Bent Uncensored

by James Morton

  p. 76 He [Krahe] was a crook all right: Richard Hall, Disorganized Crime, p. 56.

  p. 77 Following a flat-warming party at Brifman’s new brothel: Matthew Condon, Three Crooked Kings and ‘Desperate measures’.

  p. 80 However, Krahe’s champion Bill Jenkings wrote: For an account of the careers of Kelly, Krahe and Fergusson, see Evan Whitton, Can of Worms II and David Hickie, The Prince and the Premier.

  6. MacKay’s Legacy

  p. 82 Such actions and attitudes were not uncommon: Sydney Morning Herald, 10 August 2013.

  p. 83 On 10 May 1972 Roger James: Age, 20 and 22 May and 1 July 1972.

  p. 83 Scotland Yard sent over Detective Superintendent Bob McGowan: In a curious twist, the Scotland Yard officers were later gaoled in England on fraud and conspiracy charges. After he retired McGowan was sentenced for a Value Added Tax fraud and O’Hanlon received seven years for accepting bribes from London pornographer James Humphreys.

  p. 83 One result of Duncan’s death: James Morton and Susanna Lobez, Gangland North, South & West.

  p. 84 There was no evidence against him in my inquiry: Conversation with James Morton, 11 November 1996.

  p. 85 I was a cadet when Fred Hanson was commissioner: Conversation with James Morton, 22 November 2012.

  p. 85 In 1967 Allan, or possibly his then assistant Don Fergusson: PN Grabosky, Wayward Governance; David Hickie, The Prince and the Premier; Evan Whitton, Can of Worms and Can of Worms II.

  p. 86 More seriously, in 1968 he made some extraordinary decisions: Canberra Times, 1–8 July 1968; NSW Police Journal, 5 July 1968.

  p. 86 As for the baccarat clubs: Quoted in David Hickie, The Prince and the Premier.

  p. 88 By 1974 Hanson was slacking off: Richard Hall, Disorganized Crime, p. 209.

  p. 88 After Hanson retired it is alleged that he flew drugs down from Cairns: David Hickie, The Prince and the Premier.

  p. 90 Johnny James organised the meat for the Barbecue Set: Conversation with James Morton, 29 November 2013.

  p. 90 Beck found Darlinghurst police station in 1977 to be in complete disarray: Quentin Dempster, Honest Cops; Sun-Herald, 30 May 1982.

  p. 92 Lennie McPherson and George Freeman may have been the Mr Bigs of Sydney crime: Conversation with James Morton, 6 November 2006.

  p. 93 It’s a sad state of affairs pervading Sydney at the moment: Quoted in Malcolm Brown, ‘Indecent proposals’.

  p. 94 Jim Lees, a devout Christian, was the next to be appointed commissioner: Malcolm Brown, ‘Nemesis of crims and corruption’.

  p. 95 People survived because of being an embarrassment: Email to Susanna Lobez.

  p. 95 the death of 24-year-old drug dealer and socialite Maria Hission: Fashion designer and lover of solicitors, models and criminals, Hission lived in Rose Bay, Sydney. A darling of the drug dealers known as the Windsor Castle Set, she disappeared on Christmas Eve 1975 after she had dinner with her mother. Her body surfaced off North Head two weeks later and was identified through her jewellery. She had been tied to an anchor after being shot in the head with a .32 bullet. Almost certainly her body had been dumped from a boat. Ten days later an associate of the Double Bay Mob refused to answer any police questions about the suggestion that he had borrowed a boat on the night of her disappearance, and was later said to have left Australia. It seems that Hission had only reluctantly become involved in the heroin trade and wanted out. Parrington was unable to make an arrest.

  7. Whistleblowing v The Brotherhood

  p. 98 In December 1971 computer expert Philip Neville Arantz: A Lauer, Royal Commission transcript, 18 November 1996, pp. 34428–9.

  p. 98 Arantz was not the first officer to draw attention to the practice: R Blissett, ‘Vale CIB’, NSW Police News, vol. 67, no. 10.

  p. 99 Arantz’s punishment was swift and harsh: In 1993 MP John Hatton raised the issue in parliament during a debate on the final report of the joint select committee on police administration, commenting that ‘psychiatry is a weapon in the police force’, adding that psychiatric advice had been the ‘weapon’ used to dismiss pioneer whistleblower Philip Arantz from the force in 1971 after he had leaked crime statistics.

  p. 99 I was the odd one but there were so many others: PN Arantz, Collusion of Powers; Keith Gosman, ‘Baling out of the force’.

  p. 100 There was no way you could work if you didn’t ‘weigh-in’: Jenny Gregory, ‘The deconstruction of memory’, p. 78.

  p. 100 Greg Wheadon, son of a chief inspector: Ellen Connolly, ‘Police whistleblower awarded $660 000’, Sydney Morning Herald, 3 February 2001.

