We were just a new club. We had very little history and suddenly we’d been plunged into a war with the Comancheros, who were starting to do some crazy things.
Up to that time, if two clubs had irreconcilable differences, one would attack the other at a pub, at their clubhouse or at a prearranged site like a park. They’d slog it out with just about every sort of weapon short of guns and bombs. They kept it away from the public. The club that won might take the colours of the losers, but they’d leave the others to pick up their wounded.
Jock knew there was no way his club could ever beat us in that sort of situation, no matter how many blokes he recruited and no matter how much he drilled them with his little formations and war games. If he wanted to go to war with us, he had no choice but to resort to guns and other crazy plans. The first volley was fired at the clubhouse one night when a few blokes were inside. Chop and a few of the others who were there were really shocked. It was a shame. It was the dawning of a new era.
Someone shot at me and Donna while we were riding to the clubhouse. Left a hole in my petrol tank. They poured oil and diesel on the curve at the bottom of a hill near the clubhouse trying to bring us all down, not caring if there were old ladies on the back or what.
Through the winter of 1984, it escalated. There were more shots fired, a few small-scale blues, a few blokes run off the road. But because we were so confident in our ability to smash the shit out of the Comos, we never felt the need to arm up. I strapped an aluminium baseball bat to my handlebars, but that was it.
I’d been sergeant-at-arms of the Comos and the Bandits for near on five years and during that time not one member went to jail or got badly hurt – not until Junior got put in hospital by a bunch of Comos who attacked him while he was with his old lady. That’s what kicked off the whole war.
John Boy was killed in a bike accident in 1982 and Knuckles was severely injured in another one a year later, but until 2 September 1984, Father’s Day, I’d managed to keep everybody pretty safe.
And as the blokes who gathered at Lance’s place on that day knew, I wanted to go to the Caringbah Inn because it was a longer ride and they had bands on there. But I had a whole heap of blokes talking over the top of me about going to the Viking Tavern at Milperra for a swap meet. If I’d done what I normally did and listened to my gut feeling, we’d have gone to Caringbah and there wouldn’t have been any Father’s Day massacre at the tavern.
We would have heard on the grapevine how the entire Comanchero club turned up at the Viking Tavern with guns and walkie-talkies waiting for us. We would have known that they’d taken the war to a whole new level and we would not have been taken by surprise again.
Far from preparing for war, the Bandidos began the day at my son Daniel’s fourth birthday party. We left the old ladies and the kids there, in a corner-block backyard that was in full view of Frederick Street, Ashfield. We weren’t bunkering down for a battle. We rode to Lance’s and decided where we’d go next. Snoddy had spent the previous few days in Griffith, shooting and getting to know a bunch of blokes who wanted to open a Bandido chapter down there. So he drove straight up from Griffith that morning and met us at Lance’s place, with a shotgun and a carbine in the back of his station wagon, buried deep under the rest of his camping gear. They were the only guns we entered that car park with.
*
THE MINI-SERIES Bikie Wars portrays us all riding in on bikes, many of us armed. Snoddy’s got a gun attached to his back as do a bunch of the other Bandidos.
Then everybody just stares at everybody in slowmo for a full three minutes while the dramatic music plays. The whole show is filled with lots of blokes just staring somewhere. They had so little material to fill six episodes, I guess they had to pad it out with montages.
What really happened was that Snoddy’s Falcon was first into the driveway of the sprawling ranch-style pub, followed by Bull’s Holden, then me on my Harley followed by the rest of the club. We turned right into one of the car park rows shaded by skinny gum trees, but there were no spots to stop. The place was crowded with people and stalls. The smell of barbecuing meat filled the air. Snoddy and Bull drove slowly through the car park until a car pulled out in front of Snoddy, blocking his way. I looked back to check on the rest of the blokes and I saw that they were all in the car park. That’s when I noticed the first sign of trouble.
Jock’s sidekick, Foghorn, was driving a ute in behind us. He stopped, blocking our way back out. I watched him get out of the ute carrying an M1 carbine – the American World War II semi-automatic – and run down into the crowd towards the pub.
