The public has had a long held fascination with detectives. Detective see aside of life. The average person is never exposed her I spent thirty four years as a cop. For twenty five of those years I was catching killers. That's what I did for a living. I was a homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead, I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated. The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw
and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some of the content and language might be confronting. That's because no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged. Join me now as I take you into this world. Today, I had a conversation with former Victorian homicide detective called Andrew Stamper. Andrew led some of the biggest investigations in
the country, including Melbourne's deadly gangland war. Andrew was one of the leading investigators of Strikeforce Piranha, a police task force that looked into the notorious underworld killings and drug syndicates, involving infamous figures like Carl Williams. During that time Andrew put away two murderers for the killing of Lewis Kane.
He also takes us inside the twenty seventeen Lone Wolf Flinderstreet attack, where a car was deliberately driven in the busy Christmas crowds, injuring nineteen innocent people and killing one person. Having spent more than forty years with the police, Andrew is a real deal as far as detectives go, and he's someone I would have liked to have worked with. Andrew Stamper, thank you for coming on I Catch Killers.
Thanks for having me.
Well, it's good talking to a former cop, and it's really this is the genesis of what this whole podcast started about. THO I speaking to people that had worked homicide cases. So it's good to get back to our roots, so to speak.
Yep, I agree.
Yeah, you spent forty years in the in the police. What's your takeaway from it? We're looking back now you've probably been out long enough to have time to reflect on it.
On my takeaway as it was a privilege, I think, you know, someone one of our former chief commissioners said you you know you've got a front seat to the best best show on Earth and I honestly feel that it sometimes in some of the roles I was able to do, I feel immense privilege and also a great deal of pride as well when I think about the people that I've worked with over the years, and you know, and knowing how committed they've been to keep in the
community safe too. So yeah, that's my overwhelming thoughts.
I like sitting down speaking to people that have spent as long as you have in the in the police, at the sharp end of the police, and you're always in there with your sleeves rolled up doing the work that you come away from that. And I think you've mentioned the word privilege, and I look back at my career and there is a privilege, isn't it.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, look, probably the same as You've got a few bruises over the journey, and I've certainly got that, and I know you do too, But you know, holistically, it's been a pleasure and privilege.
The other thing you said, it's like, or you attributed to someone else's comment, but a front row seat into some of the most interesting things you could possibly find yourself at. I often felt that in cases, if they were high profile cases, you would think, Yeah, everyone's interested, what's behind that police tape? What's going on? What are the police doing? And here you are in the thick of it.
Yeah, it's life in the golfish bowl, isn't it. And you know, certainly there's been a number of cases over my career where you really feel that you're in the Golfish bol and a lot of cases where you're really working hard to stay one step ahead of the media
who are running their own investigations as well. And you know, that was a lesson that I learned a number of years ago to you know, I hope that's one of the things that enabled me later in my career to actually work more collaboratively with the media on a lot of those you know, those high impact cases.
Yeah, Well, with the high profile comes a different type of pressure, doesn't it when you're heading up an investigation or you're involved in an investigation. But I've followed your career, there's always interest. When I was in the cops, what's happening down in Melbourne and I saw different things, But in the times I saw you in the media, you always seem to have a purpose to what you were saying.
Well, I think there has to be and you don't just do it for the sake of it, you know. And for me engaging with the media, that was either the purpose, you know, it was either in community, in community information or reassurance or trying to gain some strategic
benefit for the investigation. And I think that was always a challenge early days in an investigation, certainly sitting in the position that I did in later years in a leadership position there to think how, you know, how we you know, how we could leverage that most effectively.
Yeah, I see it. I see it as as a tool, a tool that you know, in the kit that you have to solve a crime. You can certainly certainly use the media. Your policing career a little bit different from most Australian cops because you started your policing career in the in the UK. Tell us about that.
Yeah, five years as a bobby and just to the west of London in an area car Wiltshire there, and you know that was that was fantastic, you know, I grew up in the UK. Albeit, I you know, I'm always pains to explain that I am Australian, particularly at times such as now in the crickets, but yeah, I did five years over there, and you know that was very different starting off in the mid eighties where he
was still on foot. You started off on foot patrol and as a nineteen year old, you know, walking into people's homes. You know, I'd come from a small village in the north of England and suddenly I'm talking to people who are twice as old as me and had life experience and trying to tell them how to live their lives and a lot of early lessons there. You know, one of my old sergeants who was a pretty fearsome character.
