of Archangelo Macri near Russell Square in Northbridge had mafia overtones. He was stabbed with a long, double-edged blade by Salvatore Stillitano and screamed "Mama mia, he has killed me" as he fell to the bitumen. Their feud stretched back to the old country and the Italians of Northbridge kept their mouths shut while police investigated. The southern Italian code of silence, or "omerta", still applied in Australia.
Even Rispoli could not avoid the local mafia altogether. Once he intervened to help a doctor friend who was being stood over. He showed one of his patrons, tough guy Mick Pellegrini, an extortion note from the Black Hand. Pellegrini then went to the mafia boss, who agreed to leave the doctor alone.
"The boss told Mick that he could tell the doctor to sleep with two pillows from now on — an Italian saying that means he can sleep easy," Rispoli said in his memoirs.
Even if the mafia was frozen out of Il Trovatore officially, unofficially many criminal connections were made inside the cabaret lounge. Some would go down in history.
Before Rispoli cut his ties to the club in January 1983, there was another fracture in his family and this time another iconic Northbridge name was embroiled in the trouble.
Bert Tudor at Topolino Coffee Bar
The Tudori brothers, Bert and Laurie, who had run the Zanzibar in Northbridge since the 1960s, became partners in Il Trovatore in the 1970s despite Joe Rispoli claiming in his memoirs that he was unhappy about the arrangement. Vince Rispoli had married a Tudori and so they had become family.
"I didn’t trust them and I don’t think Vince trusted them either, but he didn't want to admit it because they were his wife’s brothers," Rispoli wrote. "Things were not good after that. My son Ricki was in charge one night and he told me that $2000 was missing from the takings and that he’d seen one of the brothers-in-law take it."
Rispoli did not say whether it was Bert Tudori, the brother who became Perth’s deputy lord mayor.
In the end, plans to license a casino at Burswood in the early 1980s made Joe Rispoli's decision to pull out of Il Trovatore easy.
The memoirs say that the then police commissioner told Rispoli his club's days were over. By that stage, the relationship between Joe and Vince was toxic and the bad blood continued until the day Vince died% in 1996.
"I’ve never been able to forgive Vince for the trouble he caused me," Rispoli said. "He passed away and I never even went to his funeral."
But the Rispoli name remained strong in Perth's entertainment scene for years to come. Joe's son Carlo continued to run Il Trovatore and opened his own Subiaco nightclub, The Godfather.
The death of illegal gambling in Northbridge ended an era for underworld punters, who lost more money than they’d care to admit. One was the Sicilian-born drug dealer Paul Musarri, who used the clubs for business and pleasure.
While winning, losing and laundering hundreds of thousands of dollars of his ill-gotten gains across the tables at Il Trovatore and Ginger’s, Musarri was always thinking up criminal enterprises.
Heroin was crowned king back in the late 1970s and Musarri could always find pawns to smuggle a package from Asia's Golden Triangle to the streets of Perth.
He wasn’t the only one. The Asian heroin connection was strong and Perth was a major landing point for the drug from the late 1970s.
Drug barons with links from Christmas Island to Amsterdam pioneered a route overland from WA to Sydney.
Smugglers who crewed Chinese ships into Fremantle would simply walk the drugs off the dock. From there, the "commodity" would be sent to Sydney and then sold to dealers across Australia. Some heroin came back to Perth.
One of the first men caught over a Perth heroin importation was Christmas Islander Kok Juan "Ray" Foo, who was jailed for 10 years in 1978 for possession with intent to sell or supply. Foo later became a senior member of the Chinese/ Singapore-run Sing Ma triad and was jailed again in 2001, this time for 17 years. A National Crime Authority operation codenamed Cha Cha seized $6 million of heroin and $740,000 cash from triad members in Australia.
But Foo wasn’t the senior Sing Ma member in Perth at the time. That was Alex Chan, aka Victor Chan, who was born in China, raised in Singapore and schooled in Hong Kong. Now 59, the father of four was a mad gambler and referred to by at least one Sing Ma member as "Dai Lo", meaning Big Brother.
Before being jailed for 20 years in 2000 as the kingpin behind a 3.4kg heroin importation from Thailand to Sydney, Chan part-owned a Perth market garden which exported vegetables to Asia, a Kuala Lumpur construction company and a Sydney firm that exported wine to China.
In sentencing Chan, the judge said he was "a man of strong personality who used others to carry out his bidding. Without any apparent source of legitimate income, he led a lavish lifestyle which included substantial gambling activities".
Another intriguing event for police tracking Asian organised crime links to Australia occurred in dramatic style on the Nullarbor in 1996 when NSW kitchenhand Mok Ka Kui was nabbed with $258,000 on a bus from Perth to Sydney. The day before, investigators watched him meet three members of the so-called John Kizon group. Kui was deported to Hong Kong after being acquitted on separate heroin possession charges because he had been living in Australia illegally.
The links between Sing Ma and Perth's criminal networks are still strong. Many of Perth’s crime gangs import drugs themselves, but just as many rely on Sing Ma for supplies.
In the 1980s, Musarri also relied on Asian-based suppliers for his deals, including the one which gave him notoriety and became known as the Barlow and Chambers affair.
Musarri was aged just two when he arrived with his parents and four siblings from Sicily, home of the Mafia. He gave up on education at 14 when expelled from yet another school. He learnt to box and, more importantly, that crime did pay.
He also developed a gambling addiction and in the 1970s, to feed this habit, he set up his O’Connor smash repair shop to process stolen cars to send east. He kept his ill-gotten gains in his mattress because he hated banks and, for a time, the car racket satisfied him — until he decided the really big money was in "smack".
By the early 1980s, Musarri was in a group of about a dozen men responsible for most of Perth’s street heroin trade. Many were linked back to the old gambling parlours, such as Victor Karapetcos, who once operated the Russian poker game at Il Trovatore and was jailed after being caught with half a kilo of heroin at a house owned by professional gambler Michael "Blondie" Onuszkanycz.