I looked down and saw a bunch of Comancheros standing about three car park rows below us. They all had shotguns on their hips. I saw Leroy, who had become their sergeant-at-arms, among them. I looked around for Jock, but couldn’t see him. I figured that, as usual, he’d sent his blokes out while he stayed back at the clubhouse.
There was no time to think. We weren’t ready for a gun battle. And we were trapped. I figured if we walked or ran out of the car park, we’d be shot in the back. I think they expected that when we saw all the guns we’d go to water, panic and throw our colours down, or whatever. They’d obviously forgotten who they were dealing with.
I got off my bike and started walking straight towards them without bothering to get the bat off my handlebars. I just strode down between the rows of parked cars, yelling: ‘Put down your guns and fight like men.’
That was about the only detail that the Bikie Wars got right. They have that ugly, tubby little bloke who plays me walking down there and saying, ‘Why don’t you put the guns down. Fight like men.’ Then they’ve got him staring at some bloke for a bit trying to look tough before he pushes the bloke’s gun upwards, it fires into the air and then it’s all on.
The television fight lasts for just two minutes before they give Snoddy some magical ability to call it off, before you have to sit through three more minutes of Snoddy staring into space while the spooky music plays.
In reality, when I was walking down towards the Comos, I was thinking that if I could just get to Leroy, he’d probably put down his gun and have a go at me, one on one. The other thing flashing through my head was that the closer I got to them, the better chance I had of grabbing a couple of them and snatching their guns. That way, if anyone started shooting, I had something to shoot back with.
I was about one car-length away from Leroy when I challenged him directly.
‘You really want to go, one on one?’ he said.
‘Yeah, put down your gun and let’s do it. If you win, we’ll drop our colours. If I win, youse drop your colours and that’s the end of the war.’
‘You’re on.’
Leroy was a big boy, and super-strong. A real hard bloke. He put his shotgun down against the car and shaped up.
I thought I was alone, but then I looked back over my right shoulder and there were my brothers Shadow, Chop, Bull, Snake and Wack, along with Davo, Gloves, Roach, Lance and Zorba all spread in line just behind me. Bear was running down towards us. They’d all come down to back me up and I felt this intense pride. None of us had a gun. This was what it was all about, punching on when the odds were against you.
Then I realised that they were the only ones. The rest of the club had either stayed back with the cars or run out into the street.
I looked back at Leroy. Standing just behind him was a Como by the name of Hennessey, shaking like a leaf, his gun still at his hip. I thought, This bloke’s gunna be a real worry. He was staring at my brother Snake, and Snake was calling him all the names under the sun. I knew this Hennessey didn’t want to start shooting, but that he might just because he was so scared of Snake.
Snake said something like, ‘Put the gun down if you’re not gunna use it. If you’re gunna use it, use it.’
There was a bang and Snake went down. He’d been hit in the gut. He sat there with his hands over the wound, blood spurting out of his stomach.
I went cold.
At that moment, I just wished Jock was there so I could’ve snapped his neck.
I heard Snoddy, still up at his station wagon, calling Chop and Shadow to come back up and join him. Snoddy had to get round the back of his car and throw all his camping gear out to get to his two pig-shooting guns and the ammunition.
Back down where I was, Leroy picked up his gun and ran behind a car. Straight in front of me in a tight little group were Sparra, Tonka and Snowy, all with shotguns hanging by their sides. They started to raise them, so I charged. I got my left arm wrapped around the barrels of their guns and had them pointed at the ground while I barged the three of them back onto the front of a car, pinning them down with my body. I was really giving it to Tonka while holding the other two down. Tonka hit the deck and I stomped on his chest and head with my Johnny Reb boots, crushing one side of his skull. I did everything I could to get him out of it until he went limp. Then, still holding Sparra down, I started belting in on Snowy with my elbow. He fell to the ground, soft as, unconscious.
That left just me and Sparra. With my left hand still pinning down the shotty in his right hand, he used his left to start throwing punches. I used my spare hand to grab him by the throat. I tried to go for the vagus nerve on the side of his neck. If you know the right spot, you can knock a man out or kill him by hitting the vagus nerve.