You know, he used to give you these old adages, you know, like to be a good copy, you've got to have more faces in town hall clock and you know, that's one thing that's that's stuck with me that you really have to adapt your approach or your communication style
to the person you're dealing with. And that was something that really really stuck with me all of my career that you know, you've got to communicate with people on their level, and that could be you know, talking to someone who's a multi millionaire and to someone who's living on the straight. But you know, another thing that that same sergeant told me is that you know that you
treat everyone equally. You treat everyone with respect, and you know you start off from a position of respect, you know, not notwithstanding where they come from or what their status is in life. You treat everyone the same. And you know, those two things I think have stayed with me from from those early days in policing.
It's good advice, isn't it. That's very much formative views those early early times in policing. And you're fortunate enough if you get a good mental pointing you in the right direction. I think that can shape your whole career. The experience you get very early in policing.
Oh absolutely. And you know I can still quite all of those little nuggets of gold that that you know, that particular sergeant used to used to drill into all of us probation as we as we were at the time.
Yeah, life is a bobby and you know a lot of our perception of what goes on in the UK is from the show The Bill. That was a big one. That was very much watching the life of life of cops walking the boat, not having a weapon, and you would quite often it was very much community based policing. That was my observation of it one out without without the firearm. What were what was the different nature of
policing that we don't follow that path in Australia. What was it about the UK policing that allowed that type of policing.
I think there was a cultural thing, I think that society in the UK at that time. And I stress
at that time because I think it's changed now. There was there was guns were were far less common and certainly, you know, certainly the crooks for one of the better better terms you probably were less less less armed than they were here and you know, and there's there's a cultural piece to that somewhere, but it was just always an acceptance that the British police weren't armed and there seemed to be this kind of unwritten code, I suppose, between between the crooks and the cops in the UK.
You know, and I'm talking back in the eighties and as I say, things have changed a lot now, but you certainly learned to think on your feet a lot more. And particularly as I was as a nineteen year old, as I say, just green, you know, you know, just come out of training school and my first role was as a you know, as a community, Bobby. So walking around what you know, what we would call like a housing commissioner state or you know, you know, a ministry
of housing kind of a state. And that was you know, three shifts, twenty four hours and sometimes on night shift, three o'clock in the morning, you're walking around in the little winter by yourself. Occasionally some of the some of the guys that were driving the cars had come and
pick you up just to defrost you. And I'll just get you in the car and just turn the heter on and and uh and just you know, come some life back into you and then you know, chuck you out because the sergeant to be coming around, and you know, the expectation was that you'd be you be on your patch, you know, and but yeah, unverwhelmingly, I think it was just learning to think on your feet and talk your
way through situations a lot, a lot more. And that's a very important tool here as you know, you know, very often I get the privilege of speaking to young cops and one of the things I, you know, I do tell them is learn to talk to people. You know, just have conversations with people. Because in the world the way it is now, and particularly with policing where it's just I must become a response type profession. Just take the time to talk to people. It's one of the greatest arts that couples have.
Well that's a good advice to pass on because it's amazing what you get when you do actually sit down and talk to people. And this is something that kept my interest in policing too. You do get to speak to a whole range of people. I was in the course of my duties speaking to world leaders and people that were living on the streets and flyblay and it
was but that communication is crucial. And I look at all the cops that I respect, they had that ability to communicate at different levels and often it breaks down that barrier.
Yep. Absolutely, And you know, and that's something I've always I've always prided myself in and just treating everyone with respect kind of help me in good stead. I think for the forty years that I was doing.
Okay, before we take you out of the voice and bring you crashing into Victorian ployees in some of the information just preparing for the podcast, so I see that at one point in time, part of your duties was protecting a UK cabinet minister high on the r IRA hit list. What was the backstory there? That seems like an interesting role.
