2. Mike Pottenger
3. Lecturer, Statistics & Political Economy at University of Melbourne

Provides funding as a Founding Partner of The Conversation.
unimelb.edu.au

The second common kind of police corruption is “green-lighting”, whereby police agree to turn a blind eye to dealers or groups that adhere to certain rules (e.g. no violence, no selling drugs to children).

Whatever the illegal market, however diversified the production of the good or service, whether you just want to take a cut for protection or get directly involved, there is money to be made controlling the turf on which illegal activity takes place. And because controlling even just a part of such markets requires using (or threatening) violence, exerting your influence over larger transnational markets is easier when there are more of you.

Consider the case of MP Geoff Shaw and the allegations that he used his parliamentary vehicle for commercial use. The Ombudsman received a complaint about Shaw in June 2012, began an investigation and presented a report on the matter in around four months.

Similarly, in a parliamentary report released last in May on an investigation into alleged improper conduct by a registrar of the Magistrates' Court, the Ombudsman notes that such an investigation would be unlikely to be able to be reported (by any of Victoria’s integrity bodies) had the allegations been made under the current legislation. The ability to publicly report on such findings is fundamental to a transparent and effective integrity system.

2. Mike Pottenger
3. Lecturer, Statistics & Political Economy at University of Melbourne

Provides funding as a Founding Partner of The Conversation.
unimelb.edu.au

Files on another informant vanished from the same office during the 1996 Boxing Day test. John Higgs (a founder of the Black Uhlans motorcycle gang) is alleged to have bribed an officer to steal them. Higgs, who has since been convicted for drug trafficking, boasted of being tipped off about being under investigation, and has been linked to other high-profile cases of alleged murderers and drug traffickers being tipped off.

While leaks are just one possible outcome of inappropriate relationships (and the reasons for leaking are varied and complex) the results are clear. In the case of Hodson and in cases linked to Higgs, people lost their lives.

It’s the (illegal) economy, stupid: the ACC on organised crime

This security also gave rise to a new phenomenon: bikies with Blackberries. Using encrypted phones made it easier for Canadian outlaw motorcycle gangs to coordinate cannabis trafficking into the US because it was harder for law enforcement to spy on their communication. Bikies in Australia have found the Blackberry popular for the same reason.

Neddy Smith drama for ABC

 

Blue Murder Sydney Australia Part One

http://www.australiantelevision.net/bm/articles.html

Neddy Smith drama for ABC

CAREER criminal Neddy Smith has been given the green light to save struggling ABC boss Jonathan Shier.

The Director of Public Prosecutions last night cleared the way for the network to screen its award-winning mini-series Blue Murder in NSW, by no billing an indictment against Smith, 56, for the murder of drug dealer Lewton Shu in 1983.

The decision comes in the nick of time for the ABC with OzTAM figures showing the network has hit rock bottom under Mr Shier.

Blue Murder is based on the exploits of corrupt NSW police and criminals during the '80s.

It stars Tony Martin as Neddy Smith, Gary Sweet as hit man Christopher Dale Flannery and Richard Roxburgh as Roger Rogerson. Since 1995 it has screened in all other Australian states twice, but it could not be shown in NSW because of the charges outstanding against Smith.

According to the ABC, pirate videotapes of the series have been in hot demand around Sydney. Critics consider it one of the best programs ever screened on Australian television.

The head of publicity at the ABC said the program would be scheduled nationally and probably would not go to air for another six weeks.

The decision by the DPP means little to Smith who is serving life for murdering brothel owner Harvey Jones in 1983.

It was the only conviction to arise out of seven murder charges against Smith after a cellmate secretly recorded their conversations and went to the police.

By Peter Lalor And Anthony Peterson
Daily Telegraph
July 13, 2001

Blue Murder: Media Release

AT LAST… 

THE STORY NSW AND THE ACT WAS NEVER ALLOWED TO SEE!

BLUE MURDER

The most controversial drama series ever made in Australia, BLUE MURDER, will finally screen in NSW and the ACT six years after it was prevented from broadcast. The two part series will begin Tuesday 31 July at 9.30pm, concluding Wednesday 1 August at 9.30pm.

The highly acclaimed drama that delves into corruption in the NSW police force and crime underworld of the 80's, was legally embargoed from screening in NSW and the ACT because underworld identity Neddy Smith, one of the key characters in the series, was charged with seven counts of murder just before the program was due to be broadcast in 1995.

Earlier this month, the Director of Public Prosecutions decided not to prosecute Neddy Smith for the murder of Lewton Shu, clearing the way for the first ever screening of BLUE MURDER in NSW and the ACT.

In all other States and Territories, the BBC drama CARE will screen at the same time.

BLUE MURDER begins with Sydney criminal Neddy Smith's activities in the late 1970's, charting his gradual acceptance into a circle of corrupt police officers led by top cop Rogerson and culminates with the shooting of policeman Michael Drury and the crumbling of Rogerson's empire in the late 80's. The series features an outstanding cast including Richard Roxburgh as Dt Sgt Roger Rogerson, Tony Martin as Needy Smith and Steve Bastoni as Michael Drury, with Gary Sweet, Alex Dimitriades, Peter Phelps, Marcus Graham and Bill Hunter.

BLUE MURDER is an ABC / Southern Star Entertainment Production. Written by Ian David. Directed by Michael Jenkins. Produced by Rod Allan.

BLUE MURDER (NSW AND ACT ONLY)
Screens Tuesday 31 July and Wednesday 1 August at 9.30pm

ABC Media Release
Thursday 26 July 2001

Blue Murder hits ABC next week

The award-winning drama series Blue Murder, which colourfully re-creates Sydney's 1980s underworld, will screen on television in NSW for the first time next week.

The ABC's legal and scheduling departments finally gave Blue Murder the green light to be screened here and in the ACT yesterday, six years after it was shown in the rest of Australia.

Featuring Tony Martin as notorious criminal Neddy Smith and Richard Roxburgh as infamous detective-sergeant Roger Rogerson, it will air in two parts at 9.30pm on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Already widely viewed on bootleg copies by police, lawyers, criminals and anyone else interested in such fare, the program is still expected to be a ratings success for the ABC.

Blue Murder was pulled from screening in NSW in 1995 when Smith was charged with seven 1980s murders, all of which have now been dealt with by courts.

Four of those murder charges were dropped at committal, one led to conviction at trial, one was "no billed" by the Director of Public Prosecutions earlier this month and one, that of Sallie-Anne Huckstepp, ended in acquittal by jury.

Despite that verdict, Blue Murder will still go to air with a scene in which Smith kills Huckstepp.

The first part of the series features Smith being awarded a "green light" to commit crimes by police grateful for Smith's favourable evidence at the inquest into the death of drug dealer Warren Lanfranchi, whom Rogerson shot in 1981.

It culminates with the shooting of drug squad detective Michael Drury by hitman Chris Flannery, in a conspiracy involving Melbourne drug dealer Alan Williams and Rogerson, who in real-life was cleared of involvement. The second part follows the flawed investigation into Drury's shooting, Flannery's and Huckstepp's murders, Rogerson's career downfall and Smith's descent to prison, where he has remained since.

By Stephen Gibbs
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday, July 26, 2001

ABC rushes Blue Murder

THE ABC's controversial award-winning miniseries Blue Murder about Sydney's underworld will be shown nearly a month ahead of schedule in NSW next week.

The program was due to air in late August but an ABC spokeswoman said the threat of legal action forced the network to screen it early.

"We have to move quickly to screen it because there may be charges pending against some other well-known people portrayed in the show which might stop us from screening it," she said.

"We've been given a small window of opportunity and our lawyers have given us clearance to screen it, but we have to do it quickly."

The 1995 production, which has been shown twice in all states except NSW, dramatises police corruption and underworld activities in the 1980s. It could not be shown in NSW because of outstanding charges against Neddy Smith, who is serving a life sentence for murdering brothel owner Harvey Jones in 1983.

Two weeks ago the Director of Public Prosecutions cleared the way for the series to be screened in NSW by no-billing an indictment against Smith, 56, for the murder of drug dealer Lewton Shu in 1983.

Based on Smith's autobiography and the book Line of Fire about the 1984 shooting of drug squad cop Michael Drury, Blue Murder depicts various underworld killings.

It stars Tony Martin as Neddy Smith, Gary Sweet as hit man Christopher Dale Flannery and Richard Roxburgh as Roger Rogerson.

* Blue Murder airs on the ABC next Tuesday and Wednesday at 9.30pm

Better late than never

As Blue Murder gets the all-clear to screen in NSW, Tony Davis takes a personal look at the events covered in the controversial drama.

It is truly odd that one of the best pieces of television drama ever produced in Australia has never screened in NSW, the country's most populous State and the one in which 90 per cent of the story is set. But that's the case with Blue Murder, winner of multiple AFI awards, which screened in the rest of the country in 1995. Now, following a decision by the Director of Public Prosecutions not to pursue Neddy Smith over a 1983 murder, the ABC will air the miniseries over two nights, from Tuesday.

Those who have not managed to beg, borrow or otherwise obtain an interstate video of Blue Murder during the past six years should get ready for an absolutely compelling re-creation of real-life events from the early 1980s.

With brilliant and appalling ferocity, Blue Murder recalls an era unlike any other in Australian criminal history, one in which certain police and crooks formed a partnership to more effectively commit crimes that at least one side of the equation was meant to prevent.

Blue Murder is a masterful piece of scripting, direction and acting. Rapid-fire conversations overlap while cameras follow the action in documentary-style, always giving you the sense you are moving among real and dangerous people rather than having scripted lines delivered to you.

Some of the greatest names of the Sydney underworld are portrayed: Christopher Dale Flannery, the hitman known as Rent-a-kill; Warren Lanfranchi, the heroin dealer who preferred a baseball bat to a well-structured argument when it came to financial negotiations; Lanfranchi's girlfriend, the glamorous and screwed-up Sallie-Anne Huckstepp; and above all others, Neddy and The Dodger.

Neddy was Arthur Stanley Smith, the drug dealer and armed-hold-up specialist given the green light by certain police to commit any crime (except murdering police), as long as he shared the proceeds. Neddy left bank robberies in police cars, while the cops up front radioed headquarters to say they'd lost the trail of the suspects.

The Dodger was Detective Sergeant Roger Rogerson, whose name will forever be prefixed by the words "disgraced" and "former". He became a household name in the early 1980s after winning a supposed OK-Corral-style shootout with Warren Lanfranchi in a Chippendale lane.

Generally less mentioned in this whole story but equally important—from this writer's point of view, at least—is me.

Blue Murder, which I watched in one breathless sitting, took me back to Glebe Coroner's Court in 1981 where, as a second-year newspaper cadet, I spent day after day with many of the "cast", sitting just a few steps away from Rogerson, Huckstepp and others, watching their every movement, reporting on each word said.

I was 20 years old. There are a lot of things I was at 20 that I am glad I am not now. Gullible is one of them. Sure, one senior policeman might play with the truth, I thought. But not two, or three, or four… and surely entire events and interviews wouldn't be invented from scratch.

It seemed so clear cut: Detective Sergeant Rogerson was a policeman with bravery commendations and Lanfranchi was a drug dealer. Officer after officer supported the story that Lanfranchi had pulled a gun first. OK, there were no fingerprints on the butt, but police forensic experts said that was not unusual.

Later revelations would change public perceptions of the NSW Police Force. Back then there still was a general sense that even when the police occasionally bent the rules, they were still operating in our best interests.

