How the bust went down
Keith Moor
July 11, 2007 12:00am
Huge haul: The seized drugs.
THOSE organising to flood the Australian market with more than a tonne of ecstasy tablets thought their plan was foolproof.
They believed they had a system to ensure the container of five million pills got through Melbourne Customs undetected.
Distribution of the ecstasy in Australia had been arranged through a proven network.
All the Australian organisers had to risk was the estimated $20 million they had to pay those who supplied and packed the ecstasy inside a shipment of ceramic tiles in Italy.
That seemed a gamble worth taking as the tablets' street value in Australia was up around the $350 million dollar mark.
What they didn't know was that Melbourne man Antonio Sergi was under surveillance for something else at the time the ecstasy was due to arrive.
Australian Federal Police had Sergi high on its list of suspects for an illegal importation of 25 tonnes of tobacco into Melbourne in November 2004. It suspected Sergi used a forged document to get the container load of illegal tobacco through Customs.
That prompted the AFP to keep tabs on Sergi's telephone records for several months, which led them to believe he had been in contact with a Melbourne-based freight forwarding company.
Further AFP checks revealed the company had been hired to handle the customs clearing and delivery of container MSKU2815585.
Paperwork for the container showed it contained eight pallets of ceramic tiles, which were due to be delivered to a Braeside company.
The tiles were made in Calabria and packed into the container in the Italian port of Gioia Tauro.
Investigations are continuing into who supplied and packed the ecstasy in Italy and no arrests were made other than in Melbourne.
The container left Italy on March 10, 2005, and passed through Singapore and Taiwan before arriving in Melbourne on April 12.
AFP interest in the container began on April 6, 2005, which was when it alleged Sergi first used his mobile to contact the Melbourne freight forwarding company four times between 9.06am and 9.20am.
The AFP claimed Sergi had been in contact with two of the company's employees, Anton Claite and Christopher Stavreff.
3S TAVREFF was the company's sales and marketing manager, and his friend Claite was hired on his recommendation.
The AFP claimed that Sergi went into a Tullamarine newsagency and faxed the waybill for container MSKU2815585 to the freight forwarding company at 9.14am on April 6, 2005.
It alleged he used the alias Sam Pacini in the fax and claimed that he represented the Stone Italia company. The fax was addressed to Chris and it asked Chris to clear the container on behalf of Stone Italia.
The AFP later discovered Stone Italia was a genuine company, based in Braeside, and that the company had no knowledge of, or involvement in, the ecstasy importation.
AFP agents alleged Stavreff was the Chris referred to in the fax and that another alleged gang member, Tony Mokbel associate Rob Karam, had previous legitimate dealings with Stone Italia.
They alleged Sergi posed as a representative of Stone Italia at Karam's suggestion, as using a genuine company as the supposed recipient of the tiles was less likely to attract attention.
Suspicion would obviously be raised if the container was delivered to the real Stone Italia in Braeside as it hadn't ordered any tiles – or ecstasy – from Italy.
An email addressed to Chris at the freight forwarding company instructed the company to deliver the container to 67 Temple Drive, Thomastown, claiming the Stone Italia warehouse in Braeside was full.
The AFP alleged the plan was to have the container dropped off in Temple Drive by a legitimate delivery company.
As soon as the legitimate driver left, the gang would move in and take the container to a nearby warehouse to be unpacked by Antonio Giampaolo and Mark Aisbett. The empty container would then be returned to Temple Drive to be collected by the legitimate delivery company and nobody would be any the wiser.
T HAT all went ahead as planned, other than the container was never returned empty to Temple Drive as the AFP seized it as it was being unpacked at a warehouse in Abruzzo Crescent, Thomastown.
The AFP had the container under surveillance from the second it arrived in Melbourne.
While the AFP became increasingly convinced the container would contain illegal drugs, it had no idea it was about to make the world's biggest seizure of ecstasy.
It wasn't until AFP agents started unpacking the container on April 13, 2005 -- after whisking it off the MSC Matilde and into a secure warehouse -- that they realised this was "The Big One".
