Chapter 7

Operation Galop

One job we began at the MDID that had nothing to do with Terry Hodson was codenamed Operation Galop. It began in June 2003. The purpose of the operation was to investigate the manufacture and trafficking of ecstasy tablets on a large scale. The prime target of Operation Galop was a crook called Azzam ‘Adam’ Ahmed. He and some others were buying large quantities of drugs from a New South Wales-based Israeli group, and they were cutting down the ecstasy tablets and selling them in Victoria. Later, we found out that there was also a connection between Ahmed and Tony Mokbel.1

I made a new recruit to our squad, Senior Constable Samantha Jennings, primary investigator for Operation Galop. Sam Jennings had just begun her very first detective position at the MDID. I think she came from a policing background and was clearly a good operator from the start. I recognised in her all the attributes of a good detective. She also had a great work ethic and took to every task with vigour and enthusiasm. We had all gone on one of those team-building rope-climbing trips away somewhere near the Grampians. Sam held her own and was a great asset to the team. Dave Miechel didn’t go. He rarely socialised with the squad.

Sam’s job was to monitor the phone intercepts and keep us updated on what our targets were doing. My faith in Sam was justified. She put her heart and soul into the operation.

In July, we became aware that our targets had collected a pill press and taken it to an address in Clayton South.2 We had executed a covert warrant on the address and found that the pill press was being kept on a trailer on the property. We didn’t have the resources to monitor the house all the time, and a day after we located it, covert surveillance found the pill press had been moved. Luckily, our surveillance on other targets helped us find it again.

Bit by bit, Operation Galop chipped away at the supply chain. On 15 August, detectives in New South Wales arrested an Israeli national named Amir Malka, who had met with Azzam Ahmed in Clayton. Malka was carrying $218,500 in cash after the meeting. In order to distance the arrest geographically from Operation Galop, it occurred in New South Wales. That meant we could keep following Azzam Ahmed around Melbourne and keep our leg of the investigation going.

By 25 August, we had identified a likely safe house in Dublin Street, East Oakleigh. The old-fashioned red clinker-brick house looked as if it might be home to someone’s grandparents rather than a drug stash. Drug houses often had babysitters, so they were never empty. Surveillance told us that a young woman called Abbey Haynes babysat the Dublin Street house. She took her responsibilities seriously, staying at the house all the time; this meant that we couldn’t make a covert entry to plant listening devices. Instead, we monitored their phones and installed a camera at another house in the street, which gave us a bird’s-eye view of who was coming and going from the address. A civic-minded resident let us have a key to his house nearby and we set up another recording device. Once a day, one of our members would go in and change the tape.

While Terry Hodson didn’t have anything do with the Dublin Street house, there was one connection that came out later – Abbey Haynes had supplied ecstasy tablets to a man known as Lucky, and Terry had bought some of the tabs from Lucky.3 But Terry should have known nothing about our surveillance of the Dublin Street house.

Over time, we found out that large amounts of ecstasy tablets were being moved from Sydney to Melbourne and $600,000 or more had changed hands. Azzam Ahmed usually chartered light aircraft from Moorabbin Airport to make his transactions. On 11 September 2003, his girlfriend, Colleen O’Reilly, drove to Sydney with a large sum of money to buy 20,000 ecstasy tablets. We monitored her the whole way.4

On Friday 26 September, things had come to a head in the investigation of Azzam Ahmed. Even though we weren’t ready to raid, we were preparing the warrants because we knew that Colleen O’Reilly was planning to fly to Sydney on either Sunday or Monday to collect the ecstasy tablets.

At 1.30 p.m. on Friday, I spoke to Acting Superintendent John Shawyer and told him that we’d received word of a telephone intercept suggesting that Azzam Ahmed himself was going to travel to New South Wales either on Sunday or Monday. By then, I’d lost count of the number of times Ahmed had talked of going to Sydney and then hadn’t gone, so nothing was set in stone.