  p. 101 On 26 October 1993 questions were raised in parliament: Parliament of New South Wales, Legislative Assembly, 26 October 1993, p. 4410.

  p. 102 There was also sexual harassment and drunkenness: This is common among police worldwide. The celebrated English detective Reg Spooner, called to investigate the body of a man found in a car, simply released the handbrake and watched the vehicle move slowly downhill so another division had the responsibility.

  p. 102 Geoff Schuberg found the situation to be similar: Interview for Sin City.

  p. 103 If you didn’t agree with something you were expected to look the other way: Deborah Locke, Watching the Detectives, p. 88.

  p. 105 ‘No police officer can claim that he or she has always followed the strict Victoria Police code of ethics’: Simon Illingworth, Filthy Rat, pp. 50–1.

  p. 105 In fact over the years and in various states officers have spied on each other: Malcolm Brown and Jennifer Cooke, ‘The circle of power’.

  p. 105 In Western Australia in 1985, The Daily News revealed that Police Commissioner Bill Bull had spied on Assistant Commissioner Spears: Daily News, 14 November 1985.

  p. 106 Illingworth, called a ‘maggot’ and a ‘filthy rat’: Email to Susanna Lobez, 13 March 2014.

  p. 107 A decade after the shutters hit the fan: George Brouwer, Past Patterns—Future Directions, p. 82; Selma Milovanovic, ‘Corruption watchdog probes 35 police’.

  p. 107 I went out in the morning and my car was completely vandalised: Four Corners, 9 February 1998.

  p. 107 partly because of the spectacle of a person being publicly disloyal: Four Corners, 9 February 1998.

  p. 108 Whistleblowers are always accused of being mentally ill: Email to Susanna Lobez, 26 February 2014.

  p. 109 It was well known in those days: Interview for Sin City.

  p. 109 Untangling corruption almost always leads to the disclosure of secrets and the erosion of underground loyalty: Simon Illingworth, Filthy Rat, p. 130.

  pp. 109–10 ‘It was the equivalent of a gold miner’: Simon Illingworth, Filthy Rat, pp. 144, 158, 171.

  p. 110 Her position was based on an early study of Australian whistleblowers: Sydney Morning Herald, 7 February 1998.

  8. Victoria from the 1960s

  p. 112 It is rather amazing: Cited by PD Beattie, Motion of Condolence, Death of Colin James Bennett, Queensland Parliamentary Debates, Legislative Assembly, 18 June 2002.

  p. 113 In 1963 at a United Nations seminar in Canberra: ‘Confessions and admissions—judges suspicious’, Age, 1 May 1963; Julius Stone, radio broadcast, 12 May 1963.

  p. 113 The next year, during the investigation and questioning of three Italian men: Age, 12 September 1964.

  p. 114 From then on discussion of these corruption allegations was front-page news in The Age: ‘Corruption claim, det. charged; others to be accused’, Age, 19 October 1965.

  p. 115 In March 1966 Thompson dismissed charges: ‘SM finds detective did neglect duty’, Age, 9 March 1966.

  p. 116 During the year of Mr X, police morale was said to be at an all-time low: Age, 25 October, and 1, 2 and 9 November.

  p. 117 And this was the case in Victoria of one-time head of the homicide squad Jack Matthews: Gideon Haigh, The Racket.

  p. 117 Wyatt had two useful friends: Gideon Haigh, The Racket, pp. 101, 151.

  p. 117 In 1959 Wyatt went to live in Ascot Vale with Elva Isabella Moran: Age,
8 and 9 December 1971.

  p. 119 Wyatt, however, was a principal witness: Canberra Times, 11 March 1970.

  p. 121 It would have been naive to suppose that responsible ministers and officials: Quoted in Russell Skelton and Fergus Shiel, ‘The myth of a clean police force’; Canberra Times, 1–10 December 1971; Peggy Berman and Kevin Childs, Why Isn’t She Dead?; Gideon Haigh, The Racket; Geoff Wilkinson, ‘The power of Peg’.

  p. 122 Later Wyatt would be portrayed by some as a loveable rogue: Gideon Haigh, The Racket, p. 155.

  p. 122 If the Victorian police thought that after the successful prosecution of Matthews: Celebrity criminal the late Mark ‘Chopper’ Read has claimed that Wainer, who died in 1987, was not all he might have been and would patch up shot criminals with no questions asked. Mark Read, Chopper from the Inside, pp. 166–7.

  p. 123 Beach began by advertising in the newspapers: Barry Beach QC, Report of the Board of Inquiry into Allegations against Members of the Victoria Police Force; George Brouwer, Past Patterns—Future Directions.

