Underworld figure’s fight to wipe convictions continues
Tara Cosoleto |
Gangland kingpin Tony Mokbel’s legal fight to overturn all of his convictions is far from over after three judges handed down a split decision on his appeal.
The 60-year-old walked into the Victorian Court of Appeal on Friday morning, hopeful that his two drug trafficking and one drug importation convictions would be quashed.
But Justices Stephen McLeish, Maree Kennedy and Stephen Kaye instead delivered different rulings on each of the charges – known under the police operation names Quills, Orbital and Magnum.
The judges ordered Mokbel’s conviction on the Quills drug trafficking conviction be quashed, while his Orbital drug importation conviction was set aside and a retrial ordered.
“Although the alleged offending was serious and evil, the way the evidence was obtained meant that placing it before a jury would have undermined fundamental principles of the criminal justice system,” the summary judgment read.
“The failure of Victoria Police and through it, the prosecution, to disclose the conduct of Ms Gobbo and Victoria Police to Mr Mokbel impugned the integrity of his guilty pleas.”
But the court refused Mokbel’s appeal on the Magnum drug trafficking charge, saying the conduct of barrister-turned-informer Nicola Gobbo and the police did not affect the evidence in that case.
Mokbel looked straight ahead as the rulings were delivered and then ignored questions from reporters as he left the court building.
His bail, which was granted in April after he spent nearly 18 years behind bars, was extended as he faces further hearings on the Magnum and Orbital offences.
Mokbel had claimed he suffered a substantial miscarriage of justice because of Ms Gobbo, who was unmasked as Lawyer X in 2019.
Ms Gobbo was registered as a Victoria Police informer from 2005 to 2009 and was acting as Mokbel’s lawyer for four years before he fled to Greece in 2006.
She continued to advise him when he was extradited back to Melbourne in 2008.
Mokbel ultimately pleaded guilty to the Quills, Orbital and Magnum charges in 2011 after he was extradited back from Greece.
The Quills charge related to allegations Mokbel trafficked more than 30 kilograms of MDMA in 2005, while he was on bail for separate offending.
Orbital related to claims he dealt with two undercover officers in June 2005, believing they were international MDMA suppliers, and tried to import 100kg of the drug.
The Magnum charge, for which he is still convicted, related to Mokbel trafficking more than 41kg of methylamphetamine in June 2006 and June 2007 while he was on the run.
He absconded from the state in March 2006 while he was on trial for allegedly importing two kilograms of cocaine in 2000 – known as the Plutonium charge.
That conviction was set aside in 2020 after prosecutors conceded there had been a miscarriage of justice as he had been represented by Ms Gobbo.
But during Mokbel’s recent appeal, prosecutor David Glynn argued Ms Gobbo was not acting as Mokbel’s legal representative at the time he pleaded to Magnum, Orbital and Quills.
Mr Glynn accepted some of the cases had been weakened, as it was revealed Ms Gobbo instructed two of her clients to make statements against Mokbel, but he argued they were still viable.
Mokbel’s barrister Tim Game SC said the evidence against his client was “corrupted” because of Ms Gobbo and he had been misled and deceived before he plead guilty to the offences in 2011.
Mokbel will face a hearing in the Victorian Supreme Court on October 29 in relation to the Orbital charge, while he will return to the Court of Appeal in November for the Magnum offence.
AAP
