Jacks and Jokers (43 page)

At 10.12 p.m., Casey relished the opportunity to reply to the criticism. ‘It was less than 12 hours ago in this Chamber that the very same persons who have tried to make dramatic gestures on this subject were the movers in having me gagged in this parliament. They said absolutely nothing in relation to it.

‘Why the turn-around? Why, in this short space of time, has the Government taken the step of holding a special Cabinet meeting and then displaying a complete about-face in this parliament? It is for the simple reason that the Government is absolutely frightened out of its very boots at the public reaction to the way in which it has been conducting the affairs of this State. Very dramatic!’

‘Give us the names of the members of parliament. Come on!’ the Premier baited.

Casey went on to outline details of the drug trade in Queensland, citing the Woodward and Williams royal commissions and his own sources. Amid constant interjection from the coalition and innumerable points of order, Casey eventually came to the strange tale of John Edward Milligan, former Associate to District Court Justice Seaman.

‘On his arrest, Milligan gave long and detailed evidence to the Narcotics Bureau in Sydney. It was very alarming evidence. I am led to believe that the evidence given by Milligan implicated a very senior member of this parliament and also very senior police officers in this state.

‘I also believe that Milligan made it quite clear in presenting the evidence to the people doing the interrogation that he had friends in high places, and that the people doing the investigation should be careful. Consequently, a tape-recording was taken in front of witnesses. My understanding is that the tape was then sent to Mr. Fife, the Federal Minister responsible for the Narcotics Bureau. The tape is, or was, in the possession of Mr. Fife.’

After a long, fiery debate, Casey finally put his trump card on the table. He said ‘… that particular person Milligan did name in that tape the Minister for Justice in this parliament, Mr. Lickiss, as having had some dealings …’

The House erupted.

‘I would be a little bit concerned if I were Mr. Lickiss,’ said Casey.

‘Order! The House will come to order,’ shrieked the Speaker.

The debate raged into the early hours of the morning leaving little doubt that Casey’s revelations and the bitter debate had its impact on Bjelke-Petersen and the government.

While still baying that the ALP policy was to legalise marihuana, the Premier made an extraordinary concession: ‘I have listened with a great deal of interest to the allegations being made by the Leader of the Opposition both within this House and outside it. Mr. Justice Williams is presently commissioned by the Australian Government and four of the State Governments, including Queensland, to inquire into drug trafficking. He is currently finalising his reports to the respective Governments.

‘I have asked that he give the highest priority possible to investigating the allegations – not only the allegations mentioned here but anything associated with the Labor Party.’

It was 1.56 a.m., and within a matter of hours the government and opposition would be at each other’s throats again.

The Premier was true to his word. Although Justice Williams was tying up his lengthy royal commission into drugs, Bjelke-Petersen wrote to the Secretary of the Commission asking the commission to give priority to allegations that officers of the Queensland Police Force and members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly were involved in the illegal drug trade.

He also asked Justice Williams that all Queensland-related issues that were being dealt with under the umbrella of the commission be deferred until this priority was acquitted. Queensland police officers O’Brien and Pointing were attached to the commission to assist Justice Williams.

Later that month, Milligan came up directly in Lewis’s official diary: ‘Insp. T. Pointing called re interview with a Mr Milligan wherein he stated that ex-Det. Hallahan said that he would have me give any necessary assistance to Milligan.’

Here was direct evidence that Pointing, working for the commission of inquiry and with full access to confidential Narcotics Bureau data, was surreptitiously reporting back to the Commissioner.

The Milligan allegations were as serious a scrutiny as any previously suffered by Lewis, Murphy and Hallahan. Still, the life of the state’s top cop continued as usual. On the day Pointing passed on his drug intelligence to Lewis, the Commissioner and his wife, Hazel, attended a march-past of the 4th Signals Regiment in King George Square, and later that evening the Commissioner went to a Christmas party for the Fraud Squad.

Lickiss Rises

About 11.20 a.m. on 21 November, the MPs, including the Premier, were all back in the chamber in Parliament House at the southern end of George Street, just hours after the previous day’s explosive debate that had roared into the early morning.

Naturally, Minister for Justice and Attorney-General Bill Lickiss, the member for Mount Coot-tha, was one of the first to speak.

Mr. Speaker, as you and other honourable members of this House would expect, I rise to reply to certain allegations raised last night by the Leader of the Opposition,’ Lickiss said. ‘The honourable Leader of the Opposition has “named” me as being accused of being associated with people involved in drug-trafficking. The accusations are, to say the least, most nebulous and come from sources which are again, to say the least, tainted.

Lickiss was dour and matter-of-fact. It was a quality that had kept him in good stead through a colourful life. He was a navigator with the RAAF in World War II and later a surveyor, map-maker and pineapple farmer. He was awarded a bravery medal following a dangerous incident during the Brisbane floods of 1974. He had been elected to parliament in 1963.

The source seems to be Milligan who is reported to have claimed that he had friends in high places. Presumably, I am supposed to be one of Milligan’s friends. I can say, categorically, that I do not know any John Milligan and certainly am not a friend of the John Milligan who is the primary source of the allegations …

My reputation for honesty and integrity is such, I believe, that it and any of my dealings with trust accounts or any aspects of criminal investigation and prosecution will stand up to the closest scrutiny.

Fellow Liberal and relative newcomer to parliament, the equally colourful Angus Innes, member for Sherwood, later rose in defence of his colleague.

‘The nearest the Minister for Justice would ever have come to drugs would be cutting the grass on his own rider-mower around his home. It was an outrageous proposition, and one that was totally unsubstantiated. He [Casey] did not rely upon any evidence whatsoever,’ said Innes.

