Crucifixion Creek (13 page)

‘Okay. But first a test.' He gets to his feet and goes through to the kitchen, where
Kelly is waiting for the kettle to boil. She has taken the bottle of wine out of
the fridge but hasn't poured it. He picks it up and gets three glasses. ‘Forget about
the tea. Come through.'

They return to Jenny and Harry pours the wine. ‘Does anyone else know you're here,
Kelly?' he asks.

She hesitates a moment. ‘Yes. I share my flat with a friend, a schoolteacher. When
I got home this evening I told her about what a
frustrating day I'd had, and it was
she who suggested I ring you. She was there when you called back, and I told her
where I was going.'

‘Well, thanks for telling us; I don't think we can go on without being honest with
each other.'

‘Right. Does that mean I've blown it?'

‘Not necessarily. But when you get home, tell her I wasn't able to help you and I've
made you promise never to contact me again. You'll need to convince her that's true,
okay?'

‘All right.'

‘I don't know if you appreciate how vulnerable you'll be if you publish a story about
Kristich and Crucifixion Creek. If the police think you have an inside source they
will throw the kitchen sink at you. Track your phone, bug your flat, investigate
your contacts… And that's just the good guys.'

‘Yes, okay.'

‘What I can tell you is known to a number of other officers, but they'll know that
you've contacted me in the past, and so I'll come under suspicion. So: from now on
there must be nothing to link us. It will probably be a good idea if you try to get
interviews with other people in homicide and local area command. Spread the risk.'

‘Right, I can do that.'

‘Did you come down Crown Street?'

‘Yes.'

‘There are lots of cameras there. I'll show you a route back to avoid them. What?
You think I'm being paranoid? Believe me, you've got to become paranoid too. Now,
regarding a link between Kristich and the Crows, I can tell you that the second person
killed in Kristich's offices was a man named Benji Lavulo, a member of the Crows.'

‘Brilliant! How do you spell that?'

‘His name has not been released. Probably won't be for another day or two.'

‘Why not?'

‘No comment. The second thing I can tell you is that Kristich had a lawyer by the
name of Nathaniel Horn.'

‘I met him. I went to the Gipps Tower and bumped into him on the twenty-third floor.'

‘You went up there?'

‘Yes, just for a look. I didn't get anything from Horn except a faceful of menace.
He was very hostile.'

‘Well, it's probably good that you've had a brush with him. He's persuaded a court
to block police access to Kristich's papers and computers.'

‘So there's stuff in them that he doesn't want made public.'

‘Presumably.'

‘Anything else?'

‘There may well be some kind of police action against the Crows within the next day
or two. I'll try to give you a warning so you can cover it. You shouldn't publish
anything beforehand, but aim to have it out as soon afterwards as you can.'

‘That's great!' Kelly is excited, writing quickly in her notebook. ‘How about the
builder? You knew him, didn't you? Was he connected to Kristich in some way?'

‘No comment.' Harry reaches into his bag and hands her a mobile phone. ‘Never contact
me using your or my phones again. Use this one if you have to. There's a number in
its address book where you can get me.'

‘Okay.'

‘As soon as you breathe a word of what you now know, Kelly, you're in the firing
line. Remember that.'

She says goodbye to Jenny, who wishes her luck. Harry describes the camera-free route
out of Surry Hills and at the front door he stops her, speaking softly so that his
wife won't hear. ‘Kelly, I want you to think about Jenny and how vulnerable she is.
If anything happens to her because you screw up, you'll answer to me.'

She holds his gaze and says, ‘You can trust me, Harry.'

17

At two the following afternoon they all gather in the operations room—the Strike
Force Gemini detectives from homicide and local command, inspectors from the gangs
and drugs squads, and three representatives of the Tactical Operations Unit, including
Deb's partner, Damian Berardi. Deb introduces them as they wait for things to start,
and he takes Harry's hand in a hard grip. ‘Hi, Harry,' he growls. ‘Good to meet you
at last. Deb's told me all about you.'