I looked over my shoulder and saw Snake sitting there still holding his guts in, blood pouring through his hands. Leroy was standing over the top of him, his shotgun down by his leg virtually pointed at Snake’s head like he was about to finish him off.
I zoned out. The world went red. I gripped harder into Sparra’s neck. I felt the shotty drop out of his hand and I squeezed harder. I felt my fingers ripping his skin. I saw blood coming out, and felt my fingers go deeper into his flesh. I felt the side of his neck rip away as he hit the ground screaming.
I looked up and saw sneaky little Glen Eaves, Jock’s brother-in-law. He was a tiny bloke with a real big mouth when he had a lot of blokes around him. He’d been in the army and he was lying on the ground in a firing position, pointing the shotty at me. For some reason, I think to get a better shot at me, he tried to get up onto his knees. But as he tried getting off the ground, he stumbled and the shotgun discharged into the ground near Sparra. I saw Sparra jerk, so I figured something had hit him. When they later took him away and did the autopsies, they found the wadding from a shotgun cartridge in his neck and concluded he’d been killed by the shotgun.
But only after half his neck had been ripped out.
Once the shooting had started, it came from everywhere. All I could hear was gunshots, but with all the rows of parked cars it was impossible to see where they were coming from. I looked around: there were Como colours climbing the back fence out of the car park, a bunch of them jumping into a green XY Falcon and heading for the bottle shop entrance. They took the door off the bottle-o, they were trying to get out of the car park that quick.
Most of the Bandidos who’d come down with me had got back to Snoddy and Bull’s station wagons by this stage.
Snake was still sitting there with the blood spurting out between his fingers. My only thought was to get to him, and anyone who got in my way was a dead man. I took a step towards him. I saw Bull had this really huge Como down at the front of his car, kicking the shit out of him, while the bloke was trying to crawl under his car to get away.
A Como came towards me and I grabbed him by the hair and started laying in. Davo was standing alongside me fighting another Como I’d never seen before. Davo was a real good bluer, and he’d just finished this bloke off when I saw another Como coming up behind him with a bowie knife. I had my hands full, so all I could do was yell out to Davo. He turned around just in time. Instead of getting it in the middle of the back, he got it up under his arm. Didn’t that get him started! He turned around and beat the shit out of the bloke.
I finished with the bloke who’d just come at me and took another step towards Snake when, for some reason, I turned to my left. Bang! I felt it in the right shoulder. I staggered back a metre. I’d been hit hard by something. I didn’t know what it was. I was stunned. It was a strange feeling. I always figured that if you got shot with a serious weapon, you’d get a burning, hot feeling. But it wasn’t like that. It was just like getting hit with a baseball bat. I’d been hit with a .22 before, but that was more like a pinprick. I soon realised this was a shotgun blast when I saw blood spurting out of a lot of holes. My arm went numb.
Then I felt another thud – this time to my chest. It was like another baseball bat, but this time I knew straightaway what it was. Blood spurted out of my arm and my chest. Breathing became difficult. I coughed and blood came out.
I think I went down on one knee, because I was bent over when a Como by the name of Alan came at me with an iron bar and, Whack!, he hit me on the side of the head, which I didn’t like.
I just went whooshka, swung my hand out and caught him right in the nuts. He hit the ground alongside me and I grabbed him by the throat. I tried to rip his throat out, and I don’t know if it was from being shot or what, because my wounds were on my right side, but I just couldn’t get enough power into my left hand to do it.
I got to my feet, took the iron bar off him and hit him with it, then put the heel of my boot into his mouth. His teeth went everywhere and I started stomping on his head.
I could hear Chop and Shadow, about 6 metres off to my right, yelling, ‘Bandidos! Bandidos!’ It’s a sound I’ll always remember. They just seemed to keep yelling out, and even though I’d been shot twice, hearing my brothers yelling gave me strength.
Lance and Zorba were over bashing some Comos, Glovesy was still giving it to someone. I looked up and I was hoping to see the rest of the club come screaming towards us, because I knew if the lot of us had gone these blokes we’d have run over the top of them. But it didn’t happen.