Yeaholved in just before I came over back to Australia. As it was, I did twelve months in a VRP protection team for a fellow who was at the time the British Minister for Northern Ireland. And you know a lot of people forget about about, you know, how serious
the Northern Ireland issue issue was. And in the in the mid eighties or mid to mid to late eighties in the UK it was, you know, it's really at its highest where we were talking Margaret Thatcher was the Prime Minister and yah, there was absolutely not I've lost whatsoever between you know, the Irish Republicans and the British
British government. So that was a really interesting time because I was kind of thrust into this really high security environment and we talk about going from a non armed situation and I then went into a situation where I was heavily armed and you know, talking about driving around country lanes in range rovers with some serious weaponry as a twenty two twenty three year old. So I'd done all the firearms training over there, and the threat from
the IRA was very real. They actually did. There was I think three people it was who who were initially convicted of conspiracy to murder and this was all the time that I was looking after him. And then you know, ironically they were acquitted due to comments made by the subject that we were protecting, who made comments in the media which were deemed a highly prejudicial and and you know the cases, you know, they were they were acquitted
on appeal. So that was quite ironic really that the person that we would try to protect screwed it up ultimately. But yeah, they were really serious about it, and you know, they were highly highly trained, highly affective soldiers. You know, they weren't some rag tag army like some street gang. They were highly effective soldiers and they did their work, They did their reconnaissance and you know, and then the reconnaissance team would pass it on to onto you know,
onto a hit team. And yeah, so it was interesting times, you know, just just being in that environment and yeah, just was it was actually you know good to come to Australia and kind of get out of that where things were.
More related would be very tense. I've done close personal prote action in situations like that. But not with that threat of the IRA. And as you describe them, they're not they're not part time as they're professional and if they've got a target, they're going to go after them tactically. So yeah, you would have had to be on your taes. So is that why you have? I dug deep enough to work out why you've come to Australia.
The look, I mean, I was born here. You know, my parents are English, they came over here, went back, So I was born here and just always been my ambition to come back. So that was really a way to you know, to you know, I took on that role knowing that I was coming here in twelve months time and so that was really you know, nothing to do with you know, I wasn't scaping that or anything like that, but yeah, it was it was you know,
it was hairy times as well. Again, as you know, you learn something through all of these roles and you take that with you during your career and you know, so that concept of personal and operational security has always been paramount as well.
I think having done tactical policing myself, I think it boted very well for working in criminal investigation when you might be doing the tactical stuff yourself at that stage, but you had the communication, you understand their capabilities and different things, so it's all about getting the experience. Did you come over to Australia with the intent to join the police?
Yeah, ok, I'd actually come here on holiday and I did all the recruiting interviews while I was here on holiday.
And they at that time here in Victoria in nineteen eighty nine, it would have been a lot of people that they just changed the superannuation scheme and so a lot of the old timers left under the old scheme, and so there was a massive recruiting drive and you know I didn't know that, but you know, they were pushing people through, you know, very quickly, and unlike today, there was a there was a you know, there was a vast pool of applicants who wanted to do it,
which is a different story these days. But yeah, so I came here, did all the testing and interviews and they said, you know, come back in six months and you can go straight in. So I was pretty much back within six months.
Okay, did you get any the credit or allowances for your experience or you know, you had to start fresh and in the in the academy learned how to march.
And yeah, and you know I've used this, I've used this analogy before. But back at the Academy in those days, they still did a thing here which was called fatigues. So if you lived in the academy, I don't know what it was like at Gulban back in your day, but if you lived in the academy, you had to have a job and you got allocated a role. So it might be picking letter up, it might be washing dishes after dinner. And my role was sweeping the round
about it at the front of the Police Academy. So you know, I'd gone from looking after the British Minister for noln Island to sweeping the roundabout the front of the Police Academy in very quick time. But you know, again, out of that, you know, I remember those times and the humbling moments where you kind of think, you know, we'll just put your head down, just do what you've got to do, you know, just keep pushing, pushing forward.
And you know you learn a lot from those moments too that you know, you could actually throw your arms up in the air and say I'm too good for this, or whatever. But you know, I think you just push through and just just think, well, yeah, there's a goal at the end of the day, and this is you know, this is part of the one of the hurdles I've got to jump to get.
There, most definitely, And it's a good attitude to have. It's all learning process. You're paying your dues. I think that's very very important in an organization like a police force, that you understand that, yeah, just learn your way, learn all the things. It might be doing point duty of the traffic accident, which is probably not what you're aspiring to, but it's all part of the learning process.
Yeah. Yeah, I do stress that they don't do those things anymore.
So we both had a conversation before this and we were talking about policing and trying to encourage police because the bigger pill you've got, the better people you can select. And it saddens me. I see across the country police forces are struggling to attract recruits and yeah, it's okay, we better not tell them they've got to sweep the roundabout if they if they.
Know, no, not and not to you know, not to take away you know how hard the job is. But it's very very satisfying and very fulfilling as well.
