BILLY THE KID

The Jika Jika division at the old Pentridge Prison in Melbourne was in fact a jail within a jail and the first supermax prison built in Australia. It opened in 1980 and was designed to be escape-proof. It was the place where the incorrigibles were put to serve out their sentences under the most inhospitable circumstances. To enter Jika Jika was like the opening credits of Get Smart where you see Maxwell Smart walking through door after sliding barred door.

One day I received a letter from a Billy Nolan asking me to visit him at Pentridge in the new Jika Jika unit. It was not unusual for me to receive letters out of the blue from potential new clients so off I trotted. Bill was serving the last few years of a lengthy sentence for armed robbery and, because he was continually playing up, was banged up in Jika Jika.

Bill quite openly admitted that he was a mad armed robber and loved working on stick-ups. His current problem, however, was administrative and related to his parole and I took instructions from him. Over the next few months I visited Bill regularly and got to know him rather well. He told me that jail for armed robbers was like businessmen paying income tax — it was all part of the job. A lengthy jail sentence, he said, was no deterrent and as soon as he was released he’d be back working at what he did best. I told him that things had changed since he’d been in jail and that most banks were now electronically protected with anti-armed-robbery devices such as fly-up screens and time-delay locks on safes, and that the tellers were effectively locked in a secure pod that you couldn’t get into unless you knew the push-button code. We chatted about the new security devices for some time when Bill smiled at me and winked. ‘They’ve all got to come out for a piss at some stage.’ As it turned out, and after quite a battle, Bill was finally released on parole.

Some months later while reading the paper, I saw that an armed robbery had occurred when one of the bank staff had gone to the toilet. The person had been waylaid by an armed gunman on returning to the secure teller’s area, punching in the security code.

I always wondered.

It wasn’t until several years later, in the early 90s, that I heard from Bill again though. This time he had been caught on the hop with another well-known Melbourne crook, Nat the Rat, doing a high-end snatch and grab from a jewellery shop in Sydney. I was instructed to act for both accused on their committal and, hopefully, bail application. I say hopefully because at that time in Sydney it was easier to get bail for murder than for armed robbery. This was largely because there had been a number of unfortunate incidents where blokes who had been granted bail for armed robbery had gone right back out and repeated themselves, and on a couple of those occasions, members of the public had been killed. So it was hardly surprising that the New South Wales Supreme Court was red hot in refusing bail for armed robbery.

On flying to Sydney and after consultation, it was decided that I would appear for Bill on the committal and we would get a well-known Sydney lawyer to appear for Nat. This seemed like a good plan until the day before the committal when I flew to Sydney and met the other lawyer. I walked in to his office and, without even shaking my hand, he launched into a tirade about Melbourne lawyers in general and me in particular. Seeing as I had never met this bloke before I was somewhat taken aback.

‘Where’s the fucking money?’ he ranted.

‘Excuse me?’ I said.

‘You heard,’ he railed. ‘Where’s the fucking money?’

‘Hang on a minute,’ I said. ‘What do you think is in my briefcase — my lunch?’

With that, he starting banging on about fucking Mexicans always coming to Sydney and dudding hard-working Sydney lawyers and where’s the fucking money, he wasn’t doing anything until he got his fucking money blah blah blah. Truly, I’d not witnessed such a performance from a lawyer before and told him that if that was his attitude then I’d appear for the pair of them myself. With that, I walked out the door.

As it happened, his partner followed me out and stopped me. ‘Look,’ he explained, ‘there’s been a lot going on and a lot of stress about. I’ll do the case with you.’ I had real reservations about this but knew it was better to have one counsel appearing for each accused rather than one counsel appearing for multiple accused. So we went to court and the Armed Holdup Squad, as they were called then, were the prosecuting police officers. The Armed Holdup Squad were a bunch of hard nuts, and in those days it was legend that you could do business with them. In other words, if the sling was big enough all sorts of miraculous results could be achieved in court.

The committal ran for about a week, and each day Bill kept nagging me about bail.

‘More important than that,’ I countered, ‘what about trying to get you off this bloody thing?’ Even so, the case against him was very strong: the two of them had been caught by the police on leaving the jewellery shop with a bag full of goodies.

Bill, however, kept pressing the greater importance of bail upon me, though I didn’t talk to the coppers about this. Finally, on the day the committal concluded the question of bail needed to be addressed.

One of the senior officers of the Armed Holdup Squad pulled me and the other barrister aside to discuss bail. I should say that I have never seen a better dressed copper in my life: he wore a suit worth thousands of dollars, beautiful shoes, an expensive watch and a diamond signet ring. Certainly not the sort of clothes you would expect on a bloke who, back then, was probably making $70,000 a year. I looked at all these things and the penny dropped: I could get this bloke.

‘If you were to ask me the following questions,’ the officer began, ‘I would give the following answers.’ He then told us the questions and the answers and concluded with the words: ‘That will get your bloke bail.’

I stood there dumbfounded, while my New South Wales counterpart seemed completely unperturbed. The copper left us to have a think about it all.

I turned to the other barrister. ‘What’s going on here? This stinks to high heaven. Are we being set up?’

‘In New South Wales we call this a boat race,’ he said.

‘What do you mean a boat race?’

‘This is where the entire Crown case goes up the river.’

‘Really? I don’t trust this copper,’ I said.

‘Yes, but if he said that’s what he’s going to do then my bet is that’s what he will do.’

I hot-footed it down to the cells and Bill instructed me to ask any questions the coppers had told me to ask. He didn’t seem at all surprised at this sudden new development.

That afternoon I walked into court with great reservations. Both accused were duly committed for trial and then the magistrate popped the all-important question: ‘What about the issue of bail’?

I responded that we wanted to make that application and then I called the senior officer who, true to his word, gave the answers he said he would to the questions he suggested I ask. It was truly farcical and, at the end of it all, the magistrate, much to my amazement, granted bail.

Usually when crooks like Bill get bail the coppers get very hot under the collar but not here, not one of the coppers was jumping up and down, they were all sitting there happy as Larry.

I went straight down to the holding cells under the old Darlinghurst court and, rather than ask Bill out loud in case the cells were bugged, on a piece of paper I wrote ‘How much?’ and held it up for him.

He looked at it, grinned and then held up his two hands, opening and closing them five times, indicating he had paid $50,000. He had paid the coppers $50,000 to get bail. This was an absolute disgrace. I had, however, abided by my instructions and had not misled the court at all.

It was quite clear why Bill was so desperate to get bail. The case against him was overwhelming and in view of his prior convictions he was likely to get around fifteen years for this stick-up. What actually did happen was that immediately after he was granted bail he absconded.

The case never went to trial, not because the authorities couldn’t find Bill, but because he died in a motorbike accident before the case was listed for trial.

Many years later reading the paper one morning I noticed a number of the coppers from the New South Wales Armed Holdup Squad had landed in trouble over corrupt activities. And the main offender? It was none other than the senior officer in Bill’s case.

Justice sometimes takes an interesting turn.