Anyway, during the Lanfranchi trial the other side overplayed its hand. During the court breaks, a cavalcade of interested parties came to the little windowless press room or stopped me in the corridor to explain that senior police controlled the State's entire heroin trade, had committed bashings, murders and more besides; that Rogerson, in spite of his modest income, leased a Lamborghini.

It seemed too far-fetched to be true, and later events showed it wasn't true. It was a Bentley, for example, and Rogerson owned rather than leased it.

I was reporting for the News Limited newspapers: The Daily Mirror, The Daily Telegraph and The Australian. My court-reporting training had consisted of being shown around Glebe Coroner's Court by the cadet I replaced, and of me asking as many questions as would be tolerated by the other permanent press-room fixture—a young reporter from Fairfax's late and unlamented The Sun.

Being a newspaper cadet in the blokey, beer-soaked atmosphere of early 1980s journalism is the sort of thing you are glad to have done, but would never do again. I spent several months as a graveyard-shift ambulance-chaser and remember it as a time of fires, car crashes, deathknocks and bullet-ventilated bodies face-down in parks.

Some of those bodies, we later learned, belonged to people who had been in the orbit of Lanfranchi, Smith and Rogerson, but for me at the time there was never a sense that any of the criminal goings-on I saw each week were likely to endanger average punters—or involved the police.

There was great camaraderie on police rounds. Senior journos drank with influential cops or chatted about wives and kids while the warehouse fire blazed or Police Rescue unwrapped the car from the pole. Some old-hand reporters could get traffic fines pulled and more. Rogerson received a bouquet of "hero" stories the morning after the Lanfranchi shooting.

The situation served the press and the police well. The only people who lost out were the public.

Glebe Coroner's Court, where I was stationed for several months, was directly above the morgue. A rather strange employee, who kept his lunch in the cold room, delighted in taking young reporters through his domain, leading the way through a field of unclad corpses on steel trolleys parked in neat rows, or through the autopsy rooms where cadavers were being pulled to pieces. "This is a motorcycle accident and this is a drowning," he would explain, but his favourite show-and-tells were the ones in the freezer drawers, the often butchered or burnt corpses being kept as evidence. Warren Lanfranchi's was among these, deteriorating and blighted with some sort of fungus.

Lanfranchi was not much older than I was. His world couldn't have been more different and, as evidence came out, it showed beyond doubt there were two completely separate Sydneys existing at the same time with very little interaction between them.

Blue Murder authentically depicts the amazing things that were happening in unremarkable-looking pubs and restaurants around Glebe, Surry Hills and Chinatown. They were places I had walked past hundreds of times with scarcely a thought that there might be a bashing in progress, a hit being organised, the proceeds of a job being split or police and crims drunkenly engaging in a target-shooting contest in the basement.

Blue Murder does not judge. It merely presents a well-informed view of what happened, and, in showing the charisma, bravery and brutality of Neddy and The Dodger, helps explain the control this unlikely partnership established.

If there's proof of a good historical re-enactment, it's when you become so involved with the characters they become fixed in your mind as the real people. When I see actual footage of Neddy or the Dodger, they don't look quite right—yet when, say, Tony Martin turns up on screen I immediately think of Neddy Smith and even shiver a little.

Writing this story made me go back and look for my old newspaper clippings. The court stories I covered—the Lanfranchi shooting, the Harry M. Miller fraud trial, the notorious severed-head-and-fingers murder of Kim Barry in Wollongong and others—were filed by phone in great haste during adjournments. They became littered with typos and literals as they were quickly shunted through copytakers, sub-editors working with pencils, then compositors shaping the words mirror-wise in hot metal.

Anyone who thinks media standards are slipping ought to search out newspapers from that era and compare. And anyone who harks back to the good old days when the streets were safe and the cops were on our side should watch Blue Murder.

Sydney Morning Herald
Monday, July 30, 2001

The who's who of Blue Murder

Detective Sergeant Roger Rogerson

Once considered among the local constabulary's finest, "The Dodger" was brave enough to stare down the likes of Christopher Dale Flannery and Neddy Smith. Rogerson cultivated friends and allies in high and low places and was ruthless in the way he did business. He shot Warren Lanfranchi in a narrow lane in 1981—supposedly after Lanfranchi drew a gun on him—and watched his empire crash down soon afterwards. Played beautifully by Richard Roxburgh.

Currently A free man (acquitted of conspiring to murder Michael Drury, he served three years in the '90s for conspiring to pervert the course of justice), although the Police Integrity Commission recommended this year he be criminally charged on three counts.

Arthur Stanley "Neddy" Smith

The dangerous and highly intelligent crook with a heart of venom. His frightening autobiography, Neddy, illustrates a man operating on a completely different moral code to the rest of us (though, alas, on the same moral code as several powerful NSW policemen). Tony Martin delivers with chilling authenticity.

Currently Serving a life sentence for murder and suffering from Parkinson's disease. He was acquitted in 1999 of the murder of Sallie-Anne Huckstepp.

Michael Drury

The cop who claimed he wouldn't take a bribe from Rogerson and almost paid for it with his life. Steve Bastoni interviewed Michael Drury to get the role right, and plays him with enough ambiguity to ensure he is not a cliched hero. Bizarrely, Michael Drury and wife Pam came on set to see the scene in which Drury is shot in his Chatswood home.

Currently Retired from the NSW Police Force last year.

Christopher Dale Flannery

The wild hitman known as Rent-a-kill. The unlikely casting of Gary Sweet is a triumph and Blue Murder leaves no doubt about Flannery's much-discussed fate.

Currently Believed dead.

Warren Lanfranchi

Petty crim and drug dealer, shot by Rogerson. It was claimed by Lanfranchi's family he had $10,000 on his person at the time of the shooting. It was not there when the body arrived at the morgue. The Blue Murder account is very different to the one Rogerson detailed under oath. A 21-year-old Alex Dimitriades does the honours.

Currently Dead.

Sallie-Anne Huckstepp

Prostitute, drug addict and girlfriend of heroin dealer Warren Lanfranchi—yet glamorous enough to captivate television cameras and become a household name with her allegations about Rogerson. Before playing the role, Loene Carmen interviewed Huckstepp's daughter, Sasha, who herself turns up as a nurse in Blue Murder.

Currently Dead.

Ian David

The writer of Police Crop, Joh's Jury and other classy TV dramas, David based his Blue Murder script on In the Line of Fire (the story of Michael Drury by Herald journalist Darren Goodsir) and Neddy, by Neddy Smith with Tom Noble. He also met Smith, conducted hundreds of other interviews and suffered real-life threats and burglaries while working on the project.

Currently President of the Screen Writers' Guild; developing a miniseries about the Ivan Milat backpacker murders.

Michael Jenkins

The director of Blue Murder, Jenkins also worked on the controversial '80s miniseries Scales of Justice.

Currently Working on Young Lions, a drama pilot for Nine, and developing a film on the life of Ned Kelly.

Blue Murder screens on the ABC on Tuesday and Wednesday night at 9.30pm.

Real-life drama in TV classic

WHEN Blue Murder screens tonight, NSW viewers will finally be able to make up their own minds on what is fact or just good television.

While the truth may never be known, Blue Murder writer Ian David yesterday admitted he had received threatening phone-calls, had his home broken into and heavy criticism from some of the people portrayed in the confronting drama.

The events depicted in Blue Murder are based on Neddy Smith's autobiography and journalist Darren Goodsir's In the Line of Fire, as well as David's own research and interviews.

But the writer said while the events were necessarily dramatised, he stood by his work saying it was as close to reality as he could make it.

"It was the best we could do for the time," he said.

"When I look back on it I'm quite pleased that it still stands up."

The series centres on the infamous shootings of drug dealer Warren Lanfranchi by detective Roger Rogerson in Dangar Place, Chippendale. It also deals with the shooting of policeman Michael Drury at his home–allegedly by missing hitman Christopher Dale Flannery.

Other incidents shown include Neddy Smith killing Lanfranchi's prostitute girlfriend Sallie-Anne Huckstepp–a murder for which he was later acquitted.

David said he would watch the show with director Michael Jenkins and actor Tony Martin, who portrayed Smith, over a few beers.

The actor on whom the production relies most, Richard Roxburgh, yesterday was filming a movie in London but said his chief fear after playing the role was the reaction of his real life character Roger Rogerson.

While Rogerson, who watched part of the TV show during a 60 Minutes interview, has always maintained he shot Lanfranchi in self-defence, the former detective sergeant is said to have liked Roxburgh's portrayal–apart from his smoking and piano playing.

"It was a very weird hall of mirrors experience as I watched Roger watching me being him," Roxburgh said.

But another of the four former police officers who witnessed the shooting in Dangar Place was yesterday not so forgiving of any dramatic licence.

Retired Detective Sergeant Rodney Moore was driving his white Volvo only metres from Rogerson when he saw the 1981 shooting.

Mr Moore, now working as a labourer, said that while Blue Murder was good entertainment, he was angry at the depiction of the character Mal Rivers.

"They have got this 'Mal Rivers' taking money out of Lanfranchi's strides," he said. "This is just absolute rubbish. What happened was what was in the coroner's court. Lanfranchi pulled out a gun and Rogerson shot him."

July 31, 2001
Daily Telegraph

ABC drama a killer in the ratings

Six years after it was made, Blue Murder has been a triumph for the ABC. On Tuesday night it averaged 379,000 viewers in Sydney. It had been shown in other Australian cities years ago, but legal cases involving the key characters delayed its presentation in its state of origin.

An audience of 379,000, as measured by OzTAM, may not sound huge compared to the 800,000 who watched Thorpie winning gold medals last week, but let's put it in context. Sydney people, in common with the rest of Australia, tend to go to bed early, so it's rare for any program starting at 9.30pm to attract more than 300,000 viewers.

Channel Ten's much publicised youth drama, The Secret Life of Us, which screens at 9.30pm on Mondays, scored 251,000 viewers this week, while Nine's Sex and the City, showing at the same time, scored 310,000. The critically acclaimed The West Wing, which showed at 10.30 on Tuesday night, attracted 150,000.

Blue Murder did surprisingly well with what TV programmers call the "youth demographic", who would have been at primary school when the events in the show happened. About 129,000 Blue Murder viewers were aged between 16 and 39 (while the usual youth favourite, Rove Live on Ten, attracted 143,000 groovers).

Normally the ABC's most watched program of the week is The Bill, which attracted 381,000 Sydney viewers on Tuesday—considerably more than its usual 320,000. This suggests Blue Murder encouraged some eager viewers to tune in early. Perhaps the ABC should show it every night.

By David Dale
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday, August 2, 2001

Almost all the chilling truth

Is Blue Murder an accurate portrayal of events? Or is it racy fiction wrapped around a thin skeleton of facts to make electrifying television? Or a bit of both?

There are doubts about the show's claim of being a true representation of the police and underworld wars. Such reservations are understandable, given the brazen, nonchalant way in which corrupt deals and killings are presented.

But not only are the scenes believable, they are, in more than 90 per cent of the cases, chillingly accurate. And that's what makes Blue Murder all the more terrifying.

Screenwriter Ian David researched the story extensively and interviewed some of the players. He also blended truthfully the themes raised in the two books that provided the platform for the production. So intent was he on accuracy that many scenes were filmed where they took place.

For instance, undercover policeman Michael Drury's shooting was filmed in the home where the event occurred. Roger Rogerson's barbecue with Neddy Smith and other mates was filmed in the real Rogerson's former backyard in Condell Park, and drug dealer Warren Lanfranchi is shot in the Chippendale laneway where the real Lanfranchi was shot.

But for pedants, there are some issues worthy of debate.