Yeah, what what steered you towards the career in detectives.
I think I've been here for a number of years and just did a few different roles in general duties or you know, in regional policing, and then one of my first postings was was in an area called paran here in Melbourne, which is is pretty much next to
sin Kilda as well. So I've worked at the support group it was called at the time, where they did a lot of the lower level drugs investigations and you know another you know, I suppose middle level crimes, you know, I suppose that the ones that the detectives weren't doing, and so I did that for a little while. And one of the one of the great things about those units and still is, is that they're a bit of
a breeding ground for new detectives. The junior people like I was come in, but the sergeants there tend to be people, you know, who've been detective, you know, either been off at the crime squad's got promoted and then are coming into these units. So you're actually getting led by people who've got that background. So you know, it was a really formative time for me. I think here where I decided, yeah, this is what I wanted to do.
And there's a few those sergeants there that had come from the robbery squad and the homicide squad, and you kind of just got a taste of those bigger investigations as well, I suppose. So that's where it started for me.
Okay, we're going to jump into your career in major crime and being involved in leading some of the country's biggest homicide investigations. But before we do, both former homicide detects, I think it's important we talk about the impact victim homicide has and the devastating that fact it has. And there's a ripple effect homicide, isn't it When one life is taken, it's not just one life destroyed. There's there's
multiple lives that are destroyed. What's your your thoughts on homicide investigation in general?
Ah, Look, it's it's it doesn't get any tougher. And I think about you know, myself, and I think about all the all the other people doing that work, that these cases stay with you forever. And I think, ultimately, if I look at why I stepped away, at the end of the day, I think, you know it just you know, there's some title of you know, of carrying all that from from over that period of time. You just it's just a weight on your shoulders that you
kind of just want some release from. But I mean the reality is, as an investigator in a homicide squads in a homicide manner, I should say those those cases
can take ten years to work through the courts. And if you're the lead investigator in those, you carry those cases and other cases, you know, so you as you know, all your homicide investigators O carry in multiple cases and a lot of them can take a long time to work through the courts, and you keep that, you know, And this is probably one of the things if I could actually change anything, or work towards changing something, it would be to take the reliance off the individual a
little bit more. And you know, I'm talking specifically about Victoria here. I think there's too much reliance and too much pressure put on what we call the informant here in Victoria, who are all things to all people. So you know, they've got to prepare the case, they've got to be the liaison with the families, which is a very very difficult, you know, very difficult role the court liaison prepare the matter for court, and that goes on
and on and on. If you get a man at the coast of the High Court, then yeah, you look at you potentially ten years down the track. That's the one thing that I would like, you know, some focus to be on and just relieving some of that pressure on the individual here. But you know, I think that's the hardest part about homicide. I don't think there's any other cases, and I've investigated pretty much everything else where. They stay with you as long as long as they do.
And of course it's not just stay with you in a technical sense, or it's an emotional sense too, because most of us, you know, most of us carry a little bit you know with this, you know, and just through that dealing with the families day to day and these manners, you know, it attaches to you.
You talked about the pressure on the informant, I know in New South Wales and I'm sure it's in Victoria. It's just the nature of things and resources are limited. Quite often you'd have a big strike force investigating a particular murder and then someone's been charged and then Okay, well we need to allocate the resources elsewhere and you're left You're left there. You used to have a team of twenty. Now you've got a team of one or two and you've expected to run the matter through the courts.
And you're expected to help other people with other jobs, and you know, and also take on new cases too.
Yeah, you said in the chat we had the other day that in the UK they have a system where that what you were saying we should aspire to, they had a system in place there where there was a little bit less or it was spread around. Once you've charged someone, there's more people available to help the matters proceed through the courts.
Yeah. So going back to nineteen eighty nine when I left the UK, that there was investigation support teams which were generally retired cops. Most cops retire after thirty years in the UK, and a lot of them are just you know, forty nine to fifty and not ready to do nothing. So a lot of them actually finish on the Friday is as a as a cop and come back on the Monday as an administrative assistance or an
investigative assistant. And there's not much that they can't do that you know, the cop can do is basically only the arrest bows that the change. So there was a lot of assistance through those areas. You know, looking at it practically as a detective, as a as a cop on the street, you go out, you make an arrest, you bring them back, you'd interview them, then you charge them and that would essentially be the last you'd see
it until it goes to court. There would be a whole range of other support services that would put the brief together with liaison with the CPS as it is there, or the opp as we'd call it here. Yeah, you're essentially just a witness on the brief. As the arresting officer. Here, it's a lot different you you do the individual does
all those things. And there's a lot of conversations here in Victoria at the moment about bringing back some of the retired retired cops and to you know, to do some of this work that's been spoken about for a long time. I just don't think. I don't think in Australia it's it's it's a priority for at the political level. I think it's always a conversation is always around police numbers and around you know, get more police, get more police.