They discovered each of the eight pallets had packs of tiles that formed a square wall and that the cavities inside the walls of tiles were filled with 670 plastic bags containing just over five million ecstasy tablets weighing 1.235 tonnes.
Aimed at brand-conscious users, logos stamped on the pills included the Ferrari horse, diamonds and the Bacardi bat.
The normal AFP practice during similar discoveries is to remove the drugs and replace them with an equal amount of fake drugs and keep the shipment under surveillance to see who collects it on delivery.
But such was the size of the ecstasy haul that the AFP didn't have enough fake ecstasy to replace the real stuff and didn't have time to make more.
S O AFP agents put bags of cement in the cavities and put the 250,000 fake ecstasy tablets that they did have on top of the bags of cement.
That meant whoever received and unpacked the shipment would quickly know something was wrong -- but the agents figured they would still have long enough to burst in and arrest whoever was unpacking the container.
And burst in they did -- with 9mm Glock pistols drawn -- at 3.50pm on April 14, 2005.
AFP agents Steven Rickard, Pam Damokas and Mark Gstalter were the first three through the door and they shouted "police, don't move" as they did so.
"Mr Giampaolo co-operated immediately," Agent Gstalter said.
"Mr Aisbett took a little bit of convincing. As we entered he took off, running towards the door.
"I told him to stop. He kept going. I told him again, with a little bit more force.
"Then he turned around as though he was going to rear up at us. He threw his gloves to the ground.
"But then, seeing as though he was told again, he went to the ground."
Giampaolo and Aisbett had already taken the eight pallets out of the container and had just started packing the tablets into empty lettuce boxes when the AFP burst in.
AFP bugs recorded mobile telephone conversations between alleged gang members during the morning and afternoon of April 14, 2005.
T HE AFP claimed the calls indicated the callers knew the container had got through Customs and had been picked up as planned from Temple Drive, Thomastown, and taken to the warehouse in nearby Abruzzo Crescent to be unloaded.
While Stavreff's mobile phone wasn't bugged, his call records were obtained later and he had rung the switchboard at work and Claite's mobile.
Given the proximity of these calls to movement of the container, the AFP claimed Stavreff was put through to Claite and was given progress reports on the ecstasy shipment.
Sergi rang Karam at 8.48am on April 14, 2005, and said: "Everything will be there between 11 and 12."
Karam said: "OK."
Sergi said: "OK, it's pick up, pick up, Oh, nearly now."
Claite rang Sergi at 4.17pm and said: "I was just talking to Chris (Stavreff) and . . . all OK."
Sergi replied: "Yeah, yeah, yeah, so have I, man."
Claite rang Sergi from the freight forwarding company's toilets at 6.08pm on April 14 after he allegedly overhead discussions at work about the container not having been returned as planned and that police were being notified.
"You better work out what you're gonna do, cos they pretty much suss out," he told Sergi in the bugged conversation.
Sergi said: "Where are you?"
Claite said: "In the dunny. But you better sort out what you're doing, man, cos they're, they're on to it."
Sergi said: "They're what? I'll come down and see you cos your phone is very crackly man, I can't hear s--t."
Claite said: "ASAP."
Sergi, Claite, Aisbett and Giampaolo were arrested that night. Karam was charged the following month and Stavreff was arrested in December 2005.
Karam, 40, of Derby St, Kew, Sergi, 33, of Dundee Way, Sydenham, Claite, 30, of Gowanbrae Drive, Gowanbrae, and Stavreff, 38, of Lorimer St, Docklands, were yesterday cleared of conspiracy to import the five million ecstasy tablets.
Giampaolo, 54, of Konagaderra Rd, Clarkefield and Aisbett, 38, of Stanhope St, Black Rock, were found guilty at an earlier County Court trial in May of attempting to possess a commercial quantity of ecstasy.
They will be sentenced in the County Court by Judge Michael Bourke on a date yet to be fixed.