Blondie later ended up in jail over a separate deal linked to professional gambler Ralph Romeo, though Romeo was acquitted on appeal. But police eventually got their man. Romeo was acquitted of drugs offences with members of the Combi family, who police alleged wanted money to buy a brothel, but was later convicted with former gambling club operator Anthony "Cannon" Ricciardello. Co-accused Ivan Jack Marinovich was acquitted on appeal.
Meet the man who looks after bikie gangs
POLICE REPORTER NICOLE COX- THE SUNDAY TIMES- NOVEMBER 19, 2011
ON THEIR SIDE: Lawyer Michael Tudori represents motorcycle gangs
ON a side street tucked away from Fremantle's bustling cappuccino strip, Michael Tudori sips a macchiato washed down with sparkling mineral water - as traditional Italians do.
It's a suburb not dissimilar to his childhood, growing up around Northbridge where his father Lawrence and uncle Bert became kings of illegal gambling in the 1970s before Burswood Casino took over the market.
"It was a very colourful childhood," Mr Tudori, 40, said. "Northbridge was a great place as a kid.
"My Nonna, my grandmother, lived in Parker St. In the back lane there were a whole lot of Italian carpentry shops. You had the Peter's Ice Cream factory in Northbridge. You would go to the Re Store and all the Italian places around. It was a wonderful place as a kid growing up, it was always very colourful and it was safe."
It was Mr Tudori's Italian migrant father, an open wariness of police and a keen interest in 1980s courtroom TV drama LA Law that encouraged his entry into law after graduating from John XXIII College in Mt Claremont.
"I remember as a child coming home (from school) and I knew I'd cop flak on the bus because Dad had been arrested that night for running the gambling clubs," he said.
"We always knew when the clubs were going to be raided. The police would ring us. It was just all part of the process. They would all get taken down to the lock-up. Dad or my uncle would pay away everyone's fines and they would have an after party, a bail-out party.
"In those days the magistrate would say: 'Laurie or Bert were you up or down?' If they were down they would keep the fine down, but if they were up that night the fine had to be a bit higher that time. That's just the way that Perth worked in those days. I've seen police corruption first-hand. I've seen police getting paid off in the days before gambling finally became quashed because of Burswood and I think that has always stuck in my mind. Police are fallible.
"You get brought up thinking you can always trust a police officer, and you do and you must instil that faith in your children. But time has shown, especially in WA that if anything, the police are the biggest gang in WA."
His list of past clients reads like a Who's Who of high profile WA cases: former West Coast Eagle Daniel Chick, notorious pedophile Bradley Pendragon and Fabian Quaid's associate Dimitrios Papadimitriou, who was charged with conspiring to traffic 45kg of ecstasy in 2008.
He acted for Robert McLeod and his two sons in their controversial acquittal over the assault of Constable Matt Butcher, who was left partially paralysed.
And now his client base comprises hulky, tattooed motorcycle riding folk the Rebels Motorcycle Club and several individual Coffin Cheaters.
"Once they trust you, it grows. But that doesn't mean that I compromise myself for anybody or anything. Once you have their trust, it's like anything, you build up a business working relationship," Mr Tudori said.
"About 15 years ago the first bikie case that I did was a bikie who got into a fight at an old beaten-up pub in the city and the bouncers got the better of him and took to him with pool cues. He went over the road and bought a slit-throat razor and went down and gave his own back."
Bikies live by a code of silence similar to the Italian mafia, flaunt their membership by sporting club "colours" and call themselves "one per centers" in the belief they are apart from 99 per cent of society.
Police say they engage in violent turf wars over drugs and the State Government has mounted its strongest bid to break gangs with its proposed Criminal Organisations Control Bill, which could stop members associating. But Mr Tudori said authorities were misguided in targeting bikies as the main perpetrators of drug manufacture and organised crime in WA.
However, he conceded there were criminal elements.
"I remember once, a bikie said to me: 'We aren't organised crime, we are disorganised'. And that's the reality of it," Mr Tudori said.
"The entity itself is not like this all-encompassing organisation that manufactures drugs.
"I've just finished watching the last season of Breaking Bad, and that is organised crime. It's not like that. Of course there are some members who commit offences but as a proportion, it's remarkably small.
"These days, the majority of them are ageing bikies. They just don't want to be troubled with the police. A good majority of them don't want to have the police kicking their door down at 5am or 6am executing a warrant. They just want to live their normal life and still maintain their association of once or twice weekly meetings at the clubhouse, drink beer and hang out."
Mr Tudori said he had already taken instruction from the Rebels, the first WA bikie club in police sights if the proposed anti-association laws get through Parliament, and had briefed QCs in the eastern states.
Under the laws, bikie gangs could be declared criminal organisations, while individuals including patched members, former members, nominees and associates could be hit with control orders banning them from associating and visiting certain places.
"When the (former Labor) government brought in the asset confiscation laws, it was a great government and police PR stunt. They had (then Director of Public Prosecutions) Robert Cock and (then Attorney-General) Jim McGinty on a motorbike outside of Parliament saying we're here to get organised crime," Mr Tudori said.
"Well, they never got organised crime because organised crime was already one step ahead. Instead, they've got all the other people caught up in this."
Mr Tudori said he had never felt threatened representing Perth's bikie set, but felt the onslaught after the McLeods acquittal over the assault on Constable Butcher packing up his wife and two young daughters and relocating to the South-West until the dust settled.
"The only time I've ever felt threatened was just after we got the acquittal on the McLeods and that's when there were all the Facebook pages set up (that were) anti-lawyers, anti-me," he said. "We had threatening phone calls and the reality of that was that, yes, some of them may have been concerned citizens, but I have no doubt that some of them were probably police."
coxn@sundaytimes.newsltd.com.au
Mafia bust in Italy reveals horrifying extent of family ties running deep in Australia
http://www.news.com.au/national/nsw-act/mafia-bust-in-italy-reveals-family-ties-run-deep-in-australia/news-story/b6803431ac01ec3280cc0f735933f9a0
FEBRUARY 2, 20163:32PM
This handout picture released by the Italian Police press office shows police officers arresting a man, no name given, during an anti-mafia operation. Source: AFP
Charles MirandaNews Corp Australia Network
ITALIAN police have carried out a series of raids to smash a Mafia-led operation to smuggle cocaine to Australia that police say godfathers have now divided into six zones for trafficking drugs, extortion and money laundering.