Smith is shown murdering Sallie-Anne Huckstepp but he has been acquitted of this crime. He is shown throwing solicitor Brian Alexander off a boat, but he has never been convicted of it.

It is highly unlikely that Smith, or any of Rogerson's colleagues, were privy to the talks about the attempted killing of Drury. And Rogerson never smoked cigarettes.

There are other small errors, but given the body of work that is assembled, and the multitude of events canvassed, they are minor.

However, on the flipside, Smith did confront CIB chief Noel Morey at Morey's boozy farewell, but perhaps not in the manner depicted; Smith did accompany Rogerson to many police functions; and hitman Christopher Dale Flannery visited hospital to see if he could "finish the job" after failing to kill Drury.

Another feature that has intrigued some viewers is the matter-of-fact way in which Drury reacted to the offer of a bribe from Rogerson. It is this author's view that Drury's nonplussed response says more about the state of the police then, rather then anything to do with Drury's integrity.

Darren Goodsir is a Herald journalist and the author of Line of Fire, upon which Blue Murder is partly based.

By Darren Goodsir
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday, August 2, 2001

Our town: the secret of Blue Murder's success

A gutsy cops-and-robbers story shot in our backyard and speaking our language, that's why this drama is a hit. And it should help a few actors' careers, writes David Dale.

It was made six years ago, about events that happened 20 years ago. The photography is grainy at times, and you can't understand a lot of the dialogue. Many of the characters are not clearly identified, and their motives are obscure.

Some of the events are implausible, bordering on preposterous. One of the real people portrayed in it has said: "It's not a bad movie as a drama, but it's all bullshit."

So why did Blue Murder work so well with Sydney viewers, and why will it launch or relaunch so many showbiz careers? A few possible explanations…

It confirms the deepest archetypes of our city. We like to think of ourselves as living in a rough, tough pragmatic town. Sydney's first police officers were criminals, because Governor Phillip appointed 12 of his most trusted convicts as "the Night Watch" in 1790. That interchangeability established a tradition which lasted at least 200 years.

Sydneysiders have always believed their coppers were a bit bent, and haven't been too fussed about it, as long as somebody came around to commiserate about break-ins. If Roger Rogerson dispensed a bit of vigilante justice, that was what those scum needed. If the cops let Neddie Smith bash a few blokes at a two-up game, or helped him throw a crooked lawyer to the sharks, that's what defines us as an exciting metropolis.

We sometimes wondered if the rumours about powerful people we were hearing in the pub were just urban myths. Blue Murder showed they were true. And when Neddie describes the show as "bullshit"—well, he would say that, wouldn't he?

It speaks our language. Thugs and cops don't articulate like trained thespians, and it was a brave move for Blue Murder's director, Michael Jenkins, to let them mumble some of the time, and for the ABC not to censor the f- words and the c- words or tone down the brutality in an attempt to enlarge the audience. It's late-night viewing, designed for people who don't mind a little mental exercise to fill in the gaps.

We want to encourage the ABC to return to its glory days. Once upon a time the ABC had money to spend on dangerous drama that held up a mirror to Australian society. Now the ABC has a boss who thinks The Weakest Link is groundbreaking television.

It has familiar actors at the top of their game. As the moustachioed villain in Moulin Rouge, Richard Roxburgh was just silly (in accordance with the director's instructions). As the South African sidekick to the Scottish sadist in Mission: Impossible II, he was wimpy. For the past six years, we've been underestimating him—because we weren't allowed to see Blue Murder. Finally we know what a charming monster he can be.

If we saw Wildside (also directed by Michael Jenkins) on TV two years ago, we know Tony Martin can do an idealistic cop barely under control, and if we saw The Interview at the movies or on video (or best of all, on DVD), we know Tony Martin can do a cop who might just be crooked. But we never knew he could make us feel sorry for a brutal killer.

We'd gone off Gary Sweet lately, but now that we've finally seen his hyped-up Rent-a-Kill, we look forward to a comeback (even without the fluff-wig). And why haven't we seen anything lately of Loene Carmen, who played Sallie-Anne Huckstepp (after an auspicious start as the love interest in The Year My Voice Broke)? Blue Murder even managed to remind us that Ray Martin was once a subtle interviewer.

It has impeccable period detailing, smart jokes and a car chase. Blue Murder isn't homework, it isn't a sociological duty, it isn't subsidised culture—it is just entertaining. How about Neddie's big-collar shirts and wide lapels, the Dodger's cardigan, the barbie round the pool, the gorgeous sunset on the harbour, and dialogue such as "How many other blokes have got a green light?" "No-one—we shot all the others".

These days every successful Hollywood thriller must contain a car chase, a sex scene, violence treated flippantly, ironic pop culture references, a flawed hero who undergoes a symbolic death-and-resurrection, and an ambiguous ending. Ian David didn't know any of that when he wrote the screenplay, years ahead of David Chase's brilliant work on The Sopranos.

All we need now is for Blue Murder to be released on DVD, on sale at ABC shops with a second disc containing deleted scenes, commentaries by writer, director and actors, and a documentary explaining why it took so long to reach us.

It might just earn enough money to make the ABC feel like doing it all again.

By David Dale
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday, August 2, 2001

Viewers go for Blue Murder, but you'd hardly read about it

Sydney is a town where word of mouth can work wonders. The second night of Blue Murder did even better for the ABC than the first night.

Driven by enthusiastic reports about Tuesday's first episode of the true-crime saga, an extra 54,000 Sydneysiders tuned in to the ABC on Wednesday, bringing the total audience to 433,000—an amazing figure for any 90-minute show starting at 9.30pm.

But, if the ABC can possibly find a way to shoot itself in the foot, it will. If you looked at the Sydney ratings figures released by OzTAM yesterday morning, you would have found no mention of Blue Murder. Instead, the ratings showed that, in Sydney, Foreign Correspondent got 443,000 viewers and Lateline got 412,000—record performances for both shows.

An ABC spokesman explained that the person responsible for notifying OzTAM of changes in the national programming schedule was based in Melbourne and had not known that Blue Murder was running (in Sydney only) over two nights.

Sorry, Jennifer Byrne, but any pay rise you may get for more than doubling your Foreign Correspondent audience will have to be passed on to actors Richard Roxburgh and Tony Martin, writer Ian David and director Michael Jenkins.

By David Dale
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday, August 3, 2001

Blue Murder is a two-part Australian television miniseries produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) in 1995 and is based on true events. Given its confronting content, the DVD release was classified MA 15+. An injunction brought during Arthur "Neddy" Smith's appeal against his life sentence saw its broadcast delayed in New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territoryfor six years, until 2001. In New Zealand the DVD release was classified R 18+ for graphic violence and offensive language.

Set in the 1970s and 1980s in Sydney, the miniseries concerns the relationship between controversial former Detective Roger "the Dodger" Rogerson and notorious criminal Arthur "Neddy" Smith. Rogerson and his colleagues were accused of giving Smith a "green light" to commit crimes without Police interference, with the relationship fraying when Rogerson orders hitman Christopher "Mr. Rent-a-Kill" Flannery to murder Police Officer Michael Drury. The murder of prostitute Sallie-Anne Huckstepp also features.

Blue Murder is narrated by the characters of Rogerson, Smith and Drury and focuses on the corruption allegations that plagued theNSW Police Force at the time. Rogerson and Smith achieved a kind of celebrity status during the Wood Royal Commission into Police corruption.

The screenplay was written by Ian David who has written extensively on the people and events featured. The miniseries was directed by Michael Jenkins and produced by Rod Allan.

The series begins with the arrest of Arthur "Neddy" Smith for attempted robbery. He is interviewed by Det. Sgt. Roger Rogerson, who instead of charging him employs him to protect various drug dealers. After serving a short prison sentence for other charges, Smith teams up with Graham "Abo" Henry and becomes a significant presence in the underworld. His association with Rogerson enables him to escape impending drugs charges and helps him to carry out other crimes unabated.

After Warren Lanfranchi, an associate of Smith's, robs drug dealers protected by Rogerson and attempts to shoot a Police Officer on the way to a robbery, Rogerson shoots him in front of fellow Officers. Lanfranchi's girlfriend, Sallie-Anne Huckstepp, vows revenge. Smith, who transported Lanfranchi to the murder and assisted the Police in court by giving a false testimony, is rewarded by Rogerson with a "Green Light", meaning he is allowed to commit any crime he likes, with the exception of assaulting or killing a Police Officer. Rogerson and Smith lead a criminal syndicate in Sydney, distributing drugs and murdering any potential witnesses to their crimes.

Meanwhile in Melbourne, undercover Detective Michael Drury sets up a drugs deal with dealer Alan Williams as part of a sting operation. Williams escapes after a botched Police chase but knows he will soon be caught and is terrified of being imprisoned. Rogerson, on behalf of Williams, tries to bribe Drury to drop the charges, but Drury refuses. In response, Rogerson and Williams contact notorious hitman Christopher Flannery to kill Drury. Flannery shoots Drury in his home but fails to kill him. The Police are unable to obtain any leads on Drury's assailant, but Drury reveals that Rogerson attempted to bribe him and Rogerson is charged.

Rogerson uses the lack of evidence and his corrupt associates in the NSW Police Force to escape conviction, but the negative image and increased Police attention caused by the affair begin to damage his criminal enterprises. His relationship with Smith becomes increasingly strained, to the point where he organises a failed attempt on Smith's life. Flannery and Huckstepp are both murdered when they begin to pose a threat to Rogerson and Smith, but Williams confesses his involvement in the Drury shooting in exchange for protection from Rogerson. Despite this new evidence, Rogerson again escapes conviction, but he is dismissed from the Police Force and arrested by the Australian Federal Police(AFP) shortly afterwards when he is caught depositing money in a bank account under a false name. Without Rogerson's protection, Smith's crime syndicate quickly falls apart and after killing a tow-truck driver in a drunken fight, he leaves enough evidence for the Police to arrest him.

In the final scene, a now-dismissed Rogerson meets Smith at his hide-out to discuss the situation. Rogerson tells Smith to keep a low profile while he uses his contacts within the Police Force to resolve the matter. However, as soon as Rogerson leaves, Police storm the house and arrest Smith and his associate.

As the credits roll, it is revealed that Michael Drury retired from the Police in 2000, Roger Rogerson served three years in prison and Neddy Smith received an indeterminate life sentence for multiple murders, which he is still serving.

• Richard Roxburgh as Roger Rogerson
• Tony Martin as Arthur "Neddy" Smith
• Steve Bastoni as Michael Drury
• Gary Sweet as Christopher Dale Flannery
• Peter Phelps as Graham "Abo" Henry
• Alex Dimitriades as Warren Lanfranchi
• Marcus Graham as Alan Williams
• Bill Hunter as "Black" Angus McDonald
• Loene Carmen as Sallie-Anne Huckstepp
• Blue Murder at the Internet Movie Database

Viewers go for Blue Murder, but you'd hardly read about it

Sydney is a town where word of mouth can work wonders. The second night of Blue Murder did even better for the ABC than the first night.

Driven by enthusiastic reports about Tuesday's first episode of the true-crime saga, an extra 54,000 Sydneysiders tuned in to the ABC on Wednesday, bringing the total audience to 433,000—an amazing figure for any 90-minute show starting at 9.30pm.

But, if the ABC can possibly find a way to shoot itself in the foot, it will. If you looked at the Sydney ratings figures released by OzTAM yesterday morning, you would have found no mention of Blue Murder. Instead, the ratings showed that, in Sydney, Foreign Correspondent got 443,000 viewers and Lateline got 412,000—record performances for both shows.