  p. 123 There were, of course, the usual criminal stalwarts giving evidence of brutality: Robber and escaper Peter Gibb’s criminal career ended when he suffered a heart attack after a bashing in January 2011. He had put a child in a deep freeze, he said, for a joke, but those who saw him do it lacked his sense of humour. ‘Piggy’ Palmer was acquitted of a 1974 murder but was later sentenced to twelve years following a string of armed robberies. Jockey Smith, who had escaped from prison, was shot by police in December 1992. In 2007 docker Joseph Power was found to be too ill to stand trial for an attack on a sex worker and was to be questioned over the disappearance of Julia Garciacelay in July 1975. Laurie Prendergast, a friend of enforcer and killer Chris Flannery, simply disappeared from his driveway one day in August 1985. Quinn died after being set on fire in July 1984 in Pentridge Prison, where he was serving a life sentence for a double murder.

  p. 124 they gathered in what the president of the Police Association, LJ Blogg: Robert Haldane, The People’s Force, p. 290.

  9. Two Coppers, Two States

  p. 131 At the beginning of August 1978, painter and docker turned brothel owner Joey Hamilton: Hamilton also complained that in 1981 many members of the Caulfield car-crimes squad were regularly partying at his brothel in Glen Eira Road, Ripponlea, and requiring free sex from the prostitutes. Some officers were transferred and others fined by the Police Discipline Board: George Brouwer, Past Patterns—Future Directions, pp. 64–5.

  p. 132 it needs to be recognised that apparently he had throughout his service been somewhat encouraged: George Brouwer, Past Patterns—Future Directions, p. 68.

  p. 135 Including the 135 days of preliminary legal argument, the trial lasted 420 days: R v Higgins [1994] 71 A Crim R 429; The Queen v Alistair Farquhar MacRae [1995] VSC 108; George Brouwer, Past Patterns—Future Directions; Age, 7 April 1993; Sunday Herald Sun, 18 November 2001 and 24 April 2004.

  p. 138 Evan Whitton was one and he remembered one of the more memorable exchanges: Evan Whitton, Can of Worms II, Chapter 1: The Police.

  p. 138 They and four Queensland officers witnessed the unsigned confession: B Stannard, ‘How we got Finch’.

  p. 139 In 1988 Ralph, along with drug dealer Morres George, was convicted of conspiracy: ‘Career check for supergrass’, Sydney Morning Herald, 7 July 1988.

  p. 140 Ten years after the killing the police could not produce anything like a complete set of papers to ICAC: Robert Klitgaard, Controlling Corruption.

  p. 140 Overall Huckstepp, who came from a Jewish family named Krivoshaw: John Dale, Huckstepp.

  p. 141 As for Drury, he was treated appallingly by his superiors: HF Purnell, In the Matter of an Inquiry into the Investigation by the New South Wales Police Force of Circumstances Surrounding the Shooting of Detective Senior Constable M.P. Drury 6.6. 1984; Quentin Dempster, Honest Cops.

  p. 142 In March 1990 Rogerson, Paltos and Nowytarger were convicted: R v Rogerson [1992] HCA 25; (1992) 174 CLR 268; (1992) 60 A Crim R 429; Evan Whitton, Can of Worms; John Silvester and Andrew Rule, Tough; Duncan McNab, The Dodger.

  10. Noble Cause Corruption

  p. 144 In their study of police ethics, US writers John P Crank and Michael A Caldero thought: John P Crank and Michael A Caldero, Police Ethics, pp. 2, 6.

  p. 145 ‘There is no way you can effectively catch criminals: Four Corners, 7 August 2000.

  p. 145 The work of any investigator … is made much easier if a suspect can be induced to confess: Torquil Dick-Erikson, ‘Confessions in evidence’, p. 864.

  p. 146 The widely read American manual Criminal Interrogation and Confessions: Fred E Inbau et al, Criminal Interrogation and Confessions; WS White, ‘Police trickery in inducing confessions’, pp. 581–629.

  p. 146 In any high-profile murder case the investigating officers: Christopher Bray, ‘ “Hell, someone’s cut this girl in half!” ’.

  p. 147 Queensland’s Crime and Misconduct Commission found that between 2001 and 2005 officers had prisoners removed: Robert Needham, Dangerous Liaisons.

  p. 148 I can remember witnessing people in the CIB getting full, free and voluntary confessions: Interview for Sin City. Later Stewart would tell Tim Girling-Butcher that one of the detectives involved was Ray Kelly.

  p. 148 The third category, known as internalised false confessions: Gudjonsson and MacKeith, ‘Retracted confessions’, p. 187; Saul M Kassin, ‘False confessions’, p. 249.

  p. 149 Although he denied direct involvement in any scrumdowns: In England the practice was known as swifting.

  p. 150 In New South Wales, Chief Justice Laurence Street set the tone: R v Lattouf and Carr, NSWCCA 287/1978.