‘All good I hope, Damian. She hasn't told me a thing about you.' They grin at each
other as if these platitudes hide some common knowledge.

Bob Marshall opens the proceedings, emphasising speed, control and secrecy. He spells
out the aims of the operation, to find evidence of criminal activities including
drug use and possession of illegal firearms and other weapons, but most importantly
to seize documentary evidence of illegal operations, clients and collaborators in
the form of notebooks, files, computers, phones and other electronic devices. All
such documentary evidence will be handed over immediately to a special task unit
which will have its own
vehicle and will, with tech support, begin recording and
analysing such materials as soon as they become available. Everyone found within
the premises will be cautioned and taken to the local station for processing and
held for interview.

He hands over to the senior TOU officer, who describes the target, the fortified
clubhouse of the Crow motorcycle gang at the south end of Mortimer Street. On the
wall are enlargements of maps, street plans and aerial photographs taken that morning
by a helicopter of the Aviation Support Branch. There are potential difficulties
in the approach along Mortimer Street to the main doors of the compound; the street
is narrow and most of the houses are now believed to be occupied by Crow members
and their families. There's an alternative approach from the other side of the clubhouse,
through the premises of a shipping container yard separated from the compound by
a high wall topped by razor wire. A second warrant has been obtained for entry to
the yard for that purpose.

Deb Velasco, as operational head of Strike Force Gemini, then outlines the plan,
identifying the members of each group and their tasks. When she finishes they break
down into their teams to work out their individual roles. Harry is to head the group
tasked with searching for the documentary evidence. They itemise the equipment they
will need and plan how they will work their way through the building. There are no
internal plans of the clubhouse and its ancillary buildings and only a hazy notion
of what they may find inside. They talk about safes and electronic equipment and
possible hiding places.

And then they wait. The raid begins at 8.00 p.m., when they hope they'll find the
most bikies inside. They break up to get their gear together, to have a meal and
a rest, and to phone home. Harry uses another unsourced mobile to send a text to
Kelly, ‘20.00'.

*

Harry and his team are in an unmarked white van, the fourth vehicle in a convoy of
five for the initial assault. In the lead is the TOU's black Lenco carrying Berardi
and his ninja mates. They drive at speed down Mortimer Street without obstruction
and come to a halt in front of the heavy steel gates. Behind them the fifth vehicle
stops to form a barricade across the street entrance. Uniformed police pour out of
it and deploy along the street to prevent people coming out of the houses. The arrest
teams in the second and third vans wait as the loudspeaker in the Lenco announces
the raid and demands that the gates be opened.

Without a pause for a reply, the back of the truck opens and armed men in black jump
out, among them a pair carrying a thermal lance. They run to the gate and get to
work on the hinges, the plasma beam slicing through the steel like ice cream until
they jump back and wave at the truck to rev up and charge the gates. The impact sends
the gates crashing back into the yard behind and the assault and arrest teams race
in. There is the noise of an explosion from inside the compound.

To Harry, standing waiting behind his van, the scene has an unreal quality. There
has been no sign of life from the compound or from the houses along the street. He
looks up at the deserted lookout tower above the clubhouse and thinks of Afghanistan,
tenses for the zip of incoming fire but there is nothing, only the barking of a dog.
He leads his team towards the gates.

As they step over the flattened steel they are met by a smell of dust and burning.
They are on one side of a yard about twenty metres square, in which stand several
Harley-Davidsons and some brightly coloured children's play equipment. The high wall
on the far side of the square has a hole blown in it and the second assault team
is climbing in from the container lot. Debris from the explosion has knocked over
a couple of the bikes and buckled a swing.

The door of the clubhouse stands open and Harry walks in, then stops as he takes
in a bizarre tableau. Four men—like cartoon bikies
with their beards, ponytails and
tattoos—are sitting around a table calmly playing cards, seemingly oblivious to the
black uniforms and bristling weapons that surround them. There is a pool table over
to one side, and on the wall beyond it a huge shield bearing the Crow colours above
a red banner inscribed with black lettering: WE CRUSH OUR ENEMIES.