An ABC spokesman explained that the person responsible for notifying OzTAM of changes in the national programming schedule was based in Melbourne and had not known that Blue Murder was running (in Sydney only) over two nights.

Sorry, Jennifer Byrne, but any pay rise you may get for more than doubling your Foreign Correspondent audience will have to be passed on to actors Richard Roxburgh and Tony Martin, writer Ian David and director Michael Jenkins.

By David Dale
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday, August 3, 2001

Blue Murder: a RE-IMAGINED history

Greg Levine & Stephen McElhinney

Erich Auerbach, whilst discussing the influence of Joyce and Proust?s use of reflected consciousness and time strata, makes an interesting comparison between a novel?s conception of time and a film?s:

a concentration of space and time such as can be achieved by the film (for example the representation, within a few seconds and by means of a few pictures, of the situation of a widely dispersed group of people, of a great city, an army, a war, an entire country) can never be within the reach of the spoken or written word. (Auerbach, 1991:546)

The interesting part for us is the phrase "a great city". In a few sequences a film can give you a version of the past far richer in detail than any history book in the same space of time. This paper will apply this idea to the tele-movie Blue Murder (1995), a quasi-fictional account of Sydney?s criminal milieu of the 1970s and 80s. Made in 1995 and screened on ABC TV in most parts of Australia shortly after, Blue Murder was not broadcast in NSW and the ACT until July 31, 2001. The 6-year delay was caused by a legal embargo placed on the mini-series because Neddy Smith, the main character depicted in the piece, was still on trial for the crimes the portrayed. We compareBlue Murder ?s representation of events in Sydney?s past with impressions of the present by visiting the haunts of the central characters and experiencing the space between representation and actual lived perception. This provides us with an insight into how the film?s narrative has compressed space and time; how Sydney?s past is recontextualised as a film and etched into the viewer?s consciousness, introducing a tension between depictions of the recent past, a vastly changed present and the fractured identity that results.

In the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, the media?s representation of crime in Sydney circled ravenously around a few key names, eager for the slightest sensation: Arthur "Neddy" Smith, Detective Sergeant Roger Rogerson, Christopher Dale Flannery and Sally Anne Huckstep among other colourful local identities and celebrities. The tales that projected these names into Sydney?s various public spheres were not only fed upon by the media but also by pub patrons. Neddy Smith, a leading criminal figure of the time, was careful to keep his face out of the media for years, yet was still regularly recognised in pubs all over the city, inner and outer suburbs. According to legend, he would walk in and, on the strength of his reputation, strangers queued to buy him drinks. But pubs were a changing environment in those days. It was a time of transformation with the pub where you went to drink, buy stolen goods or get in a fight slowly submitting to the will of today?s post-industrial patron, who goes to the pub to socialise after a hard day?s data shuffling at the office.

With this in mind, a trio of seasoned knowledge workers commenced their tour. We started our research at the Star Hotel in Chinatown. Its proximity to the ?labour mile? of Sussex Street made it a traditional NSW Labor Party drinking hole, frequented by various characters employed by the party and the unions. Presumably connections were made here between shady politicians, strong-arm unionists and criminals who shared their taste for power and action. In Neddy Smith?s book, Neddy (2002), this was one of a number of pubs around the inner city where he allegedly kept money in the safe, guns behind the bar and met associates with various relationships to NSW criminal law. It is also where he reputedly shot a man in the heart at point blank range, spraying the wall with his insides. Is this a place where my research associates and I want to be on a Friday night? Based on the reputation of events that happened at the Star Hotel in the late 80s, it would be very reasonable to assume that this place would be far too violent for proto-knowledge workers like us.

Traditionally Sydney pubs like this one characterised themselves as havens for the working man. Even when they were primarily patronised by politicians, they were still constructed around the ethos that authentic culture is built upon the efforts of the blue-collar worker. This could have something to do with the central myths of Australian national identity being based on the myth of the "bushman", who Ward described as:

a practical man, rough and ready in his manners and quick to decry any appearance of affectation in others. He is a great improviser, ever willing to "have a go" at anything, but willing too to be content with a task done in a way that is "near enough". Though capable of great exertion in an emergency, he normally feels no impulse to work hard without good cause. He swears hard and consistently, gambles heavily and often, and drinks deeply on occasion. (1965:1-2)

Traditionally, academic types like us were categorised in relation to this national identity. That is, not workers but endurable if we behaved according to the norms of the ethos and donned its garb when traversing its terrain, structures and language. This has become problematic in recent times. Theorists are saying we now exist in an information society ? a society refashioned by "the massive social impacts of new information technologies of computing and telecommunications" (Lyon, 1988:vii). They argue that these days "the engine of much of the dynamics of economic activity and the source of much of the growth of added economic value can be attributed to knowledge" (Stehr, 2004:212). According to these theorists, the growth of societies like Sydney are now dependent on the efforts of knowledge workers.

How is this shift reflected in the Star Hotel? The working class?s move away from city dwelling began in the 1960s as factories moved to the outer suburbs (or off-shore) to make room for white collar office space. During the 1970s and early 1980s, the Star would perhaps have been having an identity crisis; white collar patrons who weren?t sure if they identified with the worker ethos or with the new suburban bourgeoisie chic. An ideal environment for a fashionably dressed, gun slinging, heroin dealer like Neddy.

In 2004, it is just like any other corner pub in Sydney, cloned through the combined effects of licensing laws, random breath testing and property speculation. The main bar is dominated by the TAB and its flock of elevated TV screens and the pokies are in the next room. Jackpots flash, horses scurry around distant tracks and Friday night footy lurches across the plasma screens. The traditional working class pub fare of gambling and sport still dominate; all that has changed is the mode of delivery and its associated atmosphere. On the night we were there the crowd was part after-work suits and part pre-dinner restaurant patrons; a far cry from the pub mentioned in the book Nedd y. The man behind the bar looked like he?d seen some action but was extremely polite and professional. If you hadn?t read the book you wouldn?t know this space once oozed trouble. Now it felt hollowed out and sanitised like so many buildings in post-industrial Sydney.

We talked about the work ahead in excited though hushed voices. We had to be quiet because we couldn?t help using our favourite Blue Murder quotes and trying to imitate the character?s voices and we didn?t want to fulfil the Australian stereotype of "intellectuals" and look like wankers. These days residents of Sydney are very aware of the events with which we were trying to relate. Pub patrons still feed off stories about Neddy, The Dodger and "Abo" Henry, though in new ways. In the 1980s and early 1990s, each name stood alone and the (inevitably embellished) associated story was passed on by word-of-mouth, usually started by someone who actually witnessed the events. Now, the stories are packaged rather than muttered from increasingly toothless mouths. The names are inseparable. You can?t hear about Neddy or the Dodger without hearing about Lanfranchi, Abo or even Chopper. This particular historic field has been compressed by the film Blue Murder and other true crime narratives. The actual events have been plucked from what Carlyle called a "Chaos of Being" (in White, 1975:144), and crammed together with a poetic narrative. Blue Murder wasn?t the first attempt to make these events history but, to paraphrase Auerbach, because of the fact that it is a mini-series, it is by far the most efficient in reaching a large audience and therefore the most influential.

It is unlikely that most television audience members would consider Blue Murder a historical document. It is a "dramatisation" of events, based on books written by Neddy Smith and Michael Drury, an ex-policeman, neither noted historians and therefore, given the assumptions of the role of the historian in our society, incapable of relating objective fact. The audience would probably be unable to imagine these non-historians' tales as part of the normative history of their community. Yet the audience would also probably not be able to come up with a good explanation for why historians get a particular claim on the "truth" of the past. The conception of the historian as a person who stands outside of culture, politics and life, looks on objectively and then delivers measured, scientific interpretations of events is still very popular today. This positivist tradition developed in the mid-1800s when writers such as Ranke began to believe that "the task of the historian was ?simply to show how it really was?" (Carr, 1986:3); to impartially portray facts as they happened. This attitude ignores the idea that "portraying" an event implies a narrative shaping of some sort, an argument made by many writers since. However, judging by the emphasis the Australian media have placed on the "History Wars" since the early 1990s (and the fact that some "populist" historians can still make a living on alterations of the fabric of history, tailored to be happily consumed in the better suburban homes and retirement villages) the positivist version of historical consciousness still holds sway over most of the Australian TV audience and consequently reproduces itself in the productions made for it.

A misconception that is often associated with positivist historical consciousness holds that the historian should be an apolitical observer and that good history is that which can be shown to have not taken sides. This often seems to be regarded as "the common-sense view of history" (Carr, 1989:3-4). It is a misconception because this position is impossible and becomes simply a rhetorical trick to sell a particular point of view. As Hayden White puts it, there is an "irreducible ideological component in every historical account of reality" (1975:21). While the tradition holds that the historian has access to the "truth", many writers have argued convincingly that there are many truths; no one truth can be held up as the truest. Indeed, an analysis of a truth can reveal more about the person claiming it than the historical event itself.

Hayden White?s theories of historical narrative are very helpful in this analysis. White points out that history serves a poetic function in society rather than simply being the source of facts about the past. He postulates four principal modes of historical consciousness on the basis of the ideological intention which informs each of them: Metaphor, Synecdoche, Metonymy and Irony (metaphor is representational, synecdoche is integrative, metonymy is reductionist and irony is negational) (White, 1975:31-38). Each of these modes of consciousness serve as the basis of a linguistic protocol which is used to prefigure the historical field and provide strategies for interpretation.

The historian?s choice of narrative mode is largely an aesthetic one and White suggests this is the underlying poetic function of history. These narratives stem from the impulse in the historian to collect events into stories; to trace similarities between facts and imbue them with meaning. On the surface, Blue Murder seems to follow the conventions of a fictional tragedy. The main characters are brought to their downfalls by the very qualities which make them interesting. However, if we analyse it as a history, it is a good example of real events drawn together into a narrative cast in the ironic mode. It tells a story of Sydney?s past which superficially seems to celebrate some mythical characteristics of the audience?s community while bearing an underlying message of self-criticism. The main characters demonstrate many archetypal traits that the audience recognises from the historical discourse of what Benedict Anderson has called their "imagined community" (1991). This is any community large enough that a member could never come face to face with the majority of the other members. Applied to a historical representation presented to a TV audience this could lead to both broad and specific difference of interpretation within one community. Specifically, the discourse ethics of representing crime could vary from one part of Sydney to another (perhaps circumscribed by the rings left by a schooner glass on a tabloid paper, or a teacup on a broadsheet - either history being factual within the stain). However, on a broader level certain things can have a more unified appeal on a larger, national level.

Near the beginning of the film, as Ned is being released from Long Bay, he tells us in a voiceover that he had the dash to "go out and get his" while most of the other inmates in the prison were "shit men" who bludged on the dole and had no guts, no moral fibre. This is an appeal to Ward?s archetypal myth of Australian character, that is, male individualists with little respect for authority and enough courage and initiative to make it on their own in the world. Familiar with the myth through their consumption of media, the audience can identify with these traits and get the feeling that Ned is someone to be admired for his entrepreneurial spirit. The tragic part is that Ned applies his initiative and courage to selling heroin, armed robbery, pimping, drinking and fighting. This gives the audience the sense that if only Ned was not so misguided he could be a real asset to the community. It is ironic that these character strengths are also his weaknesses and lead to his final downfall. This mode of historical narrative ties the events together to form a story which ultimately carries the message, "crime doesn?t pay" accompanied by a sly, ironic wink that adds, "but we always had a good time".

We will now use an ironic historical consciousness to continue the story of our research pilgrimage?