And such is the entrenchment of Mafia links to Australia now, authorities say the country is virtually a state of Italy and it would be impossible to ever wipe out.
Authorities have uncovered a treasure trove of intelligence related to the fearsome Calabrian-based ‘Ndrangheta mafia group and their operations in Australia including members’ infiltration of key areas to assist in their trade, including transport and politics.
EXPLORE MORE: MAFIA ‘CHIEFS’ ARRESTS IN CORLEONE
BOOK EXTRACT: EVIL LIFE: DARK RISE OF A SEEDY UNDERWORLD
The police operation last week with raids on more than a dozen homes in Calabria has seen 14 members of clans linked to ‘Ndrangheta arrested and charged with “criminal association linked to international drugs tracking”, namely to Australia and Canada, with eight refused bail and the remaining six placed under house arrest.
One of those refused bail is a police officer tasked with protection of a port but instead was allegedly providing guidance on evading controls and security of the port area for the arrival and forwarding of consignments of drugs.
The case was the culmination of five years of work by the Central Operational Service of the Italian National Police, a specialist Italian police squad from Calabria and the district’s Anti-Mafia Prosecutor’s Office and had already led to arrests in Italy and Australia.
Arms found by Italian police during an anti-mafia operation. Police nabbed two fugitive mobster bosses after discovering them "living like animals" in a mountain hideout. Source: AFPSource:AFP
Italian Police arrest of two top fugitive members of the Calabria-based 'Ndrangheta mafia after finding the bunker they were hiding in Picture: ReutersSource:Supplied
Giuseppe Crea sits in the hidden bunker where he was arrested. He faces 22-years in prison for Mafia association. Source: APSource:AP
AUSTRALIA’S MAFIA ‘ENTRENCHED’
Despite the success of arrests and uncovering intelligence on international operations through extensive listening devices, taps and surveillance, it may not assist the overall ‘Ndrangheta crime fight in Australia.
Italian police have now classed the mafia in Australia as so entrenched, they believe it would be impossible to stamp out completely with Australian police only able to make busts and arrests where they can.
“Australia is not a target nation anymore, it’s now like a state of Italy from a criminal perspective,” a senior Italian officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, told News Corp Australia.
“They are entrenched in their activities and have been for a long time. They have not got an expansion strategy with your country anymore, it’s not expansion its consolidation. Australia, Canada, Belgium, United States, Germany are all countries where these crimes are being consolidated.”
‘Ndrangheta work as strictly a family-based enterprise, affiliation having to be through blood relation. It’s a very closed mafia group because of the family links.”
Rosario Gangemi.Source:Supplied
Gianfranco Tizzoni.Source:News Limited
Container ships pictured in the port of Gioia Tauro in Calabria, Italy. The police officer responsible for overseeing the site has been arrested for alleged ties to Mafia operations.Source:Alamy
FAMILY EMPIRES
According to evidence gathered by authorities, the group had designated six “locales” in Australia for Calabrian-linked mafia, not necessarily by State but by powerbase for both extended family support and drug importation markets as well as large-scale construction contracts, paying of backhanders and racketeering.
Each locale has its own mob boss that reports directly to Italy. Notably Sydney, South Australia and Melbourne have their own ‘Ndrangheta locale, well entrenched with fathers handing businesses down to sons and cousins. It’s the family ties that bind Italian organised crime to Australia and its large diaspora.
“In Italy we have hundreds of state witnesses from the Camorra, quite a few from the Sicilian Mafia but we only have five or six from the ‘Ndrangheta because squealing on ‘Ndrangheta means squealing on your mum, your dad, your uncle your cousin for this reason. That’s why the threat is so high.
“To be frank to some extent you have a bigger problem than they have in Europe because in Europe the big Calabrian communities outside Italy are in Belgium, Germany and Spain but in Australia the community there is much older than say Germany because the migrants have been there, well, since the end of the 19th Century. And it’s not just drugs, but big tendering processes, real big money to be made from tenders like building a motorway in Australia and you get 1 per cent of the bid and make $10 million without pushing a gram.”
A mask crosses St. Mark's Square as police officers patrol on the occasion of the Venice Carnival, in Venice, Italy, Saturday, Jan. 30, 2016. People attended the Venice Carnival, celebrated Saturday under heightened security following the sexual assaults on New Year's Eve in Cologne and the ongoing terror threat in Europe. Authorities have increased surveillance throughout the city, including the number of officers on patrol, both under-cover and in uniform. (AP Photo/Luigi Costantini)Source:AP
THIN BLUE LINE
Italian police still lament the loss of the Australian Federal Police presence in Italy, with the post closed in 2002 and responsibility of law enforcement liaison with the country now done by an AFP agent based in Belgrade in Serbia which also has to handle liaison with police in Russia, Croatia, all of the Balkans, Malta and Greece; 22 countries in all.
An AFP spokeswoman ruled out reopening the agency’s Italian bureau.
“The AFP office in Belgrade is able to effectively cover Italy from that location,” she said.
“It is not possible to have AFP officers in every country around the world. The AFP places its personnel strategically to reflect the most efficient approach possible.”
She would not reveal whether efforts to investigate Australian mafia links would be stepped up, saying the AFP did not comment on operational matters.
A spokesperson for Justice Minister Michael Keenan said: “The Government takes advice from our intelligence, security and law enforcement agencies who are best placed to make informed personnel decisions.”
Belonging to the Mafia is a stand-alone offence in Italy whereas in many other countries, including Australia, association with the group is not a criminal offence.
Who are the ‘Ndrangheta?Source:The Daily Telegraph
TIMELINE: DEADLY DONS DOWN UNDER
Known as “The Honoured Society”, the ‘Ndranghete has been Australia’s most powerful crime organisation since the early 20th century.