Deb is yelling at the card players, attempting to get them to identify themselves.
When they ignore her she has them hauled to their feet and their wallets searched.
They are the club president Roman Bebchuk, the vice-president Frank Capp, the sergeant-at-arms
Hakim Haddad and a fourth bikie, Thomas O'Brian. Harry recognises O'Brian. Their
eyes meet briefly before the man turns his head.

Beyond them Harry sees a door into a back room, which he discovers to be a small
office, and he leads his team in there to begin gathering up a collection of battered
paperbacks, a DVD set of
Sons of Anarchy
, a computer and a number of note and account
books. While they work, Harry examines a collection of business cards in a plastic
tub. Among them he finds a card for
Chieftain Smash Repairs
. He makes a note of the
address in Mascot and bags the cards. There is a safe in the corner of the room,
a relatively new strongly armoured steel box with a digital lock. It probably weighs
over three hundred kilograms, and when the card players refuse to disclose the combination
the thermal lance comes out again. When the door is off they find club badges, DVDs,
a large wad of Australian currency and a number of large plastic bags filled with
a white crystalline substance.

Harry calls Deb in and her face lights up with relief. They have found little else
to justify the raid, but this should be enough.

The four men are taken to the local police station for interview. All four nominate
Nathaniel Horn as their lawyer and refuse to speak until he arrives, which takes
some time. While they wait, Bob

Marshall calls a strategy meeting. The inspector from the gangs squad goes over what
is known of the Crows. There isn't much to tell. They are a single-clubhouse gang
which split off eight years ago from one of the bigger clubs in the city's west to
establish their own territory based around Crucifixion Creek. Until now they have
kept a low profile. Bebchuk, the president, has a history of drugs and violence and
spent some years with an outlaw club in California. Harry tells them that he knew
O'Brian, the fourth card player, in the army in Afghanistan. They served in the same
special forces company.

‘His nickname was Rowdy,' Harry explains, ‘because he was a man of few words. We
won't get anything out of him.'

They debate whether Harry should conduct the interview with O'Brian, but in the end
Marshall vetoes the idea. ‘Let's see how it goes,' he says. ‘We'll hold Harry back
in case we need to go about it a different way.'

Harry wonders what that might be.

Deb and the gangs inspector will lead the interview teams, with Harry, Bob Marshall
and a number of others observing on the big screen in the theatrette on the next
floor. There is a subdued air of disappointment among the observers as they take
their seats to await the first interview. More was expected from the raid. But Marshall
lightens the mood with stories of past raids, the gaffes and cock-ups and bloody-minded
obstructionism, which get them all laughing.

‘Ah, here comes the vulture,' Marshall says at last, and they straighten in their
seats, watching the black-suited figure of Nathaniel Horn entering the interview
room. For a brief moment the lawyer glances up at the camera, and Harry feels a frisson
go through the watchers.

There follow two hours of tedious silences, ‘no comment's and inarticulate grunts.
Gradually however a defence position becomes clear—Benji Lavulo is to be blamed for
everything. Benji was the
club treasurer and, so it is claimed, the only one who
knew the safe combination. The gangs inspector's incredulity at this suggestion is
met with blank innocence. Benji was a bit of a loner, apparently. Secretive. They
have no idea what he might have been doing in the office of Alexander Kristich, a
man of whom they have never heard.

While this is going on, a note is passed to Superintendent Marshall from technical
support. The white crystals are indeed methamphetamine, and a single set of fingerprints
has been identified on the plastic bag as matching those of Benji Lavulo. Marshall
vents a loud obscenity and sinks lower in his seat.

In the early hours of the morning the four men are charged with several offences
that probably won't stand up and released on police bail. A despondent Strike Force
Gemini and its support team disperse into the night.