Underbelly 11 Read online

  In agreeing to plead guilty, Williams cut a deal that literally meant he got away with murder – many times.

  He also killed or was connected to those who killed Mark Moran (June 2000), ‘Mad Richard’ Mladenich (May 2000), Willie Thompson (July 2003), Nik Radev (April 2003) and Victor Peirce (May 2002). He was directly responsible for the death of Pasquale Barbaro, who was accidentally shot dead by one of Williams’ hitmen while murdering Jason Moran.

  Williams is also suspected of ordering the murder of Graeme Kinniburgh, who was shot dead outside his Kew home in December 2003, and has been linked to several more gangland killings.

  Paranoid, frightened and self-deluded, he survived and prospered by surrounding himself with a gang of soldiers whose loyalty he won with a combination of drugs, money, power and women.

  But once he was inside jail, trusted subordinates began to waver. One by one they broke the code of silence and became prosecution witnesses.

  Key members of the Williams’ camp crossed the floor leaving the man who called himself ‘The Premier’ (boasting ‘I run this state’) without the numbers to survive.

  So why then did the prosecution accept a plea and do a deal with the multiple killer? Why didn’t it convict him again and again for the murders he committed?

  Because it would have taken up to ten years and cost millions of dollars.

  It would also have given Williams the public platform and the media attention he craved. By locking him away it condemns him to – as he has declared himself – a life of ‘Groundhog Day’. As it was to turn out – 12,783 of them.

  Williams first made noises that he might be prepared to do a deal as early as November 2006. He implied he had information that could help crack the murders of police informer Terence Hodson and his wife Christine, who were shot dead in their Kew home in May 2004.

  Detectives believe rogue police were responsible for the double murder, so if Williams could provide information he would have been able to demand a savage discount on his sentence.

  But he was teasing. Williams did end up making a statement to police, but it was of little real value.

  During the long pre-trial process before Williams was due to face the court for murdering Jason Moran and Pasquale Barbaro, his lawyers asked Justice Betty King: If he pleaded guilty, would the sentence be ‘crushing’?

  While no promises were made, they were told Williams could expect to see some light at the end of the tunnel.

  Justice King is no bleeding heart. She is a commonsense judge who simply made her ruling on the basis of hard legal precedent.

  The former hard-hitting prosecutor and senior member of the National Crime Authority was well aware of the case law surrounding guilty pleas.

  Paul Charles Denyer is a serial killer who stalked and murdered three women in Frankston in 1993.

  He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life with no minimum by Supreme Court Justice Frank Vincent, but on appeal he was given a minimum of 30 years on the grounds that he should receive a discount for his guilty plea – no matter how reprehensible his crimes.

  Leslie Alfred Camilleri, who killed two Bega schoolgirls in 1997, pleaded not guilty and was given life with no minimum. His partner, Lindsay Hoani Beckett, pleaded guilty and received a minimum of 35 years.

  Justice King knew that if Williams pleaded she would be required to set a minimum sentence. The maximum of life was never in doubt.

  Williams said he wanted a sentence that would give him some chance of getting out by the age of 70. Purana Task Force police said they would push for a lighter sentence if he was prepared to become a witness in subsequent trials.

  They wanted him to turn on his former role model, multi-millionaire drug boss Tony Mokbel, who fled Australia in March 2006 only to be recaptured in Greece in June the following year.

  Mokbel allegedly paid Williams to organise the murder of Michael Marshall and police claimed he was also linked to the murder of Lewis Moran.

  They wanted Williams to become a star prosecution witness.

  While Williams may be many things, he remains an old-school crook who believes in the code of silence. And while many of Williams’ old pals turned on him he remained determined to stay staunch.

  After he decided to plead guilty he pretended to co-operate but anything he said was carefully crafted to lack real evidentiary value.

  He made sure no-one would do jail time on the basis of what he said.

  So without a promise to become a Crown witness, Williams’ negotiating position was weakened. The final deal struck was that prosecutors would not demand a crushing sentence and would not oppose a move for Williams’ father, George, to receive a suspended sentence for pending drug charges.

  In effect, sentencing was to be left to Justice King without the prosecution lobbying for the longest jail term possible.

  When Williams finally agreed to the deal on February 28, 2007 – just days before the jury was to be selected – the prison van taking him back to jail was called back so the papers could be signed and the plea formally entered before he changed his mind again.

  In the minutes before the court was convened, his mother, Barbara, urged him to abandon the deal and take his chances before a jury.

  He would have been stupid to listen.

  With the open and shut case against him, it was virtually certain he would have been convicted and given life with no minimum. George, whose own legal fate rested on his son’s decision to plead, remained silent.

  Once he pleaded, the rest should have been easy. He was to attend court for a public showing of mea culpa. He was to sit behind glass with a sad face and moo-cow eyes while his lawyers said how sorry he was.

  They would say he thought the Moran family was out to kill him; that he would leave jail as an old man and would miss seeing his daughter Dhakota grow into an adult; and that he should receive a hefty discount because of his remorse.

  But, against legal advice, Carl Williams insisted on giving evidence. The move was so stupid that his own legal team made him sign a waiver that he was doing it contrary to their expert opinion.