  p. 150 It was not until the 1991 case McKinney v R: [1991] HCA 6; (1991) 171 CLR 468.

  p. 151 The necessary information shall be obtained by the police: Advertiser, 28 January 1914.

  p. 151 In practice the third degree did not go away: Royal Commission on the Alleged Shooting at and Wounding of John O’Connell Brophy, VPRS 3992 and VPRS 2570. VPRS 3992, Unit 2590, File 29916; Robert Haldane, The People’s Force; ‘Police treatment of suspects’, Argus, 19 June 1936; Advertiser, 20 June 1936.

  p. 152 There were allegations in the 1930s that police officers in Queensland had been resorting to force: Morning Bulletin, 6 June 1930.

  p. 154 An inquiry by the Police Complaints Commission headed by judge Eric Pratt: Police Complaints Tribunal, Report by Police Complaints Tribunal; Telegraph, 25 March 1986; PN Grabosky,Wayward Governance, chapter four; Sunday Mail, 16 March 2003.

  p. 155 Police perjury—unlike some perjuries—carries no risks: CH Rolph (ed), The Police and the Public, pp. 146–9.

  p. 156 Frustrated by the failure of conventional criminal investigations: Bob Bottom, Without Fear or Favour; Donald Stewart, Recollections of an Unreasonable Man; Daily Mirror, 26 November 1981.

  p. 158 In his essay Miscarriages of Justice in Serious Cases in Australia: In Carrington et. al. (eds), Travesty!

  11. Drugs

  p. 161 It’s amazing how many coppers are in this business: Sydney Morning Herald, 6 August 1977.

  p. 162 Judge Anthony Collins told Gudgeon: R v Gudgeon [1995] QCA 506; Evan Whitton, Can of Worms II; Sydney Morning Herald, 25 April 1986.

  p. 163 In the 1990s the force’s drug squad: Office of Police Integrity, Ceja Task Force, Seamer paragraph 2.3; Fraser, Snouts in the Trough, p. 147.

  p. 164 At that time we were doling out samples of our wares: Damian Marrett, Wired, p. 125.

  p. 165 Unit 2 of the drug squad: Office of Police Integrity, Ceja Task Force: Drug Related Corruption, Third and Final Report, 2007, p. 4.

  p. 165 Attwood was ordered to lift its game: After the major crime squad vacated its office at St Kilda Road, renovators tinkering with a ceiling tile were startled when thirteen pistols fell from the ceiling onto their heads. Andrew Fraser, Snouts in the Trough, pp. 183–4.

  p. 166 Even more unfortunately for the force, he was replaced by Detective Sergeant Way
ne Strawhorn: Conversation with Susanna Lobez and James Morton, 10 December 2013.

  p. 166 ‘If they didn’t have a green light to deal drugs in Victoria, they were flat-out revving the car on amber!’: Damian Marrett, Wired, pp. 66–7.

  p. 166 In a classic example of the ability of the police to load members of families: Andrew Fraser, Snouts in the Trough, pp. 150–2; Damian Marrett, Wired.

  p. 167 In the three years from 1998 nearly sixty clandestine laboratories were discovered: John Silvester, ‘Cops, robbers, drugs and money’.

  p. 168 Ferguson was additionally convicted of money laundering: R v Ferguson; R v Sadler, R v Cox [2009] VSCA 198.

  p. 169 The full disaster of the 1990s Victoria Police drugs policy became brutally clear: R v Strawhorn [2008] VSCA 101.

  p. 169 After this spate of cases Sergeant Bill Patten: John Silvester, ‘End-of-year gangster wrap’.

  p. 170 Terence Hodson was by no means the first or last Western Australian villain: Herald Sun, 18 and 26 May 2004.

  p. 171 Miechel eventually went down for a minimum of fifteen years: R v Miechel [2006] VSC 359.

  p. 171 Hodson, as was his game, was preparing to give evidence against Miechel: Paul Dale, Disgraced?; Bert Wrout, Kill the Morans.

  p. 172 The Attorney-General was sure that the public would be happy: Advertiser, 9 October 1981.

  p. 172 The president of the South Australian Police Association: Advertiser, 9 October 1981.

  p. 174 Look—this report has not even scraped the surface: Advertiser, 2 April 1982.

  p. 175 It seems that during a drug bust in August 1986: Bob Bottom, ‘The tape that trapped Moyse’; Chris Masters, ‘Suppression City’; Candace Sutton, ‘Masters lifts lid on Adelaide’, Advertiser, 2 October 1988.

  p. 175 Over the months Moyse had made more than $100 000: Advertiser, 19 January 1999; Australian, 3 September 2010.

  p. 175 After the conviction of Moyse, Octopodelis gave evidence: Sun-Herald, 23 October 1988.

  p. 177 Ranks have closed in the police: Chris Masters, ‘Suppression city’.