1922
According to an ASIO report, the Society began with the arrival of the ship re D’Italia in Adelaide, which carried three ‘Ndrangheta members who set up cells in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. Domenico Strano established the Sydney cell, while Antonio Barbara set up in Melbourne. The Perth Don was never named.
1930
Godfather Domenico Italiano arrives in Melbourne and forms a partnership with Barbara, making Melbourne the most dominant cell.
Domenico Italiano.Source:News Limited
1977
The shocking murder of politician Donald Mackay, who was a vocal anti-drugs campaigner, leads to a royal commission into organised crime that finds the ‘Ndrangheta are firmly entrenched in Australia.
1982
Drug runner Gianfranco Tizzoni is arrested and turns police informant. He says the Society has police and politicians on its payroll.
The funeral of Rosario Gangemi at St Monica's Catholic Church in Moonee Ponds.Source:News Limited
1990
Canberra boss Pasquale Barbaro becomes an informant and tells police that Rosario Gangemi is Australia’s top Godfather
2008
Gangemi dies the same year that the ‘Ndrangheta are tied to the importation to Melbourne of 15 million ecstasy pills hidden in tins of tomatoes. At the time it was the biggest ecstasy bust in the world.
The Petrelises: a tale of lost sons
Anne-Louise Brown
MAY 10 2012
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/the-petrelises-a-tale-of-lost-sons-20120509-1ycvw.html
Lesley Petrelis has lost two sons – one to a mysterious and highly publicised heroin overdose and the other to prison, where he could languish until at least 2018 for a brutal attack on his wife.
In a twist of fate the latter, 39-year-old Alexander Nicholas Petrelis, may never see his own two sons again and hasn't since he was taken into custody in December 2010.
One of them – Nicholas who was three at the time – witnessed his father brutalising his mother, Lisa Ann. He pleaded with his father to stop and Alexander did – after he'd stabbed his wife 13 times.
Yesterday, Mrs Petrelis struck a sad yet stoic figure at the Supreme Court of Western Australia,
where Alexander was sentenced to seven years and nine months jail.
She's a small lady, ever flanked by her supportive husband and the father of her sons, Nick. She smiled outside court, though the strain was clear now two sons were gone.
The Petrelis' lost their first son, Andrew, in controversial circumstances in 1995
Alexander Petrelis, sentenced to more than seven years in jail this week for a knife attack on his wife,
may never see his two young sons again
Mother pleaded with husband not to wake babies
as she slipped in her own blood
Aja Styles
It should have been a happy time for family, as the Christmas tree went up and a three-year-old boy's face lit up with the twinkling lights, but instead it was marred by horror and gore.
Lisa Ann Petrelis, 37, and her sons Thomas, 23 months, and Nicholas, three years, had spent the Saturday on December 5, 2010, putting up Christmas decorations.
Lisa Petrelis was left bruised, bloodied and battered by the attack.
The yet-to-be filled stockings were still on the dining table when police came the following morning to photograph the Karrinyup home, which by then had become a bloody crime scene.
For it was on that night, as the young family slept, that Alexander Nicholas Petrelis chose to visit his former home in a drug-fuelled state, angry with resentment and frustration of living rough in his car.
He had an amphetamine addiction that had worsened in the days of his marriage separation and he had not slept for three days.
What raced through his mind that night only he knew, but what was revealed to a Perth Supreme Court was that some time after convincing his estranged wife to let him inside and use the bathroom facilities he took hold of her kitchen knife and in a moment of "frenzy" struck her repeatedly.
The 27cm blade managed to pierce through her left arm, tear the flesh and muscle to her bowel and puncture her lung. Although the other strikes were not as deep, the 10-odd scars that dotted her breasts, stomach and neck would serve as a constant reminder of the deeper fear and pain he inflicted on her psyche that fateful night.
It was written across Mrs Petrelis's face as she told a jury of her pleas to her husband not to wake the babies as he continued to stab her, causing her to slip in her own blood.
Her desire to prevent the children from seeing this unleashed rage, as her husband beat her with his fists and a knife that only hours earlier had been cutting chicken for a sandwich, did not stop his crushing blows.
He would not listen. For him it was all a "haze".
But the reality of the life-threatening situation came crashing down on her when she saw her young son in the doorway of her bedroom as she struggled against her attacker.
"His forearm went around my neck and he was pulling up on my windpipe ... with all of his strength and my son was watching," she told the court with a sob.
"...I couldn't scream, I couldn't do anything ... and I thought 'this is it, I've got to do something'."
With a mother's might she grabbed at her husband's most vulnerable area and squeezed, hoping that the pain would be as blinding as the unconsciousness she felt herself slipping into from the lack of oxygen to her brain.
It worked and for a mere moment the hope that her own retaliation coupled by their child's screams of "stop daddy, stop" would effectively end the onslaught were dashed in Mr Petrelis's chilling reply.
"'Nicholas go back to your room' (he said) in the calmest most monotone voice," Mrs Petrelis testified. "And he continued to belt me."
Alexander Petrelis stabbed estranged wide, Lisa, over a dozen times in a frenzied attack.
It was at that moment that she knew she had to run for her life and break free of the house that had become her prison.
Mr Petrelis was convicted yesterday by the jury of a lesser charge of intentionally causing grievous bodily harm and now faces a maximum of 20 years jail.
It further rips apart his family, who already suffered the loss of his brother Andrew Petrelis who died from a heroin overdose after going into the police's witness protection program in 1995.
Andrew Petrelis was living in Queensland under an alias at the time and was due to give evidence against a prominent Northbridge identity John Kizon and his associate.
It was eventually revealed that his cover was blown.
A three-headed dog sets out on a Fox hunt
Kim and Francesco Domenico La Rosa.
Cerberus was the name of a three-headed dog which guarded the gates to the underworld in Greek and Roman mythology.