  For almost an hour he gave ridiculous testimony contradicting known facts. He denied ever being paid money for the Marshall hit by Mokbel and tried to discredit Crown witnesses who were to give evidence against some of his mates.

  Perhaps Williams’ attempt to protect Mokbel was motivated by more than Aussie mateship.

  The runaway drug boss had been paying his daughter’s private school fees after Williams was locked up.

  He also knew that when Mokbel was caught the convicted drug dealer would still be a major influence in the prison system. Carl knew Mokbel could be a good friend and a bad enemy.

  Williams’ testimony could not remain unchallenged. In the 90-minute cross-examination, prosecutor Geoff Horgan, SC, filleted Williams to protect the integrity of future Crown cases. Certainly Justice King questioned whether Williams was showing any remorse for his actions.

  Williams left the court smiling.

  His lawyers weren’t. But the self-confessed killer was fully aware that his two hours in the sun would probably cost him another two years in a dark cell. He told friends later he was ‘proud’ of his performance.

  He wanted his fellow prisoners to know he didn’t dob anyone in to save himself.

  Williams is not a stupid man. A psychiatric report declares him of ‘high average intelligence’. He is not mentally ill. There port declares him to be broadly normal.

  He was educated to Year 11 at Broadmeadows West Technical School and had a series of short-term labouring jobs before being employed as a supermarket packer. He acquired a minor criminal record but soon aimed higher – by 1994 he had embarked on a career as a full-time drug dealer.

  By the time he married Roberta in January 2001 he had dreams of dominating the underworld.

  He plotted revenge against the Morans after he was shot and then felt he had to keep killing anyone connected with them to remain alive. It was alwa
ys going to end with him dead or in jail for most of his life.

  So where to for Williams, who at 36 can only hope he lives long enough to be released as an old man?

  After the brief excitement of the sentencing he returned to the maximum security Acacia Unit in Barwon prison where he socialises with a few loyal henchmen.

  The minimum sentence will help prison officers control him. If he behaves badly in jail his eventual parole would be threatened leaving him facing life in jail.

  Prison officers say indefinite sentences destroy inmates because the dream of release is taken from them. Eventually, when threats die down, Williams will be transferred to the mainstream and if he behaves, he will eventually move to a more comfortable jail.

  But he will always be a name. As he gets older and physically weaker he will become a target.

  Even the toughest long-term inmates end up at risk of being bashed or stabbed.

  Some time in the future, a violent young offender may attack him just for the bragging rights.

  As the years pass, he will become institutionalised. His wife Roberta will have moved on (several times), his parents will have passed away, his daughter grown up and the glamorous blonde Renata Laureano, who pops in to jail to visit him, will have found a life.

  Carl Williams may have got away with murder but there is one thing no one can beat – time. It eventually wounds all heels.

  The final curtain

  DURING underworld murder hearings in Melbourne’s Supreme Court we saw many sides of the respected Justice Betty King. We saw compassionate Betty, scholarly Betty and stern Betty. But for underworld killer Carl Williams when he was finally sentenced on May 7, 2007 it was definitely Ugly Betty.

  Justice King had clearly had enough of Williams, who sat behind bulletproof glass looking by turn relaxed and bored as he listened to the reasons why he could not be released from jail until he was a pensioner.

  Williams still hoped for a minimum sentence of around 33 years in exchange for his guilty plea, so he would be released before his 70th birthday.

  He was being optimistic. His evidence during his plea hearing was so clearly bogus that any chance of that discount collapsed.

  Purana Task Force police believe the no-nonsense Justice King had no choice but to revise her sentence upwards by at least two years after he showed no signs of remorse.

  At law, a guilty plea is rewarded with a discounted sentence, and that discount can be increased through the accused showing sincere regret.

  When addressing Williams as she sentenced him to life with a minimum non-parole period of 35 years, she said: ‘I find that the evidence that you gave in the main was unbelievable, even incredible at times … I find that the manner in which you gave evidence was arrogant, almost supercilious and you left me with a strong impression that your view of these murders was that they were all really justifiable and you were the real victim.

  ‘You are a killer, and a cowardly one, who employed others to do the actual killing … you should not be the subject of admiration by any member of our community.

  ‘You were indeed the puppet master, deciding and controlling whether people lived or died.’

  Minutes before the court convened Williams showed no sign that he understood that he was about to lose the best remaining years of his life.

  He laughed and chatted with his mother, Barbara, who sat in the back row with Williams’ father, George, and Carl’s blonde friend, Renata Laureano.

  It was as if Mrs Williams was farewelling her son on a ten-day Mediterranean cruise rather than three decades down the river. She will never see her son as a free man again.

  A press photographer was given access to take a picture of Williams behind the glass. He smiled as if he had just won the blue ribbon for growing the biggest pumpkin at the Show.

  As he sat flanked by seven big security guards, the woman whose family he destroyed stared at him. Williams was pleading guilty to killing Judy Moran’s son, Jason and husband, Lewis.

  He had faced a charge of killing her other son, Mark, but it was dropped in exchange for his guilty plea.

