All Fall Down (11 page)

Thompson would go on to allege that one of the officers ‘… then held my arm while I injected. The heroin was a very good quality. Kossaris then injected himself.’

At their trial a year later, a clinical pharmacologist from the Princess Alexandra Hospital, Dr P.J. Ravenscroft, was called to give evidence and concluded that blood sample analysis confirmed that the defendants had heroin in their systems during the time they were incarcerated in the Brisbane watch-house following their arrests. Thompson and Kossaris were found guilty and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Justice Connolly made no finding adverse to police.

Straight after the trial two senior public servants had lodged a complaint with the relatively new Police Complaints Tribunal, headed up by Justice Bill Carter. This scandal became known as the Brisbane Watch-house Heroin Affair. Carter, with the approval of then Police Minister Russ Hinze, used both internal resources and outside investigators to probe the case.

The police officers investigated by the Tribunal were: Detective Sergeant 2/c Ronald Douglas ‘Ug’ Pickering; Detective Senior Constable Robert Matthew Pease; Detective Senior Constable Cameron Bruce Gray and Plain-Clothes Constable 1/c Ian Roland Claridge. All were members of the Special Crimes Squad attached to the metropolitan CIB.

The report alleged that while Thompson and Kossaris were in the watch-house they began suffering heroin withdrawal symptoms and were offered it by police. A needle, one of a type usually reserved for taking police blood samples, was retrieved and given to the two men to inject themselves. The Tribunal report said: ‘The heroin was mixed with water in an ashtray on a table in the room, and Thompson and Kossaris, with the assistance of the police officers, then received three injections of heroin each. Having received heroin and having been relieved of the symptoms associated with withdrawal, each of the prisoners then wrote statements admitting their involvement in all of the alleged bank robberies. They were later taken to their cells.’

Tribunal chairman Carter was unequivocal in his recommendations and concluded that there was ‘a body of cogent evidence available’ to establish that both Thompson and Kossaris were indeed supplied heroin by police, and furthermore that all four officers along with Detectives Raymond Frederick Platz and Vicki-Leigh Teresa Greenhill, had allegedly committed perjury at the trial of the two bank robbers.

The six officers were subsequently committed for trial on a variety of charges, including supplying a dangerous drug and perjury. In late 1982 Lewis organised for the union to pay for their legal funding.

In mid-June 1983 Senior Crown Prosecutor Frank Clair wrote to the Solicitor-General, Denis Galligan. ‘The solicitors acting for all the accused except Pickering have written to the Attorney-General [Sam Doumany] asking him to investigate the evidence with a view to exercising his discretion to discontinue the proceedings against all of the accused,’ Clair stated.

On Friday 5 August, Solicitor-General Galligan, QC, sought for himself and Attorney-General Doumany the opinion of Chief Crown Prosecutor Angelo Vasta, QC, on the matter. Vasta, in turn, phoned his old mate Police Commissioner Terry Lewis that weekend, but later said they had had no significant discussion about the case.

It was Vasta’s ultimate view that, despite the possibility there was a prima facie case available, the evidence was unsatisfactory and that it would be dangerous to proceed to trial.

Another opinion was sought from Cedric Hampson, QC. After securing further scientific information on heroin residue in the human body, Hampson agreed that the charges should be dropped. In the end, a nolle prosequi was entered.

For the police concerned, it was time to celebrate, and a party was arranged at Ron Pickering’s place at Mansfield, near Carindale. Present were all six officers who had been charged with various offences. Also in attendance were Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, his deputy commissioner Syd Atkinson, and Chief Crown Prosecutor Vasta. Another special guest was Sir ‘Top Level’ Ted Lyons.

Lewis and Lyons arrived at the party together at about 5.30 p.m. and left at 9 p.m. Lewis would later say that the police involved thanked him for not suspending them during their ordeal prior to, and subsequent of, them being charged. Vasta said it wasn’t put to him that the drinks at Pickering’s house would be a ‘celebration’. Ted Lyons would later not be able to offer any explanation as to why he was even there at the party.

