Ironside accused’s ammo cache included more than a thousand rounds of machine gun ammo

High-velocity rounds, bullets designed to fragment on impact and machine gun ammunition were in an Ironside accused’s arsenal – see the pictures.

An Operation Ironside accused caught with a loaded handgun when arrested by police had more than 6000 rounds of ammunition at his home, a court has heard.

The enormous cache, which took officers hours to separate and count, included ammunition designed for automatic and semiautomatic rifles, high-velocity projectiles and bullets that fragment on entry.

The 36-year-old man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to possessing the ammo along with a loaded handgun and a broken starting pistol.

Police are expected to lay serious drug trafficking charges against him.

He is scheduled to stand trial on four unrelated counts of trafficking a controlled drug.

During sentencing submissions earlier this month, counsel for the prosecution tendered documents outlining the full extent of the discovery at the man’s home.

A statement from a police officer who raided the man’s northern suburbs property in the early hours of June 7 said the loaded and functioning silver Bernadelli Gardone pistol was found in a laptop bag on the passenger seat of the man’s black Mercedes-Benz.

Starters pistol seized as part of Operation Ironside from the house and car of an accused whose name has been suppressed.

Contained in the bag was 36 rounds of ammunition for the handgun and another 24 rounds was hidden in the car.

In the bedroom of the home was a further 83 .32 rounds were found in his bedroom.

But it was in one of the sheds of the semirural property that police found the majority of the cache which amounted to an overall total of 6928 rounds of ammunition.

The court heard during sentencing submissions that police had seized eight firearms registered to the man from his home in November 2019 out of concerns for his alleged links to organised crime.

These guns included several self-loading pistols, shotguns and bolt action rifles. A ballistic analysis of the man’s ammo cache found a large quantity of the ammunition was not suitable for those seized firearms, making their origins and purpose unclear.

Among the arsenal was 1200 rounds of 7.62 x 39mm cartridges which are designed for use in semiautomatic rifles like the AK-47 or light machine guns. Other ammo types included hollow-point rounds designed to fragment on use, high-velocity rifle rounds and hundreds of shotgun shells.

Hundreds of rounds of ammunition seized as part of Operation Ironside from the house and car of an accused whose name has been suppressed.

Bullets seized as part of Operation Ironside from the house and car of an accused whose name has been suppressed.

When asked about the origin of the handgun, the man told police he had recovered from the house a friend who had died and had stored it at a store he owned before intending to hand it in to police.

Officers suspect the man was operating a large-scale pill press out of the back of the shop and asked where he had hidden the gun. The man exercised his right to silence but said “I knew it was safe where it was”.

The Perfecta DBP starter pistol was not able to be used but falls under the definition of a prescribed weapon.
Police also found a taser, prescription medication and a fake $50 in the house alongside numerous phones and simcards.

The man was alleged to have had an AN0M-equipped smart phone with which he organised the trafficking of drugs and “ongoing criminal activity”.

He will be sentenced later this month for the drugs and firearm offending.

Photos of ammo seized as part of Operation Ironside from the house and car of an accused whose name has been suppressed.