‘The Commission’: Ironside messages reveal desire of alleged bikie chiefs to bring standover syndicate to Adelaide

Senior members of an Adelaide bikie gang were in talks to bring a mafia-like standover syndicate to SA which would control the price of drugs through violence.

Leading members of the Comanchero Motorcycle gang were in negotiations to bring “The Commission” – a mafia-like standover organisation controlling the price of drugs through violence – to Adelaide, the Sunday Mail can reveal.

Messages sent over the encrypted AN0M app show four Adelaide men, alleged to be senior members and office bearers in the gang, were aware of the formation of The Commission in the eastern states in early 2021.

One man – alleged to be Commander of the South Australian chapter of the Comanchero – wrote: “There is a commission being formed, I want in”.

He went on to say that he would be putting himself and the other senior members forward as SA representatives with the desire to build a monopoly on the states cocaine and methamphetamine industry

“This seems like a bad ass thing being formed,” he wrote.

“Bet Italians and big boss behind it with Lone Wolf.

“I’m going to push so hard to get monopoly on state. I’d love to have a meeting, I want Commission in SA.”

Members of the Lone Wolf Motorcycle Gang along with a group of men alleged to me members of the Calabrian Mafia have also been charged as part of Operation Ironside.

The Commission continues to run in Sydney where local drug dealers and their families were threatened with violence if they didn’t maintain the price of cocaine in particular.

The "Commission" heads sent a TXT message to crime figures in Sydney saying to keep the prices of cocaine high or they would come after their families.

In a message obtained by the Daily Telegraph, a representative for The Commission ordered dealers to keep the price of cocaine high and not drop it below a certain threshold.

In exchange, the dealers would receive support if their runners and drivers were arrested with drugs.

The message was spread throughout a Sydney underworld in the grips of a war between rival crime families which has manifested in shootings and kidnappings.

The price of cocaine and methamphetamine skyrocketed during the Covid-19 pandemic as international trade routes closed down, strangling the supply of the drugs and the precursors needed to make them.

As a result the price of a kilogram of cocaine jumped to $250,000 in Sydney but plummeted a short time later to $80,000, wiping out large profit margins in weeks.

The Commission, in a separate edict from the “big boss” of the Comanchero said the Commission would ensure the price remained steady.

The same price rise has been apparent through thousands of AN0M messages released by the courts.

The price of a kilogram of methamphetamine skyrocketed throughout 2020 and 2021 with the price of a kilo of the drug selling for as much $150,000.

The four Adelaide men involved in the communications were arrested in June 2021 as part of Operation Ironside and have remained in custody since then.

They are charged with a range of offences including conspiracy to murder and bash, major drug trafficking and money laundering.

The courts have frozen millions of dollars in assets linked to the four men including mansions, luxury cars, rare alcohol and cryptocurrency.

The future of their prosecutions, and hundreds like them, await the outcome of a test case currently before the SA Supreme Court which is testing the legality of Operation Ironside and the techniques underlying it.