We soon gave up on the thoroughly safe Star Hotel. The denizens were far too interested in the poker machines and TVs to present us with any distinct local character and even our Blue Murderesque banter had become boring. We decided to get some Chinese food. Chinese food is a recurring theme throughout Blue Murder andNeddy. It seems that whenever Rogerson and Smith got together for lunch it was at a Chinese restaurant. In one particular scene they are waiting for their meals to arrive while Ned is trying to convince the Dodger that he should help him beat some charges. The food is very slow in arriving and the ever dynamic Rogerson is impatient. "Christ I?m hungry", he says loudly, the sort of man who doesn?t need to wait quietly. We strode into BBQ King hoping for a similar scene.1 Kept waiting for our food, we would talk business loudly and bemoan the woeful service. It was not to be. We were served very quickly and then efficiently moved out as we finished to make way for more patrons. We tried a few Blue Murder quotes, started singing, "Hey diddle diddle", but there was no point. The regular BBQ King hubbub was too loud for us to hear ourselves and our hearts weren?t in it - the food was very nice and even if there had been anything to complain about we wouldn?t have had the dash. Were we shit-men?

After that we strolled down to The Rocks , headed for the oldest pub in Sydney, The Lord Nelson. Along the way, the changes the city had been through since the 1980s were very noticeable. The most obvious is the construction boom. Up and down Sussex Street and Kent Street there are road works and building sites in abundance. In the 1980s and the early 1990s (when the film was shot), almost every block had at least one giant hole, barricaded by the high white walls that permeate our older memories of the city. Another sign of the coming of the information age, green bans have been overturned and the green light has been given to property development.

We had an uneventful quick top-up in the empty Captain Cook and then entered the Nelson. This pub is mentioned quite often in Neddy as one of Smith?s favourite drinking spots. The Lord Nelson claims to be Sydney?s oldest pub and has been authentically refurbished to what it was like when it first opened its doors (www.lordnelson.com.au, cited 20.7.04). How this accounts for the giant television screens and the central heating we couldn?t work out, but they are a micro-brewery. Which means they produce their own "authentic" Sydney beer and sell it to you in pints. They embrace the Australian working class beer drinking tradition, which they themselves have been a big part of for Sydney workers for over 150 years, yet the cheapest pints cost at least seven dollars; they don?t have schooner glasses and, while they stock something called Quayle Ale, they don?t sell Tooheys New. The place was full of expensive suits and thirsty cultural researchers such as ourselves, low rent workers of the information age, could not afford to stay there for more than one drink. We?d run out of chat by then and our eyes couldn?t help being turned upwards by the TVs. Rugby Union instead of Rugby League. We tried to imagine a Neddy-style fight breaking out here: sweeping aside the life-sized cardboard Bundy Bear we?d grab an inflatable baseball bat from the Bacardi Cruiser promotions girl and lay into the accountants who?d come in with their top buttons fastened and ties unloosened. But there was too many of them so we backed down. And the atmosphere wasn?t right; by embracing the cultural mythos of Australia, the Lord Nelson has become "unAustralian". We didn?t know how long this had been happening here; some reports say since the mid 1970s and the factories were gone before then. Now there are fetta and olives where a packet of "salt and vinegar" would have done. An ironic tragedy.

This is a path that a lot of city pubs have gone down while Sydney has become an increasingly post-industrialised node of the information society. They give the appearance of embracing the discourse of the historic Sydney while actually focusing on a completely different clientele and raison d?être. In The Rise of the Network Society, Castells (2001:28-69) describes an information technology revolution that took place between the mid 1970s and the late 1990s (a timeframe which roughly coincides with Neddy Smith?s rise and fall as an icon of the near weightless economy of heroin). Similar to the two industrial revolutions (steam then electricity) its effects were pervasive. The invention and maturity of technological systems and methods of production based solely on information transference led to changes at every level of society, from work to family life to government to globalisation to crime and organised crime. Capitalism has undergone massive restructuring, financial markets have become global, information systems have redefined the third world and created the information poor, while, at the same time, the relationship between women and the workforce has changed the nature of the family and sexuality. The media has become more personalised and politics has become more mediated. The gap between the rich and poor is widening and whatever was in between is vanishing. Even vice is no longer what it was; you can catch a government bus to the casino, prostitutes pay tax and you can get a drink anywhere on Easter Sunday.

Life has changed to the extent that "in such a world of uncontrolled, confusing change, people tend to regroup around primary identities: religious, ethnic, territorial, national" (ibid.:3). Social meaning and the formation of identity has fragmented to the extent that it is has been reduced to the desire to find a map. People can no longer find meaning in the places where it has traditionally been: the mainstream church, work, unions etc. In the network society, "identity is always an open, complex, unfinished game? it always moved into the future through a symbolic detour through the past" (Hall, 1999:43). As Foucault put it, "a certain fragility has been discovered in the bedrock of existence" and we are seeing "an insurrection of subjugated knowledges" (1984:201). The audience for Blue Murder lives in this post-industrial information society and, because traditional conceptions of historical truth have been subtly undermined as much as other touchstones of identity, construction of its identity could be influenced by the portrayal of events in the film.

Our next port of call was a place that does not appear in Blue Murder or Neddy, the Triple Ace Bar on Elizabeth Street in Surry Hills. Why? Because we had heard a rumour that Roger Rogerson still drinks there. But instead of bloody noses, spilt beer and scattered teeth, some young Japanese backpackers were playing drinking games.

Despite what has already been written here, we do not feel some romantic longing for the return of pub culture of the 1980s. An article appeared in "The Heckler" section of The Sydney Morning Herald (April 10, 2002), bemoaning the atmosphere and décor of the current white collar pub (or worse, the McDonaldized Irish chain pub), longing for the old days and concluding that " given a choice of drinking buddies I'd take Neddy Smith over the Corrs any day". We are not of the same opinion. The last person we would like to meet in a pub is a drug dealing, murderer who would beat you senseless if you looked at him the wrong way. But the chance to see the real, ?unrepresentational? as it were, Rogerson in the flesh would give us the final link in the theoretical hand-cuffs. To the viewing audience Rogerson is Roxborough, a man who cries when he reminisces about the show-down between Ray Kelly, a NSW police force legend, and Chow Hayes, an uber-criminal of earlier times. We wanted to know how the style of discourse which shaped Blue Murder has affected the man himself.

Sadly, he wasn?t there. The place is more TAB than pub and beige tiles predominate. The bistro was closed, though the restaurant upstairs looked interesting; hard to find anything else to say about the place. If he does drink there we couldn?t see the attraction. In fact, this was becoming central to our conversation. Apparently we are what writers such as Charles Leadbetter have called, "knowledge workers" (1999:1-2). That is, educated people with ideas who can work from anywhere, any time as long as they have a computer. Certainly, we?re the information rich, the only problem being that this hasn?t translated into the associated capital promised by Castells, Leadbetter and others. Is it just us who feel left out of the Sydney pub scene; who don?t feel at home in either the poker machine dominated, TAB bars or the boutique, chrome lined micro-breweries?

Manning Clark wrote that, by the 1980s:

all that seemed to survive was the idea of Australia as a place of "uncommonly large profit". History has blurred the vision of Eden, allowing Mammon to infest the land. A turbulent emptiness seized the people as they moved into a post-Christian, post-Enlightenment era. No one any longer knew the direction of the river of life. No one had anything to say?. (1987:500)

As mentioned earlier, the traditional areas of identification don?t hold as much sway as they used to and people have to look for new icons to cling to. Perhaps this is where Neddy and Rogerson fit in. Iconic 1980s men Rogerson, Mark "Chopper" Read and Warwick Capper do speaking tours at pubs around Australia that are equally popular at the Bridge Hotel in Balmain and Rooty Hill RSL. If the gaps between social strata are becoming bigger then Rogerson, Neddy and other elements from Sydney?s past could be some sort of common denominator. After all, Blue Murder was made with an audience in mind. Even though it was broadcast on a non-commercial station it still had to speak to a public. This effects the style of the discourse behind the relating of its tale. Its narrative potentially shapes to some degree the way the audience constructs its sense of community identity. This in turn has an influence on the way Sydney represents itself in the present and in what it is becoming. There are already cricket clubs from other states that plan their end of season trips around visiting pubs featured in Blue Murder. How long before the gangster chic becomes "the Blue Murder Theme Pub � ", perhaps staffed by the rogues? gallery of Australian actors who bought the characters to life?

The last pub on the official research crawl was the Random Bar . Before it was the Random Bar it was the Brendan Behan Hotel and before that, the Britannia. It was outside the Britannia, on the corner of Dangar Place and Abercrombie Street, where Roger Rogerson allegedly shot and killed Warren Lanfranchi. We walked up Dangar Place to see what it was like. In the 1980s it was an alley between disused factories, deserted relics of a blue collar past. In our imaginations an industrial wilderness, deserted as the gangsters face off and a plastic bag blows across the scene. Now it?s an alley between apartment buildings with washing hanging from balcony railings.

Inside, the Random Bar looks like a fading B movie actress, a decade or two post-prime, who has had one too many naïve facelifts. It?s going for a techno chic with its unbearably loud DJ and giant, anatomically correct statue of a lion. But, again, it wasn?t us and it definitely didn?t seem very Rogerson. Unlike the lion, he wasn?t all show - he had what it took. We tried to discuss issues of vital importance to our research ? is the only unAustralian crime disorganised crime? Would criminals like Neddy Smith, so hands on in his love of armed robbery, bother with it all today in an age of ATMs and credit cards? Has the information age?s electronic funds transaction dried up the loose cash he used to gain so much pleasure from violently stealing? Even his heroin trade would have taken a slide in popularity as party drugs took over. Where would we go to kick on? Where should we go to lose the ambivalence this mission had created in us? Were we shit-men or just alienated by an overly commercial pub scene?

We stumbled down to the Lansdowne as our last port of call. Assaulted by a wall of industrial metal as we entered, we climbed the staircase to relative quiet. A few chairs perched on the landing at the top of the stairs next to a baby grand. We sat down to catch our breath. Andrew opened the lid on the piano and found the thing was roughly in tune. We knew he could play so we demanded he do so to soothe our disturbed psyches. He played for about ten minutes ? sparse, bluesy improvisation, capturing our mood perfectly. Then he paused for a moment and applause came from round the corner where the bar was, followed shortly by the bartender. "Thank you, that was beautiful" she said, "but you?ll have to go downstairs, we?re closing up here."

The way we represent the past, the style of discourse we use, inevitably becomes the way we look at the present. As Auerbach put it, "a change in our manner of viewing history will of necessity soon be transferred to our manner of viewing current conditions" (1991:443). As Nietzsche points out, humans are not a fixed form; they change constantly with the times because "there are no eternal facts, nor are there any absolute truths" (1994:15). As subjugated histories gain influence the power of mainstream history becomes fragmented and leaves a space for changes in the way we represent the past. Films like Blue Murder can therefore change the way we view the present. While it is a representation of Sydney that clearly reinforces traditional, "universal" Western moral norms, the audience can now only receive these messages with a sense of self-critical irony. Consequently, the only element of this film that actually has an effect on the present self-awareness of Sydney is its narrative mode. Present representations of the identity of Sydney?s "imagined community", effected by the film, become ironic and self-critical and, as a result, the pubs (and perhaps social areas in general, whether physical or virtual) become increasingly detached from any actual use value. They are more preoccupied with selling an image than creating a comfortable social space for people to consume alcohol. That is, alienation takes place. And this was the point our discussion reached at the Random Bar: how can you have alienation in an information society characterised by fragmentation where there is no unified subject? But we were too drunk by then to figure it out.