Agent Wanted

In the early weeks of spring, just a fortnight before the state election, the
Courier-Mail
newspaper carried a curious flurry of advertisements that on the surface showed a rigorous democracy at work. On Saturday 8 October 1983, for example, the National Party wanted to make sure everybody was ready to get behind the Premier. An ad – with a mug shot of Joh Bjelke-Petersen – shouted HOW TO VOTE, and offered multiple telephone helpline numbers in Brisbane and up and down the Queensland coast. It also casually suggested, if you didn’t want to use the telephone, to call in person at the National Party Office, Brisbane City Mall, 209 Queen Street, Brisbane. ‘Now, more than ever,’ it concluded, ‘Queensland needs Joh and the Nationals.’

In the same issue, in the book review pages, was a large advertisement for the recently released authorised biography of Bjelke-Petersen –
Jigsaw
, by Derek Townsend. It claimed to be the most explosive book ever written about an Australian statesman and spruiked over 12,000 copies already sold. It retailed for $19.95.

Townsend was a curious choice as biographer. His previous publications were primarily travel guides and books on how to make home movies or master underwater photography. One of his radio programs for the British Broadcasting Corporation was titled
8mm Film Versus 16mm Film
.

In the same edition of the newspaper was a review of
Jigsaw
by writer Peter Trundle. It was remarkably uncritical of Townsend’s hagiography. ‘Because it gives a one-sided viewpoint of Joh by someone who admires him to the point of adulation, it cannot be regarded as a definitive work,’ writes Trundle. ‘But having recognised that, it is a useful source of information about [how] Mr. Bjelke-Petersen came to be the way he is.’

Further back in the newspaper’s classifieds, there was an advertisement for the World By Night strip club and restaurant – run by Gerry Bellino – at 548 Queen Street, boasting not just a full a la carte menu, but ‘Our Bathing Beauty MIRANDA’, and a topless waitress service.

Then even further back was a notification from the Totalisator Administration Board (TAB) seeking an agent for its outlet at Dunwich on North Stradbroke Island. ‘The successful applicant will be in the 25 to 40 years age group, of smart appearance and pleasant manner, capable of promoting the Board’s business and image, and who is pared (sic) to make service to the public the first priority,’ the ad read. ‘The person to be appointed must be able to provide a working capital of at least $1500 and a Security Deposit of $500.’ It explained the agency’s weekly remuneration: an hourly rate for hours worked; commission based on weekly turnover; a fee for each [betting] ticket handled. The deadline for applications was just a week hence – Friday 14 October 1983.

On the Saturday the position was advertised, Commissioner Lewis was in Townsville on official business, along with his wife Hazel. He inspected police stations in the region as well as the local water police and dog squads before attending a function with general staff at the Townsville Police Social Club.

He was back in Brisbane on Monday 10 October, and went to the fabled Milano’s Restaurant, eatery to politicians, the judiciary and the rest of the city’s wannabe A-list, under the watchful and attentive eye of wine master Gino Merlo. That day, Lewis dined with his old friend from the Belfast, Barry Maxwell, Reg Tegg, also a publican who was currently before the courts on various charges, former police officer Jack Herbert, the Commissioner’s personal assistant Gregory Early, and the flower farmer from North Stradbroke, Tony Murphy.

At the time of the TAB notification, former president of the Police Union and knockabout detective Ron Edington was working part-time for the board in its headquarters in Albion, just north of the Brisbane CBD. (In fact, Lewis had secured Edington the position through his good mate Sir Edward Lyons, chairman of the TAB. Lewis says: ‘When I was the boss he used to ring me from time to time … he took optional retirement at 55. He used to ring me to try and get a job. I got him a job at the TAB out at Albion. Probably got old Ted Lyons to get it for him.’)

Edington remembers the Dunwich vacancy coming up, and he in turn thought of his old mate Tony Murphy, living over at Amity Point on North Stradbroke.

‘When I left the police I got a job at the TAB as a security officer, at Albion, at the headquarters … they had a newsletter and this newsletter used to come out every week and I saw … the two girls that had the agency at Dunwich had a split and they were calling for applicants. So, I rang Tony Murphy and I said to him, “They’re advertising for Dunwich.” [Murphy’s wife] Maureen used to work for the TAB. Maureen’s a lovely person … I said [to Murphy], “Why don’t you apply for it? You live at Amity Point.”’