It was also the perfect title for a National Crime Authority operation aimed squarely at Italo-Australian organised crime and, more specifically, members of the Calabrese crime group L'Onorata - the Honoured Society.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/wa/7318114/three-headed-dog-sets-out-on-fox-hunt/
Three-headed dog sets out on Fox hunt
SEAN COWAN and GARY ADSHEAD - The West Australian on May 31, 2010,
Bruno 'The Fox' Romeo
Cerberus was the name of a three-headed dog which guarded the gates to the underworld in Greek and Roman mythology.
It was also the perfect title for a National Crime Authority operation aimed squarely at Italo-Australian organised crime and, more specifically, members of the Calabrese crime group L'Onorata - the Honoured Society.
For years, the group had dominated the marijuana-growing industry in Australia, boasting connected cells in northern Queensland, the tri-border area of Victoria-NSW-SA and the NSW Riverina city of Griffith, where it was led by notorious crime boss "Aussie" Bob Trimbole and, according to Justice Philip Woodward's report on the 1979 NSW royal commission into the illegal drug trade, Calabrian-born Tony Sergi.
But WA was also in the grip of the "grass" farmers. In 1978, a marijuana plantation was discovered at Lake Grace, east of Katanning, and three Italian men were arrested and jailed. Justice Woodward attributed the 2000-plant operation to L'Onorata. It was also suggested that the Lake Grace crop was not its first in this State.
Despite the emergence of heroin in Perth in the late 1970s, L'Onorata continued growing cannabis crops Australia-wide for distribution throughout its network until the 1990s.
In late 1989 a WA Department of Agriculture inspector stumbled on a cannabis crop at Kalli sheep station, near Cue, triggering a police investigation which would smash the L'Onorata syndicate and lead to another crop at Gingin and a planned crop at Mt Elvire Station in the Goldfields.
Ten men were arrested, including WA ringleaders Rocco Versace and Sebastiano "Dom" Pizzata, but the principal, named at the so-called "10 heads" trial as being Bruno "The Fox" Romeo, was nowhere to be found.
The 99-day trial finished just as the NCA was launching Operation Cerberus. Five men were convicted of conspiracy and three of related charges. But now the three-headed hound had its first target. Cerberus was going on a fox hunt.
Born in 1929 in Plati - the same Calabrian village as Trimbole and Sergi - Romeo was identified by the Bureau of Criminal Intelligence as being a senior member of L'Onorata as early as 1965. His three sons all have drug convictions, including one who was jailed in WA in the mid-1980s for a cannabis crop at Mt Magnet.
He was a close associate of the Sergi family and his wife Nazzarena Perre is related to Domenic Perre, who was later named by South Australia's coroner as the man behind the 1994 bombing death of WA police officer Geoffrey Bowen. Romeo's crime links ran deep and he had evaded police for 30 years.
But it took just three months for WA detective Peter Coombs, working under a Cerberus subsidiary operation codenamed Rottweiler, to arrest Romeo near Lismore in NSW after a bush stake-out complete with camouflage. Eighteen months later, looking frail and old, Romeo pleaded guilty to conspiracy and cultivation charges and was jailed for 10 years. Cerberus immediately began sniffing out new quarry.
WA police had first visited the Bickley orchard of Salvatore "Sam" Scaffidi in 1991, when they found two marijuana crops with more than 600 plants and arrested Scaffidi's brother Francesco, who claimed he planned to smoke all the plants to relieve the chronic pain he still suffered from a 1960 motorcycle accident and a 1987 truck accident.
Sam Scaffidi, meanwhile, didn't appear to need the money. He had successful fruit and vegetable businesses in Armadale and Spearwood which boasted $1 million-plus in annual turnover. But Scaffidi was greedy and knew he was dying of mesothelioma - a legacy of having worked with hundreds of other mainly ethnic men as a mill hand at the Wittenoom asbestos mine for a few months in 1963.
In May 1993, detectives found 214kg of cannabis, worth more than $1 million, hidden in fruit packing boxes on top of a cool room. Bundles of cash, totalling $755,000, were also found buried in a garden behind his orchard though Scaffidi would later claim $1.17 million had been buried and that police had stolen the difference.
They also raided an Eneabba farm leased by Scaffidi where they found evidence that the property, Tanderra Farm, had been used to cultivate cannabis crops, including cannabis seeds, and they found the necessary reticulation, machinery and paperwork.
In another raid in October, police were greeted at the Scaffidis' front door by Franca Scaffidi, who made tea and cakes for the officers. But it didn't stop them finding more cannabis
and another $95,000 inside. In May 1994, Scaffidi was charged with two counts of possessing cannabis with intent to sell or supply. Then, while on home detention awaiting trial, Scaffidi was charged with being the financier of a Gingin amphetamine laboratory where police discovered 4kg of "speed" base worth about $2 million.
But Scaffidi would never face trial. While waiting for his day in court, he settled his civil suit against CSR over his deadly illness, and died in October 1994.
After his death, it was revealed he had borrowed $100,000 from Northbridge's illegal gambling boss Carlo Rispoli and had never repaid it. The links between the gambling clubs and the drug scene had never been more obvious.
It was perhaps a blessing for Scaffidi that he died when he did. His amphetamines project was doomed from the start because of the involvement of an NCA informant named Francesco Domenico La Rosa.
La Rosa was sentenced to 12 years jail and later rose to fame after he successfully claimed a $220,000 tax deduction for money stolen from him during a botched drug deal. Last year, police found the bodies of La Rosa and his wife Kim buried on a property in Chittering. Two men have been charged with the murders.
But for all their Australia-wide notoriety in the cannabis industry, the Italian L'Onorata members were by no means the kings of Perth's grass castles.
Ivan Jack Marinovich
That title belonged to one Ivan Jack Marinovich.
Born on Christmas Day in 1943, Marinovich became a drug Godfather in the 1980s,
but had started out as a truck driver and heavy gambler.
In the early 1970s, he first came to the attention of police when he was charged with the gang rape of a 17-year-old girl at Mullaloo.
There were three juveniles co-accused with Marinovich.
A gambler named Martin "Freddy" Rintel and friend Salvatore Tomarchio were also charged.
