Mafia informer Gianfranco Tizzoni names Sergi, Barbaro and Trimbole clans over Donald Mackay murder

MAFIA supergrass Gianfranco Tizzoni has told police a member of a notorious Italian ­organised crime family was ­involved in ordering the ­1977 execution of Donald Mackay.

MAFIA supergrass Gianfranco Tizzoni told police a member of a notorious Italian ­organised crime family was ­involved in ordering the ­1977 execution of Donald Mackay.

Tizzoni claimed he was at a meeting with Victorian Tony Barbaro and Griffith Calabrian mafia bosses Tony Sergi and Robert Trimbole when the Mackay murder decision was made. The Barbaro clan is ­infamous worldwide.

Hitman James Bazley after his arrest in 1975 over a bank robbery. He murdered Donald Mackay two years later.

The Herald Sun yesterday revealed that James Bazley — the hitman hired by the NSW mafia cell to kill Mr Mackay — died this week in a Melbourne nursing home at the age of 92.

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Bazley’s death is expected to spark a new search for Mr Mackay’s body.

Bazley told a trusted associate how and where he had ­disposed of Mr Mackay after shooting the anti-drug campaigner in a crime that shocked the nation.

With Bazley dead, that ­associate is believed to be ­prepared to tell police what the hitman told him.

If Mr Mackay’s body is found, that could result in enough evidence to charge any surviving members of the mafia cell in the central NSW town who ordered his death.

Mr Mackay, a Griffith ­businessman, was ­exposing the mafia’s lucrative cannabis trade in the area.

His children ­yesterday told the Herald Sun they wanted to see to see how the case developed before ­deciding whether to comment.

Anti-drugs campaigner Donald Mackay with wife Barbara and children Paul, Ruth, May and James in 1977.

Hitman James Bazley (left) was friendly with now murdered Calabrian mafia money launderer Mario Condello (right).

They have had their hopes dashed after previous failed searches for their father’s body.

Police with knowledge of the Mackay case were yesterday unable to say if Tony Barbaro was still alive. Tizzoni, Sergi and Trimbole are all dead.

Tony Barbaro was in Tizzoni’s Mercedes when Victorian police arrested them both in 1982 after finding the car’s boot filled with marijuana.

Tizzoni became a police ­informer to get out of the drug charges. When giving evidence at Bazley’s trial, he admitted that he had named Barbaro, Sergi and Trimbole to police in a sworn statement as being at the meeting that decided Mr Mackay had to be killed.

Tizzoni also told the court he had later withdrawn the statement as it was all lies.

Mafia supergrass Gianfranco Tizzoni being escorted out of the Victorian Supreme Court. He gave evidence against hitman James Bazley.

But Carl Mengler, the ­former head of the Victoria Police taskforce that charged Bazley, told the Herald Sun several years ago he had no doubt the first statement Tizzoni made — in which he named names — was the correct one.

Mr Mengler said he ­believed Tizzoni had panicked when he realised his statement would be read in open court.

“He decided to withdraw that statement to save his skin and protect his family,” the ­former deputy commissioner said.

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Originally published as Mafia informer Gianfranco Tizzoni names Sergi, Barbaro and Trimbole clans over Donald Mackay murder