A US-style special prosecutor and unprecedented police powers will be used to attack organised crime in Victoria, but civil liberties groups claim the proposal is dangerously flawed.
The new officer, with the title chief examiner, will have coercive powers and can demand answers from organised crime suspects. Self-incrimination will no longer be accepted as a reason for not answering questions.
Brisbane Lions chairman Graeme Downie reacted angrily yesterday when Lions triple-premiership player Chris Johnson was named by a radio station as having links to members of the Melbourne underworld.
AFL triple premiership player Chris Johnson has been linked to a man arrested over three Melbourne gangland murders.
Brisbane Lions' star Johnson and Alfonse Traglia have been close friends and at one point last year spoke almost daily.
Traglia last month was charged with the murders of drug boss Jason Moran and his friend Pasquale Barbaro in June last year at an Essendon North children's football clinic.
The Herald Sun does not suggest Johnson was ever involved in any criminal behaviour. The spotlight on Melbourne's underworld has also uncovered other relationships between prominent footballers and gangland identities.
They include:
THE brother of a rising AFL star linked to accused drug boss Carl Williams.
A STAR midfielder who has been a friend of an armed robber who has come under Purana notice.
RICHMOND player Ty Zantuck who is a friend of the Moran family and was at the funerals of Jason Moran and his father Lewis.
FORMER AFL star Wayne Johnston who attended the funeral of Jason Moran and was a friend of his brother Mark, who was murdered in June, 2000.
Traglia is in the top security Acacia unit of Barwon Prison, near Geelong.
Chris Johnson played in Brisbane's premiership triumphs of 2001, 2002 and 2003 and has won all-Australian selection.
A highly-skilled and courageous player, he started his career with Fitzroy and headed north when the clubs merged in 1996.
An alleged crime boss charged with conspiring to kill Melbourne underworld figure Carl Williams today lost a bid to be freed on bail.
But in refusing the application, Supreme Court judge Justice Bernard Teague said 52-year-old Mario Condello's prison conditions were "unacceptable".
Justice Teague said the "particular difficulty in communicating with lawyers is particularly to be condemned".
Condello is facing charges of inciting and conspiring to kill Williams, his father George Williams and an unidentified bodyguard.
The player has been seen with members of one of the warring groups and was spotted by surveillance police while he was associating with gangsters at a five-star Melbourne hotel.
THE Carlton Crew criminal gang was losing the underworld war and needed to wipe out the rival Williams clan, a court heard yesterday.
"I think it's all going to die down . . . I think the other side, they're too strong. They've won," he allegedly said.
Mr Condello allegedly offered the hitman $150,000 a head for the slayings and said there would be no peace until Carl Williams was "put in a hole".
Roberta Williams, wife of Carl Williams, was seated in the public gallery of the court to hear claims Mr Condello gave the hitman advice on where to find her relatives and how to kill them.
PUBLICATION of a book written by gangster widow Judy Moran has been delayed.
The book, which was expected to be released this year, will hit bookshop shelves early next year.
Mrs Moran has lost two sons and a husband to Melbourne's gangland wars of the past six years and those deaths are expected to be a major focus of the book, entitled Another World.
Anti Drug guy: "I lost my job, then my car, then my house, then my kids. Don't do drugs."
Billy Hicks: Well, I'm definitely not doing them with you, fuck! Man, you're bumming me out, get him out of here! Who invited Mr. Doom over, get that guy out of here!
Mrs Moran's husband, Lewis, was murdered at Brunswick in March this year, Jason was gunned down at Essendon North in June last year and another son, Mark, was shot dead at Aberfeldie in June, 2000.