Acknowledgements

- The authors would like to thank Andrew Keese for his ideas, encouragement, piano playing and rounds at the bar and Amaya for giving us a lift home.

References

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Hall, S. (1999) ?Culture, Community, Nation? in Boswell, D. & J. Evans (eds) Representing the Nation: A Reader, Routledge: London

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Leadbetter, C. (1999) Living on Thin Air: The New Economy, Penguin: London

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Nietzsche, F. (1994) Human, All Too Human, Penguin: London

Smith, A. S. (2002) Neddy, with Tom Noble, Noble House Enterprises: Victoria

Stehr, N. (2004) "The Economic Structure of Knowledge Societies" in The Information Society Reader, Webster, F. (ed), Routledge: London

The Heckler, (2002) "The Pub With No Cheer", The Sydney Morning Herald, April 10, 2002

Ward, R. (1965) The Australian Legend, Oxford University Press: Melbourne

White, H. (1975) Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe, Johns Hopkins University Press: Baltimore, Maryland

1 BBQ King itself was recently associated with the new crime of the 21 st century. Its co-owner was kidnapped by two Chinese nationals seeking a ransom from the other respected and successful owners.

http://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/C498098?mainTabTemplate=workFilmDetails

PRODUCERS:

Rod Allan (Producer) 
Errol Sullivan (Executive Producer) 
Penny Chapman (Executive Producer) 
Wayne Barry (Associate Producer) 

PRODUCTION COMPANIES:

Southern Star Entertainment 
Australian Broadcasting Corporation 

FINANCE ORGANISATIONS:

Australian Film Finance Corporation 

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY:

Martin McGrath 

EDITORS:

Bill Russo 

PRODUCTION DESIGNERS:

Murray Picknett 

COMPOSER:

Peter Best 

CAST:

Richard Roxburgh (Roger Rogerson), Tony Martin (Arthur 'Neddy' Smith), Steve Bastoni (Michael Drury), Gary Day (Bill Crofton), Steve Jacobs (Mal Rivers), Peter Phelps (Abo Henry), Marcus Graham (Alan Williams), Alex Dimitriades (Warren Lanfranchi), Bill Hunter (Angus McDonald), Gary Sweet (Christopher Dale Flannery), John Hargreaves (Chester Porter QC), Ian Bliss (Bobby Chapman), Stephen Eley (Duty Sergeant), Richard Carter (Lyail Chandler), Joy Smithers (Debra Smith), Eleni Batley (Jaime Smith), Dion Mihajlovsky (Darrin Smith), Bruce Barry (Commissioner Abbott), Bogdan Koca (Lewis Roussos), Loene Carmen (Sallie-Anne Huckstepp), Ray Martin (Himself), Anthony Cogin (Steve Paully), Phillip Hinton (Ian Barker QC), Nicole Pottinger (Melinda Rogerson), Brigitte Lawson (Gillian Rogerson), Kris Bidenko (Joy Rogerson), Jim Holt (Brian Alexander), Jeffrey Rhoe, Jack Mayers, John Jarratt, Graham Rouse, Laurie Foel, Robert Morgan, Frank Violi, Peter Sommerfeld, Brendan Higgins, Tom Appleton, David Baldwin, Warwick Moss, Paul Sonkkila, Terrie Bowie, Skye Wansey, Aaron Jeffery, Marshall Napier, Erin Smith, Jake Blundell, John McNeill, Vincent Ball, Michael O'Neill, John Sheerin, Stephen O'Rourke, Geoff Morrell, Kristoffer Greaves, Sascha Huckstepp, Stephen Leeder, Ron Graham, Les Dayman, John Walton, Dennis Miller, Bryan Marshall, Neil Moora, Mervyn Drake, Barry Donnelly, Ricky Noble, Damian Monk, David Franklin, Ken Radley. 

RELEASE DATES:

1. Episode one aired in Australia on ABC Television on 14 September 1995, with episode two airing on 21 September, except for NSW (see note below). The mini-series also aired in Croatia (27 December 1997) and Portugal (28 April 1999). 
2. Released on videocassette and DVD formats in 2000 by REEL Corporation. 

LOCATION:

Filmed largely on location in Sydney. 

AWARDS:

Australian Film Institute (AFI) Awards (1996) Best Television Mini Series or Telefeature - Rod Allan (winner) 
Logie Awards (1996) Most Outstanding Achievement in Drama Production (winner) 
Logie Awards (1996) Silver Logie, Most Outstanding Actor - Richard Roxburgh (winner) 
Logie Awards (1996) Silver Logie, Most Popular Actor - Gary Sweet (nomination) 

NOTES:

1. Also known as Corrupção E Morte (Portugal). 
2. Due to elements of the story being seen as prejudicial to legal trials in NSW and Federal Courts, the series was unable to be broadcast in New South Wales or to be distributed on video until 2000. It was eventually allowed to be broadcast when the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) decided to drop charges against Neddy Smith over a 1983 murder. 

 

The Mickelburg brothers win after 20 year legal battle

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=248182

 

This one has everything 

The almost perfect crime
The frame up by the cops
The 20 year fight for justice
Ray Mickelberg the ex SAS soldier
Brian Mickelberg's conviction being overturned after nine months and his death an aircraft crash. 
The suicide of one of the crooked cops
The death by bombing at the hands of bikies of the crooked cops superior, Don Hancock who is alleged to have shot a bikie
The vindication of an author who had to fight off the cops attempts to suppress the story. http://www.bookscope.com.au/index.htm
The conviction of other members of the family for fraud
The continuing questions.

And then there is the mystery of the gold itself.

Can’t wait for Harry M Miller to get the movie up.


"Ray and Peter's latest appeal centred largely on the June 2002 admission by former detective Tony Lewandowski that he and his superior, Don Hancock, had framed all three brothers.

Mr Lewandowksi, who was found dead at his Perth home six weeks ago and who is believed to have killed himself, confessed notes of interviews had been fabricated, perjured evidence tendered and a beating handed out to Peter by Mr Hancock.

"In these circumstances, and given my conclusion that the fresh evidence now available plainly casts doubt upon the police evidence of admissions made it seems to me, once again, that there is a substantial possibility that the jury reached its verdict in reliance upon false evidence and was consequently misled in the manner in which it reached its conclusion," Justice Steytler wrote in his judgement.

Outside court, lawyer for Ray Mickelberg, Malcolm McCusker QC, said he was "delighted" the appeal was successful and that the Mickelbergs' fight was now over.

"I feel elated that at last the justice system has done the right thing," Mr McCusker told reporters.

He described it as "an excellent day for WA justice" but said it should have come sooner.

Attorney General Jim McGinty said while the split judgement suggested controversy surrounding the case would continue, he was confident "justice has been done".

"I think in the light of Lewandowski's confession that today's judgement in the Court of Criminal Appeal was the appropriate judgement," he said.

He said the government would consider any application for compensation the Mickelbergs might lodge, but that no such application was expected while a separate Mickelberg action alleging malicious prosecution remained before the courts.

The case indicated "a failing on the part of the police and the law enforcement process of this state", Mr McGinty said.

But the WA Police Service was not taking a backward step.

A disappointed Assistant Police Commissioner Mel Hay said, "There is an abundance of evidence to suggest and point the finger in their direction so that evidence is still there, that hasn't been expunged or taken away in any way.

"It still exists today and one can't ignore it."

Author Avon Lovell – who extracted Mr Lewandowski's confession – also admitted to being disappointed, but for entirely different reasons.

"I think that it is such an appalling thing that it has taken 22 years for justice to happen, but in an odd way it's not justice," Mr Lovell said.

"The justice system has absolutely failed. It hasn't worked. It's only come to this decision because it's been flogged, pushed and prodded with spears."

Attempts to contact the Mickelbergs today proved unsuccessful, after the brothers enlisted the assistance of agent to the stars, Harry M Miller.

When asked why the brothers were not present to witness the end of their fight, Mr McCusker said, "They didn't come down. They were very apprehensive about the outcome after this long wait". 
http://www.news.com.au/common/story_...5E1702,00.html

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au...5E1702,00.html

 

Wrong side of the law

Date- March 4, 2012

A notorious miscarriage of justice marked the beginning of trial by TV, writes Michael Idato.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/wrong-side-of-the-law-20120302-1u6kj.html#ixzz2YduoVnK2

 

v

The Great Mint Swindle

An entertaining telemovie about Australia’s most famous unsolved gold heist.

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LINDY CHAMBERLAIN, Gordon Wood, Gabe Watson … to measure the way television has changed our perception of crime, look no further than the way coverage of high-profile trials fuels backyard barbecue debates over people's innocence or guilt.

In 1982, however, a television trial was a very new thing. And the arrest and conviction of three brothers - Ray, Peter and Brian Mickelberg - for robbing the Perth Mint was one of the first crimes catapulted by television from the crime pages of the newspaper into people's living rooms.

''The police allowed, for the first time, television cameras into the raid and they filmed the police ripping up floorboards, so it brought the crime into people's homes,'' says Paul Bennett, a producer of The Great Mint Swindle, which airs this week.

The Great Mint Swindle " src="http://images.smh.com.au/2012/03/01/3085885/art-613177757-420x0.jpg"

Cast of The Great Mint Swindle

The crime was the theft of 49 gold bars and the enduring TV image was the discovery of gold under the Mickelbergs' floorboards. The gold was legal and the Mickelbergs had receipts to prove it but, Bennett says, ''those television images are powerful - people see it on television and they ask, why would you have gold under the floorboards?''

Advertisement

The Mickelbergs were tried and found guilty, sentenced to 20 (Ray), 16 (Peter) and 12 years' jail (Brian). What makes the case so compelling is that in 2004 all three convictions were finally quashed - a twist given particular resonance in 2012 given the recent acquittals for Gordon Wood and Gabe Watson and the fourth inquest into the death of Azaria Chamberlain.

''It's a huge story in the West Australian psyche,'' co-producer Russell Vines says. ''But it's also a poisoned chalice, because it's fraught with intrigue, politics and legal issues. Until the case was settled it was simply impossible to tell the story.''

That didn't stop the Ten Network producing a telemovie in 1984, The Great Gold Swindle. It presumed the brothers' guilt and was caught up in the first of seven appeals by the brothers, not airing until 1986.

The genesis of Nine's telemovie, however, was an earlier Cordell Jigsaw biographical series, The Two of Us. Vines suggested Ray and Peter Mickelberg as subjects and then, he says, ''almost immediately regretted it'' given the difficulty of covering a 20-year saga in 30 minutes of television. It did, however, lead to ''the big drama that we have now done''.

Written by Perth playwright Reg Cribb, the $3 million telemovie tells the story from the perspective of youngest brother Peter (Todd Lasance), who serves as narrator. It stars Grant Bowler as eldest brother Ray, Josh Quong Tart as Brian and Shane Bourne as detective Don Hancock, who framed the brothers for the theft. It was filmed over seven weeks last year at Fremantle Prison, the Perth Mint and other locations connected to the story.

Bowler describes the story as a great mystery. ''To this day nobody knows where that gold is,'' he says. ''But it's also a human story, because the family are so tight.''

Bowler was also struck by what he felt were distinctly Australian qualities in the story. ''It's one of those great Australian stories about getting shafted, which all the way from Breaker Morant, is something we pay attention to,'' he says. ''Ned Kelly, who is considered an icon, was also a lunatic who tried to blow up a train, Chopper [Read] becomes a star here. Criminals [in Australia] tend to be either very, very quiet, or there is some quality in them we use to redeem them.''