Intelligence said that he’d carry between $600,000 and $700,000 to buy 50,000 to 60,000 tablets. It was only an educated guess; we didn’t know exactly how much he was paying per tablet with such large quantities. And we always had to take into account the code that drug dealers use when they talk to each other: a conversation about horse racing with a particular horse in race 5 might actually mean 5000 ecstasy tablets.

There had been a bit of interstate disagreement between our squad and the New South Wales Drug Squad. We wanted them to conduct surveillance on the deal just as they had the week before, then let our targets return to Melbourne, where we could arrest them ourselves. Our investigation, our arrests. But the New South Wales Drug Squad had other plans. They told us they’d make the arrests. Our squad was devastated after working three solid months on this one case. Ideally, we wanted to conclude the operation by catching Azzam Ahmed red-handed in the Dublin Street house punching out pills.5

The New South Wales decision didn’t go down well with our force command either. I got approval for me and Sam Jennings to go to Sydney and take part in the arrest when the time came. At least we’d get to play a small part in the end of our operation and fly the flag for Victoria Police.

Around 4 p.m. on Friday 26 September 2003, Dave Miechel had the work car, so he dropped me home. I had to pick up my baby son, Bailey, from crèche and was off for the rest of the evening on bottle-and-bath duty. I was on baby duty most nights, unless I was away on a police trip. My wife, Ditty, had returned to work not long after Bailey was born. She put her name down with an on-call nursing bank for evenings, since I worked during the day. We were both keen to pay off our mortgage as soon as we could. My wife and I had the same work ethic: we worked hard to get ahead.

After dropping me off, Dave returned to work to finish the briefs that the rest of the squad were working on. We all knew that the next couple of days would be important. Little did we know how important they’d be.

 

On the morning of Saturday, 27 September, I spoke to Superintendent Shawyer and told him that the telephone intercepts had contained no new information about Azzam Ahmed’s trip to Sydney, so we were all a bit in limbo.

Even though I wasn’t rostered on, I kept abreast of the situation. I was taking a well-earned break to host my annual grand final barbecue. I’d set up my back yard with a TV and a keg and had the barbecue fired up ready to sizzle snags and steak. Salads were at the ready and there were eskies full of ice, stubbies and cans. My wife and I had invited about thirty people, a mixture of police and non-police friends, along with their families. The only difference between this grand final barbie and those I normally had was that this time I limited myself to one beer every couple of hours, just in case I was called into work. But I was hopeful that the day would be quiet, because there had been no updates. If I got to the end of the night sober and nothing happened with the job, I figured the worst that could happen was that I’d be a little annoyed to miss a big drinking day.

Around 11 a.m. on Saturday morning, I sent Sam Jennings a text to ask who was changing the tapes at the surveillance house around the corner from Dublin Street. She texted a reply: Miech is mate. Sam normally did it, but it was okay that she’d allocated Dave Miechel to do it. I thought nothing of it.

Around midday, after some of our guests had arrived, Dave Miechel unexpectedly knocked on my door. He told me what I already knew – that he’d be changing the surveillance tapes – and he asked if I needed the work car, or did I just want him to come over on Sunday morning and pick me up? I invited him in for a drink, but he said that he had his girlfriend with him in the car and he didn’t want to stop.6 I could see the white Holden Jackaroo parked in my driveway, but I couldn’t see who was sitting inside it. Normally, I’d have craned my neck to get a look at the mystery girlfriend, but with a houseful of guests, I had other things on my mind.

Dave and I made plans for him to pick me up the following morning at 9.30 a.m. Our crew was scheduled to work the next day, and I had to be ready to fly to Sydney at a moment’s notice.

My footy team wasn’t playing, but I picked Brisbane over Collingwood for a win – mostly because it’s fun to stir those of my mates who are silly enough to barrack for Collingwood. Being the typical Aussie barbie, the guys were outside while the women and kids largely ignored the game and sat around chatting inside.

I stayed sober while all my mates were downing beer after beer and getting louder and louder. As much as I enjoyed my day off, I occasionally checked my phone for updates on the operation. At this crucial stage of an investigation, it’s hard to switch off from work totally.

When the phone call came just after 8 p.m., it was one that would change everything, and I could barely fathom its implications.