I saw the Como JJ and his old lady down between two cars looking up at me pointing a handgun. I can’t remember to tell the truth whether it was JJ or his old lady with the gun, because I had blood spurting into my eyes and I was feeling real dizzy, but knowing JJ it was probably his old lady. She had more balls than he did. I was looking down there through this haze and then all of a sudden I felt Whack!, in the forehead. I didn’t think I’d been shot, I just felt this thud and then a burning sensation and blood was in my eyes. I was staggering around blind, but I heard a voice. It was Bull. ‘Get out of here, Ceese!’ I wiped my eyes and saw Bull and Wack heading towards Snake.
I started finding it really hard to breathe. And then all I heard was Bull yelling, ‘Get out of here or you’re going to die.’ He was right.
I looked up to Snoddy’s Falcon about 10 metres away and saw him leaning out of it shooting towards the Comos who were about 10 metres behind me. There was Chop and Shadow standing out in the open, back where I’d been, just a couple of metres from the Comos, firing away with guns they must have snatched off the Comos, screaming to the other Bandits to get up to the street.
As I staggered up, I felt, Whack, whack, whack. Little stings in the back. I knew from experience that they were probably .22s but I didn’t know what was going on. It was too hard to see through the blood.
‘Fuck it.’ I stopped to turn around and go back down there to kill as many of them as I could before dying. Then something inside said to me, ‘No. Walk out.’ So I turned around again and lurched back up to the left and out of the direct crossfire.
My right leg was dragging and I couldn’t feel my right arm. It was hard to breathe, but I just kept going and made it to the road. I saw all these Bandits up there. ‘Go down and help your brothers,’ I yelled, but I’m not sure how loud it came out. They might not have heard a thing.
Knuckles came up and grabbed me under the left arm. Lout and Bernie came over. Both of them yelled to Hookie to come and help me. One of them waved down a car and it turned out to be this sheila who knocked around the club, Big Sue. Lout, Hookie and Bernie threw me into the back of her green HK or HT Holden and I remember the car moving and seeing red and I was playing the last few minutes over in my mind. The numbness turned to pain. I remember Lout saying, ‘We’ve got to get him to the hospital,’ and hearing sirens.
Suddenly, someone was helping me up a hospital driveway, leaving me there on the ground outside. Later, I found out that one of them had run over and rung the bell to Emergency and the nurses had come out to find me lying there.
I was supported through some glass doors and now there were nurses all around me. I was on a bed or a table.
I was the first person from the tavern to reach the hospital. I could hear on the radio that they’d interrupted the program to report a bikie shooting in Milperra. The Asian doctor who was working on me said, ‘What’s going on down there?’
I was thinking, Fuckin’ just fix me up. The pain was getting worse.
The nurses tried to make me as comfortable as possible, but the doctor was trying to get my colours off me.
‘You’re not having me colours,’ I said.
‘You’ve got to take them off so I can examine you.’
There was no way anyone was getting my colours. I’d been shot every which way. I’d seen my brother shot. I’d smashed and probably killed one bloke by ripping half his throat out. All for these colours. There was no way they were coming off.
‘I’ve got to examine you,’ he said. There was a running argument for about five minutes and I took a swipe at him. ‘My colours stay here.’
‘You’ll die if we can’t get them off.’
I had my left hand over my chest holding the vest under my right arm so they couldn’t take it. Some wardsmen came in and they had enough blokes to hold me down. I didn’t have the strength to resist. They cut the vest up the right-hand side and along the top of the shoulder, so they could slip it off.
I heard the doctor say, ‘We’ve got to stem the flow of blood from his head.’ Something sharp got stuck into my head, then the doctor was pulling at something in my forehead. ‘Does this look like a bullet to you?’ I heard the doctor asking the nurse.
It turned out that JJ or his old lady had shot me in the head with a .38, which miraculously just lodged in my skull without penetrating.
Then the quack yelled out to a nurse that my lung had deflated. He grabbed a rod about 30 centimetres long with a thread on it like a self-tapping screw. He came up to me and thumped it in under my right arm, and started more or less screwing it in through the side of my chest.
I took a deep breath, and that’s the last I remember.