Tactical police teams arrested seven men in what appears to be a sophisticated,
thriving drug operation —
starring a remote clandestine laboratory hidden from prying eyes in the middle of nowhere —
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where they’re accused of strange alchemy: reconstituting liquid cocaine.
It’s a fascinating probe, but I can’t take my eyes off this — the T-shirt one of the alleged narcos
was wearing when pinched this week in a raid. The Mob Reporter here with news of an amazing
discovery in the rural bush of Australia — secret labs, tubs of liquid coke,
homemade crystal meth, underworld chemists and cash, cash, cash and more cash — all allegedly
part of an enterprise that is interesting not so much for what it is, but for what it isn’t.
Let me tell you about it.
“Police! Sear warrant! Open the door!” [Banging] “Police search warrant”
Before we talk about the importance of that T-shirt, let’s first look at what
the men are accused of. And how it fell apart. Police suspected a criminal syndicate was at work,
securing supplies of precursor chemicals commonly used to manufacture drugs and in July formed a
task force to look into it. They made uncertain progress, but then something happened last week.
Here’s how the head of the New South Wales drugs and guns squad described it:
“In August, early August, just last week the investigation took a bit of a turn.”
He didn’t say it, but more often than not, this means there was a snitch.
However they got there, this is what they found. It started with the search of three storage sheds
in a suburb of Sydney, Australia, named Prospect, which, incidentally, was originally a settlement
for freed convicts. Police say that officers seized 150 kilos of methylamphetamine, known
as ice, and 14 kilos of cocaine bricks, worth as much as Aus$33 million, by police calculations.
They also seized Aus$1.5 million cash, as well as large quantities of chemicals and
solvents often used in the manufacture of ice. What they found there led to a further six search warrants
at various neighborhoods and suburbs of Sydney, on Aug. 12, 2021.
“Police search warrant! Open the door!” [Banging]
Look at the size of this guy.
In Millers Point, officers found $3 million cash inside four large black duffle bags
— and another $50,000 cash inside a safe. Money in bags suggests money that’s on the move
and cash locked in a safe is cash staying put. In a search in Prospect, officers seized
$130,000 cash, a Range Rover, luxury watches, electronics, and documents.
At a home in Pemulway, police found 400 kilos of liquid, believed by police to be unrefined cocaine.
These raids led to two crime scene warrants executed by officers,
one in another Sydney suburb and another one here. In a remote and intensely rural part of
southeastern Australia, about 200 kilometres inland from Sydney.
Here is where officers seem to have stumbled across lifeblood of the operation.
A large sophisticated clandestine laboratory. Police allege that they
were using the lab to extract liquid cocaine, reconstitute it, refine it and repackage it.
It was arriving concealed in industrial tubs of what police described as painting
and grouting supplies. How it was processed is not yet known. Police weren’t saying much
and gave the impression they hadn’t really figured it all out themselves.
The best Detective Superintendent John Watson was willing to offer was this:
“This particular syndicate had the know-how to reconstruct it, to extract it and to refine.
This particular extraction technique that we’re seeing now
and we’re still finding out more about at the clan lab,
is a technique rarely seen in New South Wales and indeed in Australia. So it is something we’re
seeing more commonly throughout Colombia so it is something that we’re particularly keen to understand.”
Dismantling the lab, police say they found 15 kilos of cocaine pressed into bricks, and thousands of litres
of liquids that were still being tested. Inside an SUV, police say they found
several buckets containing 140 kilos of what they believe to be unrefined liquid cocaine.
Four men were arrested and charged in the Sydney raids and three at the rural property.
They range in age from 33 to 54 years old.
All in, police say they seized Aus$4.7 million in cash, 430 kilos of coke,
30 kilos of it in brick form and 400 kilos in liquid form, along with meth and other chemicals.
Police also seized cars, two air rifles and two Harley-Davidson motorcycles.
Harley-Davidsons you say? You must be thinking what I thought,
an outlaw biker club was behind it. But at the start of the video,
I said this is more interesting for what it isn’t, than what it is. By that I mean,
it isn’t what people might immediately pin it on. For starters, police said this:
“No, there were no outlaw motorcycle gangs in relation to this…”
And also this: “Most the men are Australian citizens,
and there is one person that we’re still trying to establish what his citizenship is.”
So it wasn’t any of the large and active biker clubs in Australia,
and it wasn’t a foreign gang which have previously been caught drowning Australia in meth in recent
years. It isn’t a previously known gang or mob connected to a known crime group.
At this stage, it looks like a homegrown, independent group that flew under the radar
to fund, build, activate and operate such a significant and well-run affair.
However, there is one caveat — the presence of a non-Australia arrested at the isolated laboratory
raises the prospect of a foreign underworld chemist, there to oversee, perhaps teach,
a technique that is already known to be used in Colombia, and possibly recently also in Canada.
I’ll put my link to a video on that discovery here and in the description.
Now, let’s get back to that T-shirt. For starters, it’s hilarious — imagine
an accused gangster appearing before a judge seeking bail wearing that shirt
with such an iconic symbol of organized crime. In case you don’t recognize it, it is a frame
from the exquisite opening scene of one of the greatest Mafia movies of all time, The Godfather.
It is such an emblematic scene that it was used as the main art on the poster for the 1972 movie.
It makes it one of the most famous Mafia images ever.
This is what the picture is from. It features Marlon Brando playing the
powerful Mafia boss, Vito Corleone when a successful and upstanding businessman
comes begging the Godfather to get him justice after his daughter is attacked by two men.
“And I said to my wife, for justice, we must go to Don Corleone…”
To me, though, it is more than just a great sight gag.
The deeply cinematic scene it depicts captures perfectly the ethos of how the
Mafia works to imbue itself into a community — simultaneously acting as both the cops
and the robbers of the people around it. The scene is an important one in the movie
and the shirt seems specifically designed to capture that moment and its message. celebrating
the underworld, boasting of an admiration of a deeply ingrained criminal culture.
I think the shirt isn’t just a shout out to a great film.
It seems a direct tribute, a reminder of the power of organized crime, the supremacy of the
mob. It singularly expresses an understanding and appreciation of the fundamental concept of what
every gangster craves: Respect.
[Loud yawn]
That’s a commodity with little equal within organized crime,
the forced, and earned admiration, acquiescence, and submission of those around you.
It is one of the few things that must be earned, and can’t be bought.
Or maybe it’s just a shirt. Maybe I’m just giving it too much respect.
Thanks for watching.
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