Tomarchio was a lifelong cannabis user and gold prospector who made national news this year for loan sharking to struggling Aboriginal families in Laverton.
But the rape charges fell away after the girl signed a statement saying the crimes never happened. She was then charged with conspiring to pervert the course of justice - a crime which she admitted. Eventually, the rape charges were reinstated, and a court was told the girl had been paid $2000 to sign the statement. The defence denied the allegation and the charges were dropped again when a doctor gave evidence the girl was faking the complaint.
For the next few years, Marinovich and Rintel, who later became Burswood International Room patrons, were as thick as thieves. The police rarely caused them problems and they increased the size of their tight-knit gang when they hooked up with a group of northern suburbs hoods who fancied themselves as future boxing champions. Marinovich, being much older, naturally became leader and friend to many of those boys. Among them was a promising young fighter named John Kizon.
In 1979, Marinovich was charged with growing more than 7000 cannabis plants in remote scrub country north of Lake Gnangara. At his trial, which was held in the old Beaufort Street Courthouse, Marinovich said drug squad detectives had only seen him inspecting the cannabis plants because he had accidentally discovered the plantation when he went to chop wood. He said the plastic bags in his garage had been for his sandwiches, the seed trays at his house were used to germinate palms and the cannabis seeds were there because he smoked the occasional joint. The magistrate believed him.
It wasn't long before police tried again and this time Marinovich's counterclaims didn't work. In 1981, Marinovich, Rintel and market gardener Giuseppe "Joe" Cardile faced charges of cultivating and possessing cannabis with intent to sell or supply it.
At their trial, Marinovich said he and his friends had heard about the Yanchep crop from a man named John Kizon and had gone there to steal some. Kizon had drawn them a map so they could find the crop easily. The magistrate found them guilty only of possessing the 1.4kg of cannabis they managed to stuff into their bags before being arrested by waiting detectives. The trio were jailed for just five months each and Rintel was later convicted for heroin dealing.
But Marinovich was still in the game.
"Marinovich was using the name Conti and had a red Mercedes," former detective Bob Colton said. "He was moving heaps of stuff. But because of the finances and the time it was, we wanted to keep what we were doing a secret. So we eventually got set up in the Kings Ambassador Hotel. The Australian Federal Police and Customs were listening in real time to Marinovich."
Cerberus had badly mauled WA's crime bosses, but now it was time for a new operation called Synecdoche.
Bert and Laurie Tudori and Carl Rispoli
https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/wa/a/7302938/gambling-and-heroin-pave-road-to-riches/
Club owner Carl Rispoli of Godfathers night club.
It's 1938 and Italian migrant Giuseppe Rocco Rispoli is eyeballing a Northbridge building as a possible illegal gambling club.
The location is perfect but there's a problem. The bank which owns it told the dapper 27-year-old from Calabria he can rent 155 James Street on one condition: he must open a food store rather than a club. The last tenant tried to run a gambling den until police raided it so often it was forced to close. The bank didn’t want history repeating.
"It was a good spot for my club, though," Rispoli wrote in his memoirs before his death in 2005, "so I went to see if a friend of mine could help me."
Arthur Gallagher was a good friend to have. He was a WA police officer who had known Rispoli since their days in Wiluna, where one was the town barber and the other was the local cop.
"I talked to Arthur about the premises in James Street that I wanted to run as a club," Rispoli wrote. "Arthur was a great friend of mine so he told me he’d see what he could do."
The Rispoli memoirs, revealed in The West Australian for the first time, say the police officer visited the bank's manager.
"Arthur then came and saw me and told me to go and see Mr Clark (the bank manager) again," Rispoli wrote. "When I next see Mr Clark he said: 'Come in Mr Rispoli. You’ve got a good friend. The keys are here, you can do what you like'."
The Rispolis' infamous Roma Club was born and so, it could be argued, was Perth's underbelly.
Only World War II and the internment of migrants such as Rispoli, a member of the pro-Mussolini fascist Black Shirts, put a hold on the spread of Perth's colourful illegal gambling venues. Once the war ended, it was business as usual and by the time the swinging 60s came along, Rispoli was entrenched in his second club.
He and his brother Vince, a partner in Roma, had fallen out and Rispoli found a new James Street location to start Il Trovatore, one of a handful of clubs in Northbridge before Burswood Casino stole the market. Others were the International Club, Club 27, the Latin Quarter and the Patris Club.
Another memorable character from those lively days was Rocco "Ginger" Antonetti, the boss of Ginger's in William Street for 20 years after migrating to Australia in 1952 from Fondi, a town half way between Rome and Naples. But it was Il Trovatore which drew the biggest crowds and the most attention from police.
"I had gambling in the club but, of course, that was illegal," Rispoli recalled. "The police would raid the club. It was something that would happen regularly and it was just part of doing business.
"I had connections in the police force who would let me know about an upcoming raid on our club so we could make sure we were seen to be doing the right thing on that night."
Nowhere in his memoirs does Rispoli discuss what the police wanted for tipping off the illegal club bosses, but he gives more than a hint that money changed hands.
"I never resented the inconvenience of the raids or the arrangements with the police," he wrote. "It was a good arrangement. If they arrested us, we'd go to court and the magistrate would fine us 20 or 50 pounds, sometimes 100 pounds.
"But we were mostly protected by the police."
Stepping up from illegal gambling, by the mid-1940s, organised crime in WA had graduated to murder. Visiting Sydney standover man George "The Midnight Raider" Wallace was stabbed in a toilet outside Perth’s European Club. He died two weeks later after refusing to name his killer or the motive for the attack.
But unlike the waves of organised crime violence in the Eastern States, Perth's underbelly has only had the occasional murder, usually from turf wars, personality clashes or disputes over money. Much more common were bashings, stabbings and intimidation, especially by the local gangs who ran prostitution rackets and collected their take from the poor Northbridge shop owners.
Rispoli, meanwhile, never considered himself a criminal for simply running a gambling club.