That's that's sexy for politicians. Yeah for twelve months. Yeah, yeah, so you know we're in that cycle again, or we will be in that cycle again here very soon. And what never gets spoken about was, you know, well, we could we could probably do with less police if we had more more assistances, more administrative assistance. And they're not people that actually have to be swarm police, so they
don't have to go off and do three months. And as you know, there's a body of people out there in ex cops who would be prepared to come in and if it was just taking statements or putting briefs together, that sort of stuff. You know, those are the roles where you could actually free up your investigators to actually do the stuff that you want them to do. You can go out and catching crooks.
Andrew I think that's an important conversations, something that we've touched on previously, and it's usually with the experienced cops like yourself, that that is really a way forward. It doesn't necessarily we have to increase the police numbers, but take a bit of the pressure off the administrative stuff, not just with the criminal investigations, but the administration in terms of keeping diaries up to date and different things that really even and people I think have a misconception
that and I'm sure you would have experienced this. You could be leading a hole profile homicide investigation, and you could also be spending a day on the phato copier making sure you could FADO copy, getting the brief prepared, and doing stuff like that. And I often thought, with the experience of experienced officers that we could have people assisting in those roles. But there seems to be a reluctance to it. But I think it's definitely worth having the conversation about.
Yeah, well, as an example of the major cases you're talking and I often used to say, you know, somewhat flippantly, when we've made a significant arrest.
You know, all the fund's over that, you know, the hard work begins.
The hard work begins and putting the brief together. And these days it's not just putting the brief together, it's the disclosure. The disclosure and in a lot of cases
is greater than the brief. And you know, and through disclosure we're talking about when you know, obviously, just to explain to the listeners, when the solicitors get the brief and they and put in their disclosure requests or demands as they are, you know, or the other material that they deem to be relevant or want to assist their case has to be prepared and submitted, and in a lot of cases there's a lot of redaction and a lot of a lot of work got to go into that,
and generally it's one person doing that again, and that can take longer than the brief.
To put together. Most definitely, I think it's quite often, I believe, not just solely, but sometimes use strategically by defense barristers and solicitors that you get your requisitions on a Friday afternoon and they can be extremely broad, and it would be literally going through hundreds and hundreds if not more, pages of evidence and redacting certain things and
gathering gathering information. So look, it's a conversation that I think's worth having, and it's good sitting down speaking to an experience police officer looking at it, stepping away, not involved in it now, but thinking where there could be improvements, and just using the experience of retired police officers. That's something that I've often said about New South Wales and I can only speak with knowledge on New South Wales. But when someone retired, they were gone from the force.
And I had friends colleagues that had retired for whatever reason, but they would love to be working two or three days a week and it could just be as simply as sitting down taking witness statements just to and there's a skill set that they've walked away with and we're not utilizing that.
And don't get me started on witness statements, because you know, that's probably one of the you know, if I had to talk about one of the one of the arts of certainly being being an detctive is good witness statements and they're very rarely done. And you know, some of the some of the more experienced people, if that's all you're doing, you know, because as you know, your case.
Is revolve on your witness witness statements.
Yeah, so yeah, I'm not submitting my CLV just.
But just for I know what you say. And we look at it. And I was working with strike forces and I'm thinking, I know these people are sitting home board because they're fanning me all the time since they've left the police, and I would love them to come in and get this detailed twenty page witness statement covering off all the information that's required. But look, we're getting distracted.
I was going to have the conversation about about policing, but let's let's delve into some of the cases that you've been involved in. I'd be criticized by the audience if I didn't take you to strike a Force or Piranha, the Melbourne Underworld gangland killings that certainly played out big time and in the Underbelly TV series. What was your involvement in that investigation and tell us about what was going on at that time.