In the case of the Mickelbergs, the only crime they were ultimately guilty of was the so-called Yellow Rose of Texas case, in which a manufactured gold nugget was fraudulently sold to Alan Bond for more than twice its value in 1980. ''My Australian DNA goes, 'that's awesome','' Bowler says. ''We all love that - that's the little guy getting the big guy.''

Vines agrees: ''What people love about the Mickelbergs is that they took on the establishment and in particular an establishment that couldn't admit its mistakes.''

Quong Tart spent time before the production researching archival footage from the case. He and his two co-stars also met with the two surviving brothers, Ray and Peter.

''Looking at the archival footage, I was struck by the very strong emotions,'' he says. ''There was anger but there was also an inquisitive determination to unlock the truth. And that has stayed with them to this day. If you're guilty, once you're out of jail that fight ends. For these guys it became a daily obsession.''

Vines says the case has particular resonance in Perth, which has an uneasy relationship with its judiciary. ''It starts before the Mickelbergs, with people like [Darryl] Beamish and [John] Button.'' They were wrongly convicted of murder in 1961 and '63 respectively and exonerated 44 and 39 years later. More recent cases include teenager Patrick Wearing, accused of rape and jailed in 2006 for almost a year awaiting trial before being proved innocent, and Andrew Mallard, wrongfully convicted of murder in 1995 but not exonerated until 2007.

''There is significant concern in this state about judiciary. If you can't trust the system, what can you trust?'' Vines says.

Lasance says the community's unwillingness to accept the innocence of the Mickelbergs taps into our fear that the framework intended to uphold law and civilised values can fail us. ''Look at the scenario: three people stitched up for something they did not do, eight years of their lives literally stolen in what were almost the worst conditions you could imagine, then losing their brother, splitting up three relationships, a family unit, kids, wives. This is the destruction of a family,'' he says.

''If the police are capable of fabricating a scenario where that's possible, it's a natural reaction to place guilt on the Mickelbergs because the other alternative - that the system could fail them - is a far worse scenario.''

And that, Bennett says, is the pivot on which the story sits. ''This could happen to you,'' he says. ''Ultimately people want to believe the system is strong and works and is on your side but stories like this make you doubt the system and when you do that the fabric of everything starts to fall apart.''

What's the buzz?

What was the ''Perth Mint Swindle''?

 

In 1982 the Perth Mint was tricked into exchanging 49 gold bars for stolen cheques. The gold, weighing 68 kilograms and valued at $653,000 (about $2 million today), was delivered to Jandakot Airport where it disappeared.

When were the Mickelbergs exonerated?

 

In 2002, during a royal commission into police corruption, retired police officer Tony Lewandowski admitted fabricating evidence to frame the brothers. By default his testimony implicated detective Don Hancock, who had died a year earlier. Lewandowski was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice (charges later dropped) and committed suicide in 2004.

Did the WA police apologise to the Mickelbergs?

 

In 2004, after seven appeals, Ray and Peter's convictions were quashed (Brian, who was killed in a light plane crash in 1986, had his conviction quashed in 1985). Assistant police commissioner Mel Hay challenged that ruling, prompting the brothers to sue for defamation. In 2007 that case was settled and the WA police issued an apology to the Mickelbergs for their wrongful conviction and jailing.

 

The Great Mint Swindle

Nine, Sunday, March 11, 8.30pm.

Preview, p25.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/wrong-side-of-the-law-20120302-1u6kj.html#ixzz2YduycL8x

 

 

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/wrong-side-of-the-law-20120302-1u6kj.html

 

 

Mickelberg brothers win appeal

July 2, 2004

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/02/1088488134579.html?from=storylhs

After more than 20 years of maintaining their innocence, the brothers convicted of the infamous Perth Mint swindle today had their convictions overturned.

Ray and Peter Mickleberg's eighth appeal against their conviction for the 1982 theft of $653,000 in gold bullion from the mint was today upheld in the West Australian Supreme Court of Criminal Appeal.

In a 2-1 split decision, Chief Justice David Malcolm and Justice Christopher Steytler agreed the conviction should be quashed and no retrial ordered.

Justice Michael Murray disagreed, saying the appeal should be dismissed on the grounds that no miscarriage of justice had occurred.

Ray Mickelberg served eight years of a 20-year sentence for the swindle, while Peter served six years of a 14-year term.

The third Mickelberg brother, Brian, whose conviction was overturned after nine months behind bars, died in a light aircraft crash in 1986.

The latest appeal centred around self-confessed crooked detective Tony Lewandowski, who admitted in June 2002 that he and another detective, former Perth chief of detectives Don Hancock, had framed the three Mickelbergs.

The court had been deliberating the appeal since mid-December.

Earlier this week, Ray Mickelberg said that if the outcome did not go their way, they would appeal to the High Court.

- AAP

 

 

 

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I would have thought was not the right person to do the job considering his very close connections with Hancock was an ex head of the CIB himself I thought it was a very poor choice Peter Mickelberg The Mickelberg brothers say the refusal of the police service to apologise for its part in their conviction for the Perth Mint Swindle sets a very bad example to younger [ Peter Mick m912017 jpg - www.abc.net.au ]

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PETER DOCKER: I am compelled in the same way that, you know, West Australians ... HARRIS: When writer Peter Docker was approached by the Mickelberg brothers to ... [ Stateline Western Australia - www.abc.net.au ]

I would have thought was not the right person to do the job considering his very close connections with Hancock was an ex head of the CIB himself I thought it was a very poor choice Peter Mickelberg The Mickelberg brothers say the refusal of the police service to apologise for its part in their conviction for the Perth Mint Swindle sets a very bad example to younger [ Peter Mick m912017 jpg - www.abc.net.au ]

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Freeview digital TV, more channels for free. Why pay for TV when you can get a better picture and more choice with Freeview? [ Freeview – digital television – TV Guide - freeview.com.au ]

After this book was published, I was approached by Ray and Peter Mickelberg, who want ... Peter Fonda said of his 1969 cult classic movie. Easy Rider – " This ... [ BOOK CLUB NOTES - www.fremantlepress.com.au ]

INTERVIEW: Author Peter Docker discusses Someone Else's Country and his Mickelberg play. 10th March 2009 ... Else's Country was published, I was approached by Ray and Peter ... [ Fremantle Press : News / INTERVIEW: Author Peter Docker ... -www.fremantlepress.com.au ]

Ray, Peter and the late Brian Mickelberg were convicted in 1983 after ... Jim McGinty today said Ray and Peter Mickelberg, who respectively served eight and six ... [ $1m payout leaves no one satisfied Gold Coast Top Story ... - www.goldcoast.com.au ]

Extracts from Ray Mickelberg's police file will then be taken to ... Mickelberg supporters had further good news earlier this year when defamation ... [ Mickelberg evidence to be tested | Green Left Weekly - www.greenleft.org.au ]

By Peter Boyle MELBOURNE — Victoria's Kirner Labor government could ... which helped to convict Ray and Peter Mickelberg of the 1982 Perth Mint swindle were ... [ Australian news | Green Left Weekly - www.greenleft.org.au ]

Sponsored Tip - InstantCheckmate.com

Check to see if Peter Mickelberg has been arrested! Have you?

In 1992, Professor Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld, the lawyer who won Earl ... said the use of fabricated evidence to convict Ray and Peter Mickelberg for the 1982 Perth ... [ DNA and the justice game - Griffith REVIEW - www.griffithreview.com ]

Mickelberg and his brothers Peter and Brian were framed by police and ... The convictions of Raymond and Peter Mickelberg were quashed in 2004 after they served ... [ Man to pay $379 after $16 Bunnings theft | Herald Sun - www.heraldsun.com.au ]

Hills of Rest Memorial Park in Sioux Falls, SD is a peaceful and reverent place for many families who have chosen this cemetery as the final resting place for their ... [ hillsofrest.com - www.hillsofrest.com ]

Tony Rickards, Actor: Castaway. ... Peter Pearce. – Conflict of Interest (2003) ... Peter Pearce. 1994-2003 Blue Heelers (TV series) Compo Hayes / Comp Hayes / Reg Taggerty ... [ Tony Rickards - IMDb - www.imdb.com ]

Directed by John Power. With John Hargreaves, Steve Jodrell, Tony Rickards, Paul Conti. ... Peggy Mickelberg. Will Day. MalcolmMickelberg. Elaine Baillie. Faye Mickelberg. Rochelle ... [ The Great Gold Swindle (TV 1984) - IMDb - www.imdb.com ]

 

 

Mickelberg movie so wrong: widow

A scene from The Great Mint Swindle.

Which is exactly what happened when the real Mickelberg, who just happened to be enjoying a stroll around the leafy suburb of Applecross while the cast and crew of Nine's new telemovie The Great Mint Swindle were filming the harrowing scene that is seared into the minds of most West Australians, according to producer Russell Vines.

The infamous car explosion, which killed retired Detective Sergeant Don Hancock on a quiet Lathlain Street in 2001, opens the made-for-television movie.

"To understand the full story we have to go back 20 years," a voice says before we cut to the early 1980s.

The golden age of Western Australian, before the fly-in, fly-out acronym FIFO was thought up in some noughties newsroom, where Bondy was king and corruption was as widespread as bad perms, aviator sunglasses and super-charged Toranas.

"The bellies in WA were as big as the bank accounts. Greed was God," the narrator Peter Mickelberg, played by Todd Lasance, says as a faceless and shirtless rotund man (presumably Alan Bond) wanders around his palatial Western suburbs mansion.

The story is based on the three Mickelberg brothers, Ray (played by Grant Bowler) Peter and the late Brian (Josh Quong Tart) and their infamous PR stunt - a manufactured, backyard gold nugget called the Yellow Rose of Texas which they claimed to have discovered while prospecting.

All is peachy for the brothers after Bond buys the find which was made in Ray's back shed, as the soundtrack featuring Midnight Oil and The Strangeloves pepper images of beach barbecues and a loving family unit, until 62 kilograms of gold, worth an estimated $2 million today, is swindled out of the Perth Mint in 1982 when it was "leaking like a sieve."

Sergeant Hancock, played by Shane Bourne, answers the "embarrassing call from higher up than the minister" to restore the tainted image of the lawless wild west.

Like a bloodhound, Hancock and his henchman Tony Lewandowski (played by John Batchelor), pursue Ray, Peter and Brian as the prime suspects for the heist.

After being jailed in 1983 to serve sentences ranging from 12 to 20 years, the brothers begin their 22-year battle to prove their innocence.

Some brief - yet cheeky - references to Bond, WA Inc and The America's Cup are thrown in which adds some comedic relief before Ray loses his finger in a jail yard fight and Brian dies in a plane crash.

"Bond wants to buy the Yellow Rose of Texas," Ray tells his brothers.

"Who? James Bond?" Peter replies.

Brain's response to an offer to go prospecting for gold, echoes the sentiments of many Perth workers even today, "Nah, I'd rather go to Bali," he says - without the Sh** Perth People Say hashtag.

Classic moments which have been fished out of the network's archives, including Richard Carlton's 60 Minutes expose into the glaring holes in the Mickelberg's case and a rather terse interview with sergeant Hancock, are synced to perfection.

The Great Mint Swindle, with its cast of relative yet talented unknowns is what Underbelly was before Matt Newton was cast – an interesting story told by actors who invested themselves into every angle, shot and syllable of an earnest script.

The Great Mint Swindle is coming soon to Nine.

