New police task force to target South East’s youth crime gangs

A Queensland cop who has been at the forefront of a fight against notorious bikie gangs will head a task force focused on violent street gangs menacing parts of South East Queensland, as he reveals the long list of often violent crimes they’re accused of committing.

EXCLUSIVE

A special police task force will crack down on criminal street gangs allegedly responsible for theft and violence so extreme that it has killed two people and left others with lifelong injuries.

In an exclusive interview with The Courier-Mail, Detective Superintendent Brendan Smith, who is spearheading the operation, said police wanted to stop the South East street gangs before they further escalated.

Taskforce Uniform Knot will begin this week and will target gang violence and helping trouble youths involved in gangs turn their lives around.

“We’ve identified an emerging issue with criminal street gangs, and we want to nip it in the bud before it escalates,” Superintendent Smith said.

As Operations Commander of the Organised Crime and Gangs Group, Superintendent Smith is well versed in targeting criminal gangs, including some of the country’s most notorious bikies.

Superintendent Smith, a team of about 30 investigators from the Crime and Intelligence Command and numerous other specialised QPS members from various specialist teams across four South East districts will zero in on Queensland’s street gangs.

“We’re seeing an opportunity to bring the capabilities of those districts and the command together to really do some work, particularly in prevention,” he said.

“This is about maybe turning some of these younger people away from a path that could see them in the criminal justice system, when we want to bring them back.”

The Courier-Mail has been told kids as young as 12 are joining dangerous street gangs, including the Southside Drillaz, The Swish Gang, who also call themselves the Swish Bound Gorillas, the Northside Gang and the Southside Gang.

Superintendent Smith said random attacks on members of the public were rare, but tragically do happen.

Detective Superintendent Brendan Smith is manning a task force to nip Brisbane’s youth crime gangs in the bud. Picture: Steve Pohlner

He said the reasons kids as young as 12 join criminal street gangs were complex, but showed society as a whole had let down those children.

“To me, it shows that society is failing,” he said. “You know, we’ve got 12-year-olds involved in some very serious crimes.

“It would be wrong to blame the family because we’re all one community.

“That saying about how it takes a village to raise a child, well it’s true.”

The groups have repeatedly come to police attention over the past six to 12 months, including after three alleged incidents that resulted in the alleged attempted murders of three men in serious gang brawls in Brisbane and Logan.

In November 2021, an 18-year-old man was left for dead on the roadside in Logan’s Carbrook following a serious attack between the rival gangs after attending a rap concert in Brisbane that night.

Those involved were members of the Drillaz and Swish gangs.

Similarly, affiliates of those gangs were allegedly involved in two prior serious gang bashings during one night of horror in Milton and West End in August 2021.

Police charged a total of 11 people with attempted murder following the August incidents, which occurred on the same night and involved many of the same people.

A portion of those involved were at the time still enrolled in southeast Queensland schools.

While in 2020, 19-year-old Girum Mekonnen was allegedly murdered by 13 men in a north Brisbane park, and in 2019 Harrison Geppert, the younger bother of notorious former-bikie Ben Geppert, was stabbed to death on an afternoon in the Gold Coast.

Both crimes would later be identified as acts of alleged gang violence.

Although it’s these terrifying acts of extreme violence that are killing our state’s youth in targeted attacks, it’s other gang crime that police say may arguably be the greater risk to the public.

Vision of an alleged gang attack at Logan that included the serious assault of a teenager.

“The Northside gang and the Southside gang are a greater risk to the community than (Swish and Drillaz),” Det Supt Smith said,

“Really, those two groups butt heads, but the others are just driving like idiots.

“It could be your family that gets cleaned up at a red light.”

Although not necessarily a specific example of a gang-related incident, the horror crash that claimed the lives of Kate Leadbetter, Matt Field and their unborn baby Miles on January 26 last year was a prime example of an innocent family being struck and killed by a young teen on the wrong side of the law.

Det Supt Smith random attacks on members of the public by these gangs are rare, but tragically do happen.

Unlike traditional gang structures seen in Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs, street gangs do not have a clear hierarchy or ‘membership’ process, and in many cases don’t identify by a gang name.

They don’t have a clubhouse or organised meeting place, and those involved will often come and go to gatherings.

It’s for this reason, Det Supt Smith says police are unable to identify how many street gangs exist in the southeast, and how many young people form part of those gangs.

A screenshot from a Southside Gang social media post.

He said, however, the gangs are often sophisticated in the way they operate, and use inventive means to fund their operations including gaining money through fraudulent activity, which for operational issues, The Courier-Mail is unable to detail.

Members range in age from about 12-25 years-old, are almost exclusively male and often live in low socio-economic areas.

As part of Taskforce Knot, QPS Liaison Officers meet with local community members and engage with schools to help build relationships and change young people’s perception of police.

“We’re engaging with community groups and their leaders,” Det Supt Smith said.

“It’s about explaining what we’re about because we don’t want them to think we’re out there targeting them because we’re not. We’re targeting a social issue, and enforcement is just one part of it.

“We know the underlying drivers of these crimes are complex, including social disadvantage and disengagement. This cohort of youths are drawn together for various reasons, and at times are involved in serious crimes. It is this behaviour we need to address collectively.”

He said police and community partnerships are “fundamental for societal crime prevention and fostering a conducive society.”

The QPS have committed six months to the Taskforce, with the view for the program to extend longer if necessary.

Det Supt Smith said he’s unsure how long it will take to tackle the emerging problem, but he’s confident the problem will be fixed through the Taskforce.

“I wouldn’t have stood it up if I didn’t think this was going to work,” he said.

“And we’ve got to try things differently, we just can’t keep doing things the same way.

Short term success, Det Supt Smith said, would be some of the kids on the fringe of interacting with gangs attending school at more frequent rates.

While long term success, although potentially difficult to measure, would be no street gang-related arrests at the Taskforce’s end.

“I think they’re still young, there is a chance to turn them around.”