He said in his memoirs he had always resisted Perth's "mafia", which was also referred to as the Black Hand. Of Sicilian origin, the mafia was rumoured to have been established in WA as early as 1922. The Calabrian crime organisation L’Onorata, or Honoured Society, came later.
In 1956, the murder of Archangelo Macri near Russell Square in Northbridge had mafia overtones. He was stabbed with a long, double-edged blade by Salvatore Stillitano and screamed "Mama mia, he has killed me" as he fell to the bitumen. Their feud stretched back to the old country and the Italians of Northbridge kept their mouths shut while police investigated. The southern Italian code of silence, or "omerta", still applied in Australia.
Even Rispoli could not avoid the local mafia altogether. Once he intervened to help a doctor friend who was being stood over. He showed one of his patrons, tough guy Mick Pellegrini, an extortion note from the Black Hand. Pellegrini then went to the mafia boss, who agreed to leave the doctor alone.
"The boss told Mick that he could tell the doctor to sleep with two pillows from now on — an Italian saying that means he can sleep easy," Rispoli said in his memoirs.
Even if the mafia was frozen out of Il Trovatore officially, unofficially many criminal connections were made inside the cabaret lounge. Some would go down in history.
Before Rispoli cut his ties to the club in January 1983, there was another fracture in his family and this time another iconic Northbridge name was embroiled in the trouble.
Bert Tudor at Topolino Coffee Bar
The Tudori brothers, Bert and Laurie, who had run the Zanzibar in Northbridge since the 1960s, became partners in Il Trovatore in the 1970s despite Joe Rispoli claiming in his memoirs that he was unhappy about the arrangement. Vince Rispoli had married a Tudori and so they had become family.
"I didn’t trust them and I don’t think Vince trusted them either, but he didn't want to admit it because they were his wife’s brothers," Rispoli wrote. "Things were not good after that. My son Ricki was in charge one night and he told me that $2000 was missing from the takings and that he’d seen one of the brothers-in-law take it."
Rispoli did not say whether it was Bert Tudori, the brother who became Perth’s deputy lord mayor.
In the end, plans to license a casino at Burswood in the early 1980s made Joe Rispoli's decision to pull out of Il Trovatore easy.
The memoirs say that the then police commissioner told Rispoli his club's days were over. By that stage, the relationship between Joe and Vince was toxic and the bad blood continued until the day Vince died% in 1996.
"I’ve never been able to forgive Vince for the trouble he caused me," Rispoli said. "He passed away and I never even went to his funeral."
But the Rispoli name remained strong in Perth's entertainment scene for years to come. Joe's son Carlo continued to run Il Trovatore and opened his own Subiaco nightclub, The Godfather.
The death of illegal gambling in Northbridge ended an era for underworld punters, who lost more money than they’d care to admit. One was the Sicilian-born drug dealer Paul Musarri, who used the clubs for business and pleasure.
While winning, losing and laundering hundreds of thousands of dollars of his ill-gotten gains across the tables at Il Trovatore and Ginger’s, Musarri was always thinking up criminal enterprises.
Heroin was crowned king back in the late 1970s and Musarri could always find pawns to smuggle a package from Asia's Golden Triangle to the streets of Perth.
Tony_Trajkoski and Paul Musarri in Albany Jail in 2003
He wasn’t the only one.
The Asian heroin connection was strong and Perth was a major landing point for the drug from the late 1970s.
Drug barons with links from Christmas Island to Amsterdam pioneered a route overland from WA to Sydney.
Smugglers who crewed Chinese ships into Fremantle would simply walk the drugs off the dock. From there, the "commodity" would be sent to Sydney and then sold to dealers across Australia. Some heroin came back to Perth.
One of the first men caught over a Perth heroin importation was Christmas Islander Kok Juan "Ray" Foo, who was jailed for 10 years in 1978 for possession with intent to sell or supply. Foo later became a senior member of the Chinese/ Singapore-run Sing Ma triad and was jailed again in 2001, this time for 17 years. A National Crime Authority operation codenamed Cha Cha seized $6 million of heroin and $740,000 cash from triad members in Australia.
But Foo wasn’t the senior Sing Ma member in Perth at the time. That was Alex Chan, aka Victor Chan, who was born in China, raised in Singapore and schooled in Hong Kong. Now 59, the father of four was a mad gambler and referred to by at least one Sing Ma member as "Dai Lo", meaning Big Brother.
Before being jailed for 20 years in 2000 as the kingpin behind a 3.4kg heroin importation from Thailand to Sydney, Chan part-owned a Perth market garden which exported vegetables to Asia, a Kuala Lumpur construction company and a Sydney firm that exported wine to China.
In sentencing Chan, the judge said he was "a man of strong personality who used others to carry out his bidding. Without any apparent source of legitimate income, he led a lavish lifestyle which included substantial gambling activities".
Another intriguing event for police tracking Asian organised crime links to Australia occurred in dramatic style on the Nullarbor in 1996 when NSW kitchenhand Mok Ka Kui was nabbed with $258,000 on a bus from Perth to Sydney. The day before, investigators watched him meet three members of the so-called John Kizon group. Kui was deported to Hong Kong after being acquitted on separate heroin possession charges because he had been living in Australia illegally.
The links between Sing Ma and Perth's criminal networks are still strong. Many of Perth’s crime gangs import drugs themselves, but just as many rely on Sing Ma for supplies.
In the 1980s, Musarri also relied on Asian-based suppliers for his deals, including the one which gave him notoriety and became known as the Barlow and Chambers affair.
Musarri was aged just two when he arrived with his parents and four siblings from Sicily, home of the Mafia. He gave up on education at 14 when expelled from yet another school. He learnt to box and, more importantly, that crime did pay.
He also developed a gambling addiction and in the 1970s, to feed this habit, he set up his O’Connor smash repair shop to process stolen cars to send east. He kept his ill-gotten gains in his mattress because he hated banks and, for a time, the car racket satisfied him — until he decided the really big money was in "smack".