Well, I was there at the start, so I'd not long been a homicide and I was I was allocated
to to a crew. My senior sergeant was Pheli Bonymus Phil Swindles at the time, and we actually had a lot of the unsolved cases on our crew which had happened so unsolved shooting murders out in the western suburbs of Melbourne, and that it was actually Phil who put together a report a recommending a task force be set up to investigate these all of these unsold murders because there was some commonality in some of the some of the identities that were that were that were cropping up.
And of course you know, now people like Carl Williams and as you know, as a as a trooper and and then as a boss task forces, you don't you know, you don't want us that one up unless you absolutely have to. So there was there was, you know, there was some resistance at at the early stages, so that was knocked back that request initially. And then there was a there was a feller by name of Nick Radev who was notoriously known as Nick the Russian, which I
could never understand because he was actually Bulgarian. But Nick the Russian was shot and killed in Melbourne in an area of Melbourne called Cobert and that was pretty much the straw that broke the camel's back. So when that happened to happened in a very public place, and there was you know, rightfully, there was a lot of media outrage about that, and so that was the start of Prana.
So it was really you know, for any of your listeners and yourself, if you've watched the wire, when you know it's a bit like setting up setting up the task force in the wy you know that you go down to the basement with the old you know the facts mass. You know, we didn't quite have the walking wounded that they had in the in the in the wire.
But again I always I've always found the startup of task forces or strike forces something, you know, it's funny and it's it's it's it's got its own culture itself in policing.
I think as well, well, you've opened up my mind about some of the strike forces that were started up and then to be announced by the senior police that we've got the strike force. And then you look around and we're still sitting at the same desk. No car, yeah, no computers. Well what about staff? We should be able to get you some stuff. And invariably you get someone that's on long term sick for on holidays.
He's coming back in six months. Yeah, but you can have him.
Yeah yeah, Well it has twigged my memory on on those times and that work was chaotic and I would explain to people, and the more experienced I got, and I was taught by people that were experienced, I couldn't the stand when we're starting the strikeforce. When I was a young fresh detective, all excited, Why we're worrying so much about where are we going to access a whiteboard? Why are we worried about computers? Shouldn't we be locking
up the bad guys? But I came to learn that was imperative for the success of an investigation, to make sure your fought for everything you could to get your strike force.
White boys were a serious commodity, weren't they, and policing in but I do say that Piranha was different in that. So our entire crew went up to this task force, and then they brought in some other people and some great people as well from different areas, from drugs and stolen stolen cars. And so that was the start of it, and then it multiplied significantly after the murder of Jason Moran and a feller by name of Pasquali Barbera added
add at the Cross Keys Hotel in Pascal Vale. And this was the one that happened on an oz kick mourning. All the kids are playing playing footy and the two deceased in that manner actually loaded their kids into into a van and we're just about to leave from memory when they were, you know, they were brutally assassinated and in public view with all these kids at this junior footy morning, and that was the one that just caused
enormous outrage. And you know, as I've said before, I think there are a number of things that are sacrosanct in Australian society and kids sport on the weekends as one of them, and for something like that to happen in that environment, so then there was there was a big injection of staff into the task force. As a result of that, we probably tripled in number, went to a bigger room, got a couple more cars, a couple more whiteboards. But yeah, that's when it really took off.
What was the pressure like then, because I know when you're involved in big strike forces like that, it's twenty four to seven For each action, there's a reaction. You're targeting people, you're keeping an eye that further crimes, and it's a little bit different from some homicide investigations because you've almost got to be proactive in the way that you're trying to prevent further fever crimes happening.
It was like who's next, So you know, we all were allocated an investigation, and then there's homicides that are happening. You're looking at those and seeing there's any connections into it, and then if there are connections, then there was a bit of a negotiation with a homicide squad, you know, to release those investigations to the Task Force. So it was yeah, that was crazy days really that you kind of just every day you were just kind of wondering who,
you know, who's next. That the crooks on us got intoxicated on what they thought was this power that they had to do this, And yeah, so that's why, you know, I'm really proud of the work that we did. And you know, I often get asked about there's obviously been some issues over the years where you know, some of the tactics that we use they have you know, certainly
been questioned. But holistically, from my point of view, it stopped what was happening and undoubtedly saved lives and you know, stop the underworld we're actually trying to run the city.
Yeah, that is the difficulty of situations like that, Like I'm sure the task Force was set up to solve the crimes but also prevent further crimes from happening, and there's a lot of pressure and you've got to play think outside the square in those ways. I think what we're alluding to and we don't have to delve into it was the solicit that became an informant that's been playing out publicly over the past the past few years.