  Mrs Moran stood and glared from the front row at Williams for four minutes before Purana detective Senior Sergeant Stuart Bateson persuaded her to sit down: ‘Don’t fire them up,’ he gently advised.

  Mrs Moran then sat and chatted with Purana detectives, who spent years investigating her sons and husband.

  Most Purana investigators in court wore their squad tie that included a small Hindu motif. It was a reminder of the ancient Indian proverb from the words of a Purana: ‘For the salvation of the good, the destruction of the evil-doers, and for firmly establishing righteousness, I manifest myself from age to age.’

  Judy Moran, was dressed head to toe in black – complete with an extraordinary cowboy hat and Darth Vader-style wraparound sunglasses she wisely removed inside the court.

  But despite her apparent fashion hints, lynchings have gone out of style.

  Judy Moran and Roberta Williams had their habitual pre-court spat where they sniped at each other on issues of etiquette, dead relatives and fashion tastes.

  On this day Mrs Williams contrasted Mrs Moran’s black look with a white beanie as she had recently shaved her head. Their robust discussions were limited to the court foyer as Mrs Williams was banned from the court after previous outbursts.

  She waited outside for the final sentence.

  Mrs Moran said repeatedly the death penalty should be returned and Williams executed. She was not such a strong advocate of capital punishment when Jason was accused of the murder of Alphonse Gangitano a few years earlier.

  Three former heads of Purana – Inspector Phil Swindells, Superintendent Andy Allen and Inspector Gavan Ryan – were there to see the legal last rites delivered on team Williams.

  A film producer and screenwriter slipped in, as did members of the public.

  One was quickly reminded that sunglasses perched on top of her head may be acceptable at the races but not in the Supreme Court.

  Williams wanted the big finish. He planned to read a prepared statement he had in his blue folder.

  When he asked if he could address the court, Justice King firmly said no. ‘I expected nothing less of you,’ Williams told her. ‘You are not a judge. You are only a puppet of the police.’

  Williams was taken from the court – his statement unread. He was already yesterday’s man. His departing words – ‘Aah, get fucked’ – do not match Ned Kelly’s ‘Such is life’.

  Superintendent Allen later spoke outside the court, praising his team while pointedly reminding critics who declared police would never smash the code of silence that they were wrong.

  The Purana team and the prosecutors went for the traditional court day celebration lunch that looked so unlikely in the dark days of the underworld war.

  The wise Justice King, out of her wig and gown and back in civilian clothes, wandered off for lunch. Her work was done. Now she was just Hungry Betty.

  The judgment

  Excerpts from Justice Betty King’s sentencing remarks, May 7, 2007.

  ‘CARL Williams, you have pleaded guilty to three counts of murder and one count of conspiracy to murder. The maximum penalty for each of those offences is life imprisonment.

  ‘These offences occurred during an extraordinary time in the history of this city, in that there was an almost unprecedented level of very public murders of known or suspected criminals. This was ultimately referred to in the media as the “gangland war”. The perception of these offences was that there was a distinct war being carried on between rival gangs, firstly, over control of the illegal drug trade, and also on what could be described as a “tit for tat” basis, as reputed members of various gangs were executed in their homes or on the streets of Melbourne. The first of these recognised murders was that of Alphonse Gangitano in January 1998 and they continued on relentlessly with up to 29 persons murdered, although it is apparent that in respect of some of those murders there may h
ave been motives other than gangland warfare. On October 13, 1999, you were shot in the stomach by Jason Moran in a park in Gladstone Park. Mark Moran was present at the time that this occurred, and even upon your own evidence, one of the consequences of this occurring was a high degree of animosity between the Morans and yourself. It is also clear that you and Jason and Mark Moran were competitors in the selling of illegal drugs, which would have done nothing to decrease the animosity that you bore towards each other. I accept that you had a degree of apprehension in respect of the Moran brothers also, which once again is not surprising having been shot by them at close range, and undoubtedly with a warning of some description. I am unable to say whether that shooting and possible warning related to the drug-trafficking business in which you were both competitors, or whether it was a more personal basis. It is unnecessary for me to determine that matter.

  You went to hospital and were interviewed by the police as to your knowledge of the person or persons who were responsible for the shooting and you refused to provide any information to the investigating officers. You maintain that was because the Morans had told you that they had a police officer in their pocket, and you did not believe it would be investigated properly. I do not accept that was your reason for refusing to co-operate with police investigators, but rather your reasons related to the supposed code of silence of the criminal milieu in which you lived. On November 10, 2000, shotgun damage was observed on the front door of your Hillside home and on a Mercedes Benz parked in the driveway. The prosecutor opened that you believed that the Morans were responsible for such shooting and it is apparent from your evidence that you did blame the Morans for that shooting.

  There is no doubt, on the basis of your own evidence, that you were actively looking for Jason Moran so that he could be murdered, you equally did not dispute the role of your adviser in the Jason Moran murder by providing you with information to help locate Jason Moran and assisting you to plan the killing. In the ensuing months various plans were formulated by you and those you had recruited to assist you in the murder.