By the early 1980s, Musarri was in a group of about a dozen men responsible for most of Perth’s street heroin trade. Many were linked back to the old gambling parlours, such as Victor Karapetcos, who once operated the Russian poker game at Il Trovatore and was jailed after being caught with half a kilo of heroin at a house owned by professional gambler Michael "Blondie" Onuszkanycz.
Blondie later ended up in jail over a separate deal linked to professional gambler Ralph Romeo, though Romeo was acquitted on appeal. But police eventually got their man. Romeo was acquitted of drugs offences with members of the Combi family, who police alleged wanted money to buy a brothel, but was later convicted with former gambling club operator Anthony "Cannon" Ricciardello. Co-accused Ivan Jack Marinovich was acquitted on appeal.
Meet the man who looks after bikie gangs
POLICE REPORTER NICOLE COX- THE SUNDAY TIMES- NOVEMBER 19, 2011
ON THEIR SIDE: Lawyer Michael Tudori represents motorcycle gangs
ON a side street tucked away from Fremantle's bustling cappuccino strip, Michael Tudori sips a macchiato washed down with sparkling mineral water - as traditional Italians do.
It's a suburb not dissimilar to his childhood, growing up around Northbridge where his father Lawrence and uncle Bert became kings of illegal gambling in the 1970s before Burswood Casino took over the market.
"It was a very colourful childhood," Mr Tudori, 40, said. "Northbridge was a great place as a kid.
"My Nonna, my grandmother, lived in Parker St. In the back lane there were a whole lot of Italian carpentry shops. You had the Peter's Ice Cream factory in Northbridge. You would go to the Re Store and all the Italian places around. It was a wonderful place as a kid growing up, it was always very colourful and it was safe."
It was Mr Tudori's Italian migrant father, an open wariness of police and a keen interest in 1980s courtroom TV drama LA Law that encouraged his entry into law after graduating from John XXIII College in Mt Claremont.
"I remember as a child coming home (from school) and I knew I'd cop flak on the bus because Dad had been arrested that night for running the gambling clubs," he said.
"We always knew when the clubs were going to be raided. The police would ring us. It was just all part of the process. They would all get taken down to the lock-up. Dad or my uncle would pay away everyone's fines and they would have an after party, a bail-out party.
"In those days the magistrate would say: 'Laurie or Bert were you up or down?' If they were down they would keep the fine down, but if they were up that night the fine had to be a bit higher that time. That's just the way that Perth worked in those days. I've seen police corruption first-hand. I've seen police getting paid off in the days before gambling finally became quashed because of Burswood and I think that has always stuck in my mind. Police are fallible.
"You get brought up thinking you can always trust a police officer, and you do and you must instil that faith in your children. But time has shown, especially in WA that if anything, the police are the biggest gang in WA."
His list of past clients reads like a Who's Who of high profile WA cases: former West Coast Eagle Daniel Chick, notorious pedophile Bradley Pendragon and Fabian Quaid's associate Dimitrios Papadimitriou, who was charged with conspiring to traffic 45kg of ecstasy in 2008.
He acted for Robert McLeod and his two sons in their controversial acquittal over the assault of Constable Matt Butcher, who was left partially paralysed.
And now his client base comprises hulky, tattooed motorcycle riding folk the Rebels Motorcycle Club and several individual Coffin Cheaters.
"Once they trust you, it grows. But that doesn't mean that I compromise myself for anybody or anything. Once you have their trust, it's like anything, you build up a business working relationship," Mr Tudori said.
"About 15 years ago the first bikie case that I did was a bikie who got into a fight at an old beaten-up pub in the city and the bouncers got the better of him and took to him with pool cues. He went over the road and bought a slit-throat razor and went down and gave his own back."
Bikies live by a code of silence similar to the Italian mafia, flaunt their membership by sporting club "colours" and call themselves "one per centers" in the belief they are apart from 99 per cent of society.
Police say they engage in violent turf wars over drugs and the State Government has mounted its strongest bid to break gangs with its proposed Criminal Organisations Control Bill, which could stop members associating. But Mr Tudori said authorities were misguided in targeting bikies as the main perpetrators of drug manufacture and organised crime in WA.
However, he conceded there were criminal elements.
"I remember once, a bikie said to me: 'We aren't organised crime, we are disorganised'. And that's the reality of it," Mr Tudori said.
"The entity itself is not like this all-encompassing organisation that manufactures drugs.
"I've just finished watching the last season of Breaking Bad, and that is organised crime. It's not like that. Of course there are some members who commit offences but as a proportion, it's remarkably small.
"These days, the majority of them are ageing bikies. They just don't want to be troubled with the police. A good majority of them don't want to have the police kicking their door down at 5am or 6am executing a warrant. They just want to live their normal life and still maintain their association of once or twice weekly meetings at the clubhouse, drink beer and hang out."
Mr Tudori said he had already taken instruction from the Rebels, the first WA bikie club in police sights if the proposed anti-association laws get through Parliament, and had briefed QCs in the eastern states.
Under the laws, bikie gangs could be declared criminal organisations, while individuals including patched members, former members, nominees and associates could be hit with control orders banning them from associating and visiting certain places.
"When the (former Labor) government brought in the asset confiscation laws, it was a great government and police PR stunt. They had (then Director of Public Prosecutions) Robert Cock and (then Attorney-General) Jim McGinty on a motorbike outside of Parliament saying we're here to get organised crime," Mr Tudori said.
"Well, they never got organised crime because organised crime was already one step ahead. Instead, they've got all the other people caught up in this."
Mr Tudori said he had never felt threatened representing Perth's bikie set, but felt the onslaught after the McLeods acquittal over the assault on Constable Butcher packing up his wife and two young daughters and relocating to the South-West until the dust settled.
"The only time I've ever felt threatened was just after we got the acquittal on the McLeods and that's when there were all the Facebook pages set up (that were) anti-lawyers, anti-me," he said. "We had threatening phone calls and the reality of that was that, yes, some of them may have been concerned citizens, but I have no doubt that some of them were probably police."
coxn@sundaytimes.newsltd.com.au