From it, I look at it, I look at it from an investigator's point of view, and I can just picture how Chao think that whole time would have been down there, and the pressures that were on and the people involved in Yeah, you got big personalities in the investigations like this and you're getting pulled from pill the post. Did you have a specific role, Yeah, well, I.
Was one of the one of the lead investigators. There was a murder that happened after the task force had started Fellabono of Lewis Kane who was shot and killed out at Carlton and then his body was dumped in Brunswick. And there was two too very well known criminal identity who I can't name because of active suppression orders. Still they were ultimately charged with that. So I was the informant in that case, carried that one through know over
a period of time. But so I was, you know, one of the one of the homicide investigators who, as I say, we had a you know, we generally had an active job, and we had a you know, we had you know, other unsolved jobs as well that we were looking.
At without giving away methodology on how they were caught. A lot of them have gone through gone through the courts. Where did you think that the police was starting to get the upper hand on what was going on.
It was probably the most significant investigation, you know, in terms of the volume of electronic surveillance that was carried out of a period of time, and again without sort of digging into the depths of that, as you know, that's you know, that's pretty complicated stuff. It's not stuff
you get, you know, it's it's hard to get. It's a very high bar and justification and then actually managing that stuff and when you're talking about the volume of you know, of electronic material that we were dealing with, some of the people and the scene so never got the accolades should be you know, hell up high because as you know, managing that kind of you know, information and going through it and listening to it twenty four to seven is highly challenging. So that was one of
the big things. You know. Another one was the ability of you know, some of our people and again just coming back to talking to people, and even some of these the people that we were talking to were were you know, the hardest, hardest criminals in this country. You know, at the end of the day, a lot of them you can actually have a conversation with.
You again, that communication, Yeah, if.
You actually just give people respect and give them a bit of time. And I'm not saying all of them, as you know, there's some that you wouldn't waste your time on, but you know, some of the some of these people are actually you know, you can have a conversation with him. There's kind of like a mutual respect. So one of the really you know, important things that happened during that time was that they actually recruited some people and came on board and actually you know, gave
evidence against their associates. So that was a really important part of it as well. And I think that came from the quality of a lot of the investigators that we had and the team who had those abilities to actually, you know, to actually communicate with with you know, some pretty serious crooks at the end of the day.
I don't think you can underestimate that ability for people to be able to communicate and cultivate relationships with people to get information and we're talking criminal informants here, but there's some people that have from law enforcement have a natural aptitude for it and it can make a world of difference in investigations of that nature.
It is a bit of a dying art. But you know, back in the back in the olden days, you know, I talked about the olden days, and you know, in the eighties you did actually get out on the town a little bit more and talk to talk to people. And that's gone now, you know. And for some reasons that's a good thing, and you know, for other reasons
it's not a great thing. But you know, again, I think that's just one of the challenges of modern policing is how you kind of breage that gap where, you know, in teaching our younger people how to actually communicate with with with people on the other side of the tracks, because a lot of them don't do very.
Well, No they don't. And we had that was identified as a problem in the Royal Commission we had up here in New South Wales police and informant relationships and all that. But in my time involved post Royal Commission, we're very accountable in the communications that we had with criminal informants. We had to document it and it was painful, like every time you virtually every time you're speaking to them,
documenting it and all that. It was painful at the time, but what I see down the track when it came through the courts, it was great. The barristers are things, Okay, what's gone here? Is something shocky gone on here? And you produce all the records. This is every time I've spoken to the informant, this is what the informant told me. And moving on from there with the what we know is the Melbourne Gangland War, how long did that go on for?
Well, it had started well before Piranha started, so you know it would have started in the early two thousands and you know, probably for at least five five years after that, I would think, you know, it would be at least five years and then you know, obviously you talk about how things now long things take to work through the courts. But yeah, I would say certainly there was five years of it with Piranha.
The task force that was set up. How many police were attached to that at its highest.
Well, I would say we started off with from memory, we started off with about ten or twelve in the in the very early days, and then it went up to about sixty years I think. So it was you know, and that's a sizeable task forces, you know, in Australian terms, it would have been up around those numbers.
Yeah, that's that's big numbers when it ended. Can you put a point on when the war ended, as we describe as a war and how many people were killed or got the tributed in that course?
I couldn't tell you.
I can't.
