Post by ~Wizeguy~ on Jan 31, 2004 21:46:49 GMT -5
Australian Mafia syndicate cracked
By Padraic Murphy and Jeremy Roberts
January 30, 2004
A RIVERINA-BASED Italian-Australian criminal syndicate is believed to be the Australian arm of a sophisticated drug trafficking network raided by authorities on three continents this week.
Australian Federal Police on Wednesday raided 15 properties linked to the group in Adelaide, Melbourne and Mildura and seized documents and computer equipment.
The raids in Australia, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Colombia and Venezuela were part of a coordinated crackdown on a major Italian-based cocaine ring.
Italian authorities arrested 80 people and indicated that 5.5 tonnes of cocaine had been seized worldwide as part of the investigation.
The Australian syndicate has been linked to drug smuggling, stand-over rackets and several brutal murders over the past 30 years and was particularly active in the 1980s, according to police sources.
The group has also been linked to the murder of anti-drugs campaigner Donald Mackay, who was killed in Griffith in 1977 after complaining about organised crime in the area.
Police now believe Italian and Colombian criminals are using the group to import and distribute cocaine in Australia.
The overseas criminals are also believed to have links to Spanish terrorist organisations.
Australia's part of the crackdown -- Operation Hellenic -- began in August 2000 when local police, working on information received from Italy's Carabinieri, seized 317 kilograms of cocaine in Adelaide.
AFP Adelaide director Jenny Russ said the total Australian seizures during the course of the four-year investigation make it among the largest in Australian history.
"Whilst there has been no arrests or seizures in Australia (on Wednesday), we believe we have disrupted a major international drug trafficking ring," Ms Russ said.
Ms Russ said the investigation was ongoing. "The investigation is at a very sensitive stage," she said.
According to the sources, the group at the centre of the Australian raids began in the the Mildura area and have strong links to the so-called "Honoured Society" -- the Calabrian-based arm of the Mafia.
The group were also implicated in Melbourne's so-called fruit market murders of the 1960s, a series of murders that flared again in the 1990s and have links to the current wave of Melbourne underworld killings.
In 1983, Marco Medici, a senior member of the group, was murdered as he worked at his fruit plantation at Red Cliffs near Mildura.
Police believe the man who supplied the gun that killed Marco Medici also supplied the gun that killed Donald MacKay.
Marco Medici's son, Matteo, was cleared of his father's murder in 1988.
In 1984, the body of Marco Medici's cousin, Rocco Medici, was found dumped along with that of another criminal, Giuseppe Furina, in the Murrumbidgee River near Griffith.
By Padraic Murphy and Jeremy Roberts
January 30, 2004
A RIVERINA-BASED Italian-Australian criminal syndicate is believed to be the Australian arm of a sophisticated drug trafficking network raided by authorities on three continents this week.
Australian Federal Police on Wednesday raided 15 properties linked to the group in Adelaide, Melbourne and Mildura and seized documents and computer equipment.
The raids in Australia, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Colombia and Venezuela were part of a coordinated crackdown on a major Italian-based cocaine ring.
Italian authorities arrested 80 people and indicated that 5.5 tonnes of cocaine had been seized worldwide as part of the investigation.
The Australian syndicate has been linked to drug smuggling, stand-over rackets and several brutal murders over the past 30 years and was particularly active in the 1980s, according to police sources.
The group has also been linked to the murder of anti-drugs campaigner Donald Mackay, who was killed in Griffith in 1977 after complaining about organised crime in the area.
Police now believe Italian and Colombian criminals are using the group to import and distribute cocaine in Australia.
The overseas criminals are also believed to have links to Spanish terrorist organisations.
Australia's part of the crackdown -- Operation Hellenic -- began in August 2000 when local police, working on information received from Italy's Carabinieri, seized 317 kilograms of cocaine in Adelaide.
AFP Adelaide director Jenny Russ said the total Australian seizures during the course of the four-year investigation make it among the largest in Australian history.
"Whilst there has been no arrests or seizures in Australia (on Wednesday), we believe we have disrupted a major international drug trafficking ring," Ms Russ said.
Ms Russ said the investigation was ongoing. "The investigation is at a very sensitive stage," she said.
According to the sources, the group at the centre of the Australian raids began in the the Mildura area and have strong links to the so-called "Honoured Society" -- the Calabrian-based arm of the Mafia.
The group were also implicated in Melbourne's so-called fruit market murders of the 1960s, a series of murders that flared again in the 1990s and have links to the current wave of Melbourne underworld killings.
In 1983, Marco Medici, a senior member of the group, was murdered as he worked at his fruit plantation at Red Cliffs near Mildura.
Police believe the man who supplied the gun that killed Marco Medici also supplied the gun that killed Donald MacKay.
Marco Medici's son, Matteo, was cleared of his father's murder in 1988.
In 1984, the body of Marco Medici's cousin, Rocco Medici, was found dumped along with that of another criminal, Giuseppe Furina, in the Murrumbidgee River near Griffith.