The House returned to relative calm, debating the Motor Vehicle Safety Bill. During the discussion Don Lane was accused ironically of being a ‘big, tough ex-cop’, and he in turn accused the Opposition of being ‘anti-police’.

In the afternoon, members chewed over the
Port of Brisbane Authority Act
Amendment Bill. Kev Hooper, the member for Archerfield, offered a soft but curious interjection: ‘Is there any truth in the rumour that Mr. Max Hodges will be the new chairman?’

It had been only three months since Hodges, the former Police Minister under Commissioner Ray Whitrod, and perhaps his greatest ally, had stepped away from his political career. It was Hodges who had joined forces with Whitrod in attempting to eliminate the Rat Pack in the early to mid-1970s, and who had lost the Police portfolio when he stood up against Premier Bjelke-Petersen over the street-march fiasco, where a young woman was struck on the head with a police baton. He knew of John Edward Milligan’s activities, as did former commissioner Whitrod. Now, in the wake of the drug scandal, his name resurfaced.

Again, Hooper’s contacts were spot on.

At that, parliament adjourned comparatively peacefully at 5.39 p.m.

The Stranger

Just over a week before Christmas Day 1979, a young man with pitch-black hair, an English accent and spectacles, started work at the Licensing Branch on the seventh floor of police headquarters in the city.

He was Nigel Donald Powell, 28, who had previous experience with the West Midlands Police, covering Birmingham, Coventry and Wolverhampton in central England.

Powell had joined the Queensland police as a constable on 5 July following his training and was seconded to the City station in Makerston Street. Just days into his new job on ‘beat #2’ in the CBD, at 10.55 p.m. in King George Square, beneath the giant illuminated clock face of the City Hall tower, Powell came across a dishevelled man who appeared a little worse for wear.

Powell wanted to check if the man was alright. The man became aggressive when Powell enquired about his wellbeing. ‘Police here are terrible,’ the man said in a European accent. ‘You’re harassing me!’

‘I’m just trying to see if you’re alright,’ the young constable replied.

The man identified himself as Albert Rosen, chief conductor of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra, and that he was residing at the Crest Hotel. Powell was shocked by the man’s reaction to police, something he’d never experienced in the West Midlands.

‘I remember going home [to a small flat in Herston] and having a conversation with my wife, Heather, about it,’ says Powell. ‘She remarked that it appeared people didn’t like the police in Queensland. She told me she didn’t tell anyone that I worked as a police officer in Brisbane.’

Three weeks later, Powell was on the beat again in the city. He decided to check out the public toilets in Albert Park, a notorious gay beat not far from the police station in Makerston Street. It was 1.30 a.m. on 26 July.

Powell checked the Ladies. His partner went into the Mens, and quickly rushed out.

‘I’ve caught two of them at it,’ the young officer said.

Powell then interviewed one of the men, who identified himself as Paul Anthony Griffin, a television broadcaster. (Griffin was in fact an anchor for Channel Nine news in Brisbane. In 1979 he would win a TV Week Logie Award for Most Popular Male Personality in Queensland.)

‘Tell me what happened here tonight,’ Powell asked Griffin.

‘I went to use the urinal and had a torch shone in my face,’ the media personality replied.

‘You must realise the other officer has seen a circumstance that raises suspicion.’

‘I cannot see why.’

Powell asked Griffin about his movements that evening.

Griffin said he had finished work around midnight at the station up on Mount Coot-tha and had dropped into Lucky’s pizzeria in the Valley. ‘I had a couple of glasses of wine and wanted to go to the toilet before I left so I came here,’ Griffin explained.

‘Did you see the other gentleman in the toilet?’ Powell inquired.

‘No, it’s very dark in there.’

The media identity refused to go down to the station to discuss the matter, and an inspector was called to the scene. It was the word of two against one police constable, and Griffin was permitted to leave without charge.

Not long after that, on 10 August, Powell arrested a man who had damaged a glass pane and some lights at the Allegro Restaurant in Edward Street. It turned out the offender, who acknowledged he had committed the offence, was detective Sergeant Second Class Peter Reiken of the Fraud Squad. Reiken was taken to the city station and charged on summons.

Powell had unwittingly breached a powerful police code. He had arrested a brother officer. He wasn’t made to forget it.

Walking the beat, police cars would cruise by him. ‘Are you Powell the Pom?’ they’d ask. ‘You arrested Peter Reiken?’ On other occasions they would simply gawk at him and shake their heads.

On 15 October, Powell was then sent to the suburban station at Nundah – 8 kilometres north-east of the CBD. Just two months later he was informed he’d been transferred to the Licensing Branch. He took up his duties on 17 December.

Unwittingly, Powell was placed in a difficult situation. He was the stranger in town, and he had a natural desire to be liked and accepted. Powell had come from a comparatively sophisticated police force in the UK. In Queensland he hit an antiquated system head on.

Not only that, he entered a Licensing Branch where inter-personal suspicions and paranoia were literally palpable. There were officers in such a state of nervous disrepair that they could not hold a tea cup steady. The place was paralysed with secrecy.

When Powell was rostered on for a job he would travel to a location with other officers and was only told at the very last minute what the job was, and who or what was the target.

‘I wanted to fit in,’ he says. ‘I went in believing everyone was good and these were the people I wanted to work with. If you walked up on a couple of officers in conversation, they’d just stop. People were paranoid.’

Powell learned very quickly that there appeared to be a number of unwritten rules. There seemed to be an arrangement with the massage parlour girls whereby they were arrested on rotation and invariably pleaded guilty. And when a strip club and brothel called the World By Night, not far from the old National Hotel at Petrie Bight, was raided for illegal sales of liquor, they were back trading as normal an hour later.