Whistle

Friday 3^rd November 1989

Newsletter for WhistleBlowers Association

PO Box U129, Wollongong NSW 2500

Unstitching the Mickelbergs
On June 11, one of the lead news stories was that a WA police officer had admitted to helping frame Brian, Ray and Peter Mickelberg for swindling gold from the Perth Mint nearly 20 years previously.
What was not mentioned in the initial news story was the role of defamation law in preventing discussion of the issue. In 1983, Avon Lovell (now WBA Vice-President) wrote a book, The Mickelberg Stitch, providing evidence of a police frame-up. It was
selling like hotcakes until defamation actions were launched by the WA police against the author, publisher and booksellers. These cases proceeded for years, funded by a levy on the salaries of police officers. In this way, defamation law helped to cover up corrupt
behaviour. — Brian Martin

Paige Goodsell courageously spoke out about sexually abusive initiation rites at the North Burleigh Surf Life Saving Club in Queensland, leading to an inquiry and suspensions.

Workers suffer for whistle-blowing
Transcript from ABC 7.30 Report, 25 March 2002

MAN: We've been treated like criminals for doing the right thing.

NORM BREW: It was a nightmare. You were under constant threat of
being harassed, abused even if you did the right thing.

PETER CAVE: Norm Brew has six young children. His colleague Lindsay Woods has a pregnant wife and a baby daughter. Both had a lot to lose in reporting what was going on in an anonymous office at the end of platform three at Wyong station on the NSW Central Coast.
A year ago, while working as revenue enforcement officers for State
Rail, they blew the whistle on what they claim was a culture of bullying,
harassment and illegality by some of their workmates who were jokingly
known as the ‘marines.’

NORM BREW: We were told the night that we finished at Goulburn Academy by two senior managers that we were going into a unit that did things their way, not the railway’s.
They took no prisoners and they got the job done no matter what they had
to do.

LINDSAY WOODS: They were breaking the law, false imprisonment
of passengers, harassment of other staff. They had illegal databases with tens of thousands of names on it.

PETER CAVE: Revenue protection officers are not special constables.
They’re told during their training about the limits on their power. What are you
supposed to do when you stop someone who hasn't got a ticket?

NORM BREW: Firstly you will ask them for identification. If they
want to give you the identification they give it to you. We haven't got the right or the law behind us to demand identification.

PETER CAVE: What were you
asked to do at Wyong on a daily basis?
NORM BREW: Demand identifi-
cation.
PETER CAVE: What if you didn’t
get it?
NORM BREW: Arrest the person
and have the police called and hold the
person until the police arrived.
PETER CAVE: Woods and Brew
claim that they and their colleagues
were ordered to demand identification
such as tax file numbers and Medicare
and pension card details in contraven-
tion of Federal law. That information
was meticulously collated, along with
the names and addresses of people
suspected, but not convicted, of fare
evasion and then entered into a
computer database.
LINDSAY WOODS: We
complained of it to management on
March 1. Approximately three months
later, staff at Wyong were still putting
data into the database.

CHRIS PUPLICK, NSW PRIVACY COMMISSION: This was drawn to the attention of Privacy NSW. We raised it with State Rail immediately.

PETER CAVE: Chris Puplick is the NSW privacy commissioner. He became involved in the case after receiving a complaint.

 CHRIS PUPLICK: Clearly there are copies of this material around.
What I want to know now is what is State Rail doing in relation to the people who have committed this
outrage? And secondly, what steps are they putting in place to ensure that nothing like this happens again?

 PETER CAVE: What action was taken against those who compiled the
database?
MICHAEL GLEESON, NSW
STATE RAIL AUTHORITY: I think it
needs to be understood what their
motivations may have been. Now I'm
of the view, and I think CityRail is of
the view, that in good faith they
believed they were trying to keep track
of those people who were serial fare
evaders.
PETER CAVE: So the message to
CityRail employees is you can break
state and Federal laws and not be
punished?
MICHAEL GLEESON: No, the message is we will not tolerate such things and if found, we will have them destroyed and counsel people as to
what they should do in the future.

PETER CAVE: The database at Wyong was wiped from the computers,
but so far no charges have been laid.
What do you believe should have happened to the people who collected the information?

CHRIS PUPLICK: I think they should have been summarily dismissed. I don’t think there is any place in a government organisation for
people who go around improperly collecting information, compiling databases on people, copying those databases, presumably spreading them around the place, gossiping about them.

PETER CAVE: The two men that Woods and Brew accused are appealing against disciplinary measures imposed for relatively minor breaches of State Rail rules, but for the whistle- blowers, the repercussions have been devastating. Some of their colleagues refused to work with them and State Rail transferred them, saying it was for their own welfare.

LINDSAY WOODS [reading]: It was not a part of, or as a result, of State Rail forming a view about the complaint.

PETER CAVE: They refused toaccept that transfer and they’re now living on welfare benefits, engaged in a paper war seeking compensation and reinstatement at Wyong.

LINDSAY WOODS: We reported corruption on March 1. We didn’t hear anything for approximately seven months. Basically the first thing we heard in seven months was we're under investigation. “You’re transferred.” We asked why we were under
investigation and they said that an illegal petition had gone in, signed by others at the Wyong depot. We wrote in a response to that. They then wrote back two weeks later, saying that we weren’t transferred under investigation, we were
actually transferred because of safetyreasons.

MICHAEL GLEESON: It is myview that we believed that there was an occupational health and safety issue there. Everyone wants to work in a harmonious workplace and at that stage, it was not a harmonious work- place.
It was potentially volatile and so as we could keep a team in place to catch the crooks who are cheating the system, Mr Woods and Mr Brew were moved temporarily and since then have been offered a position in our elite squad.

PETER CAVE: They were moved because they were troublemakers?

MICHAEL GLEESON: No, that’s an unreasonable representation. Mr Woods and Brew were moved aside temporarily while an investigation took place. Two people have subsequently been demoted.
We then attempted, from Novem- ber 1 to February 7, to have a meeting with Mr Woods and Mr Brew to try and work out what they would like to take place. They would not come into a meeting. On February 7 they were
offered a position with our elite squad. They have knocked that back.
PETER CAVE: Why didn’t you take the job they offered you?

LINDSAY WOODS: The job they offered us — the majority of it was back shift and night shift down in the city.

NORM BREW: The job was 12 months. When asked what happened after the 12 months, they just said flatly, “We don’t know.”

PETER CAVE: Does CityRail agree there was something rotten going on?

MICHAEL GLEESON: There is no question that the Wyong situation was one that couldn’t continue. Now, there is a new manager in place there. There is a new head of security, generally, in CityRail and we are working very carefully with both the
unions and with the personnel in Wyong to try and sort the area out.

PETER CAVE: That’s scant comfort for Woods and Brew, off work now for five months and convinced that they, and not the wrongdoers, are being punished.

NORM BREW: If I had of known it was going to be like this, I probably would have had second or third thoughts, I wouldn’t have done it. But it had to be done because people need to know.

MICHAEL GLEESON: It is our great hope that there can be some assimilation with Woods and Brew. My advice to them, if they’re watching this, is to make contact with
management again. Let’s try and find a way forward. It is our great hope that
we can utilise them to the best to their ability. But, let’s see.

LINDSAY WOODS: Our career is finished in CityRail.

NORM BREW: Gone. No matter what they offer us, we know, person-
ally, that it will only be a matter of time. Political intelligence What happens when U.S. spies get the goods — and the government won’t listen?

Ken Silverstein and David Isenberg Mother Jones, Jan/Feb 2002, p. 36
In 1989, an intelligence analyst working for then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney issued a startling report. After reviewing classified information from field agents, he had determined that Pakistan, despite official denials, had built a nuclear bomb. “I was not out there alone,” the analyst, Richard Barlow, recalls. “This was the same
conclusion that had been reached by many people in the intelligence community.”
But Barlow’s conclusion was politically inconvenient. A finding that Pakistan possessed a nuclear bomb would have triggered a congressionally mandated cutoff of aid to the country, a key ally in the CIA’s efforts to support Afghan rebels fighting a pro-Soviet government. It also would have killed a $1.4-billion sale of F-16 fighter jets to Islamabad.
Barlow’s report was dismissed as alarmist. A few months later, a Pentagon official downplayed Pakistan’s nuclear capabilities in testimony to Congress. When Barlow
protested to his superiors, he was fired.
Three years later, in 1992, a high-ranking Pakistani official admitted that
the country had developed the ability to assemble a nuclear weapon by 1987,
In 1998, Islamabad detonated its first bomb. “This was not a failure of intelligence,” says Barlow. “The intelligence was in the system.”
Barlow’s case points to an issue that has largely been overlooked in the post-September 11 debate about how to “fix” the nation’s spy networks: Sometimes, the problem with intelligence is not a lack of information, but
a failure to use it.
In the early days of the Vietnam War, a CIA analyst named Sam Adams discovered that the United States was seriously underestimating the strength of the Vietcong. The agency squelched his findings and he left in frustration.
During the Reagan years, Melvin Goodman, then a top Soviet analyst at
the agency, reported that the “Evil Empire” was undergoing a severe
economic and military decline.
Goodman was pressured to revise his findings because, he says, then-CIA director William Casey wanted to portray a Soviet Union “that was 10
feet tall” in order to justify bigger military budgets. (Reagan’s secretary
of state, George Shultz, put it more delicately in his memoirs: Reports from Casey’s CIA, he wrote, were “distorted by strong views about
policy.”)
At about the same time Barlow issued his warnings about Pakistan, an Energy Department analyst named  Bryan Siebert was investigating
Saddam Hussein’s nuclear program. His report concluded that “Iraq has a
major effort under way to produce nuclear weapons,” and recommended
that the National Security Council look into the matter. But the Bush admini-
stration which had been supporting Iraq as a counterweight to the Ayatol-
lah Khomeini’s Iran ignored the report.
It was only in 1990, after Saddam invaded Kuwait, that clear-eyed
intelligence reporting on Iraq came into fashion.
More recently, the Clinton admini- stration went to great lengths to protect
Boris Yeltsin, who was viewed as a critical partner in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union. One former intelligence analyst says that Al
Gore and his national security adviser, Leon Fuerth, would “bury their heads
in the sand” if presented with any derogatory report about Yeltsin.
“Taking unpopular positions means that you get bad reviews and don’t get promoted,” he says. “Some analysts simply stop pursuing information because they know that it can get them into trouble.”
A different type of political filtering takes place when the CIA relies on
“liaison relationships” with foreign intelligence agencies, whose reports are often colored by the biases of the local elite. One notorious example came in Iran in the 1970s, when despite decades of cooperation with the secret police, the U.S. government
failed to grasp the extent of public opposition to the Shah. Less than four
months before Khomeini’s revolution toppled the Iranian monarchy in early 1979, the Defense Intelligence Agencyreported that the Shah was “expected
to remain actively in power over the next 10 years.”
In Pakistan, the CIA has worked closely with the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) ever since the two institutions teamed up in
the 1980s to fund and direct the Afghan guerrillas. After the Taliban took power in 1996, the CIA relied on the Pakistanis for help in monitoring the regime. But the agency reportedly got little support or information from its ally in Islamabad — probably
because ISI was also one of the Taliban’s primary backers.
“We have consistently misled ourselves because we don’t have our
own sources of information,” warns Burton Hersh, author of The Old Boys:
The American Elite and the Origins of the CIA.  “If we had had people working the bazaars in Saudi Arabia or Egypt, we would have seen that there is a lot of unhappiness and that even upper-middle-class people were thinking about joining up with bin
Laden.”
Reforms of U.S. intelligence — whether they involve bigger budgets, better recruiting, or more effective spying — won’t make much of a difference, Hersh and others warn, as
long as officials are unwilling to hear the bad news.