I can't recall from from memory. But but pretty much everyone either ended up dead or locked up one or the other. And you know, certainly in the case of Carl Williams, he was locked up and then he ended up dead. But that's pretty much, you know. It was actually the fact that we locked all the players up at the end of the day or they were either they'd either already been killed.
Or they've been killed or been locked up, and they probably put an end to it.
It was.
It was a fascinating job and it certainly captured the attention of the nation. With the Underbelly, the first Underbelly series that the played out in it was that up and running at the time of the investigations or that came after the investigations.
Well it actually it actually came after the investigations, but they started filming that and I was I was again privileged to be part of that and actually was was given permission within within Victoria Police to actually act as the technical advisor to to that show, which was which was really interesting. It wouldn't happen, it wouldn't happen now,
but different times. But that's where I got to know a lot of people in that, you know, and in the well in the film and television industry, I suppose because a lot of the you know, the top people in Australian film and television worked behind that, as you know, because you were involved in it. And so that was really really interesting experience to to be there from the start with with Underbelly and to work with the writers
and the producers from the start of that. And you know, I remember one of the one of the greatest takeaways I had from that is a thing that I, you know, I maintained today is that the truth is truth is
stranger than fiction. I remember sitting in writers' rooms with you know, some of the best writers in Australian television and seeing their jewels at the table when we were telling them stories about things that had happened, and these are ultimately things that made it into into the television show. And they were, you know, saying, oh, we couldn't make this up. You know that we couldn't. We couldn't, we couldn't write this. And that's you know, that's one thing
that's actually stuck with me. There's a lot of things that we see in the war exposed that you couldn't make up. So that was really, you know, insightful for me thinking that, yeah, a lot of a lot of what we do see is actually stranger than fiction.
It seems. And I think you've got permission to consult with the Underbelly. When they did the series on Underbelly Badness on the Terry Falcon murder, senior police approached me and said, look, Underbelly writers are doing this. We're happy for them to sit down speak with you and all that. So I had permission also to provide information to them. Sadly, about three weeks before it was due to go on, they've canceled that permission and I've said, well, you know,
I've already given all the details. They've followed me around it at your direction, and now you're telling me not to speak to them, But my experience with it, I know in speaking to you, and I got to the point where I said, look to the underbelly writers, you can't be around while we're working. Step away from it, and I'll give you my time after work. And they would often say, well, yeah, we're taking up so much
of your time. I said, that's fine. And the thing that helped me get through that was working with creative people. I found it refreshing because police is so dark, heavy, and you're stuck in this world, and then you sat down with the writers and spending time in the writer's room as you described, I found it quite refreshing, and that balanced out the day to day police work I was.
I still am in awe of some of those people, some of those writers, you know, I have the sort of privilege of working with some of them still today. And one i'll give a shout out to I know he's mate of yours, Greg Hadrick. He's a good friend
of us. And Greg was one of the main guys and his ability to absorb information and then to convert that into a script or a story overnight, you know, it was it still leaves me, leaves me and if his skill and you know, Greg was one of one of a number of writers and they were all good, and a lot of them had come out of that Neighbors and Harme and Away kind of environment where you know, there's a constant churn, and I think that was kind of where a lot of those riders cut their teeth
as well, you know, talking about where we cut our teeth, you know, just on that constant churn.
The constant pressure. I was surprised that the depth and the team that Greg had and I would fight often joke with them that they delve so deeply. I said, I need you guys on the strikeforce to work as my analysts, like they would dig up things and come back with things. But look, it's an interesting experience and it's good sitting down speaking to a fellow cop who has that experience, because it's something that's rather unique in the world of police.
Well, if I could just say as well, I mean, I know you've had experience of this, but in the in the in the production phase, so when they're actually filming things, you know, one thing that actually just just I used to think I wish I could have these people working for me doing doing warrant planning because they're
planning logistics and execution of their plans. You know, everything is planned down because you know, time is money, as you know, in that industry, and the planning that goes into it, the communications and logistics is just it's just first rate. So yeah, big shout out to that industry.
Yeah, interesting experience. We might we might take a break here here, Andrew, and when we get back, I want to talk about a couple of other cases. We'll talk about the brutal rape and murder. You're a dissy Dixon stalked on the streets of Melbourne. I'll get your thoughts on, get your thoughts on policing, and I'm sure we're going to have a lot more, a lot more to talk about when we get back. OK. Thanks, cheers,