Murphy took Edington’s advice. His application was dated Tuesday 11 October, and was received at Head Office on the Thursday. There were 27 applications for the agency, which were whittled down to four interviews. ‘I said to him [Murphy], “Just get onto Terry, Terry will get onto Sir Edward Lyons,” I said. You couldn’t fucking miss,’ recalls Edington.

Lewis confirms that he helped out Murphy with the position. ‘… when Murphy got in touch with me when he left the job and wanted to get a TAB at … whatever island he was on,’ he says. ‘And I didn’t mind ringing old Ted Lyons and saying, look, he is a worker.’

Lyons didn’t just pull strings for Murphy, he ordered that Lewis’s mate get the agency. Former TAB general manager Charles Harriott had sighted the application and believed that Murphy was too old to run the Dunwich outlet; the job was six days a week. ‘It’s very, very rare to put someone his [Murphy’s] age into the job,’ Harriott later said. ‘He’s the only former police officer we’ve ever appointed to that position.’

Harriott did not agree with the appointment, but changed his recommendation to the board on the instruction of Lyons. As a ‘servant of the board and the chairman’, he felt he had no choice.

Murphy got the job.

The TAB office itself was in a small, rectangular brick building on the corner of Shepherd Lane and Rous Street, opposite the Dunwich state school. The dreary besser brick building housed three shop spaces with identical sliding doors at the front, a stainless steel sink, and a small window at the rear near the back door.

‘But it wasn’t worth nothing,’ remembers Edington ‘They only used to open three days a week and … $300, nearly $400 a week, it was worth … and then he employed one of the girls that had the split with the other girl because he didn’t know much about the TAB himself.’

Maureen Murphy says the family made no money from the agency. ‘It was … we didn’t make anything out of it … it was pitiful,’ she says. ‘We applied for it and we got it. I don’t know whether anybody else applied for it. It was more of a hobby sort of thing, and so was the farm.’

A Letter from the Frontline

Meanwhile, Queensland’s political landscape had seen some pyrotechnics leading up to and after the 1983 state election, held on 22 October. The Liberal–National Party Coalition had dissolved, an ambition of Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen since the late 1970s, and new leaders stepped up – Keith Wright for the ALP and Terry White for the Liberals.

Labor had hoped to capitalise on the Coalition split, but Bjelke-Petersen won a sixth consecutive term. The Liberals lost 14 seats in an electoral wipe-out. Joh fell one seat short of a majority. The result had no impact on the ebb and flow of Brisbane’s underworld.

A month after the state election, the irascible and newly returned Labor member for Archerfield, Kev Hooper, again rose in Parliament House and did what he had been doing, relentlessly, for a decade – he tried to prompt government action on matters of vice. Hooper being Hooper, he sprayed the parliamentary chamber with a volley of random barbs before he knuckled down to the point. He took aim at the Police Minister, but his real target was crime and corruption, inside and outside the Queensland Police Force. ‘It is common knowledge that where there is organised prostitution there is organised crime …’ Hooper continued, with what must have seemed like endless déjà vu, ‘… I have pointed out on many occasions that the prostitution industry in this State is the soft underbelly of the Queensland Police Force.’

Hooper highlighted the Gold Coast and its booming trade. ‘I have received many calls from elderly residents on the Gold Coast who have purchased units on the coast for retirement only to find several prostitutes operating from the building in which their units are situated,’ he said. ‘These elderly folk are very upset about harlots using their premises as a house of assignation.’

As ever, Hooper left the best till last. He alerted the chamber that he would read a letter ‘from a police officer I have no reason to doubt’, regarding the ‘non-existent’ brothels and casinos in Fortitude Valley, Brisbane. The letter was dated 12 October 1983. In addressing Hooper, the officer asked: ‘Why is no Police action taken against illegal businesses conducted by the Jeri [sic] Bellino family? This family is the state’s biggest operator of illegal casinos, massage parlours, escort agencies and unlicensed bars.’