Bikie news: Michael Basanovic has sentence reduced over Zeljko Mitrovic shooting
A meth cook for the Hells Angels, who ordered his son to shoot his former boss dead, has seen his murder charge downgraded and his sentence reduced.
NSW
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A Hells Angels meth cook, who ordered his son to shoot his bikie boss dead, had his sentence reduced after his original murder charge was overturned.
Michael Basanovic was, in 2016, handed almost 25 years in prison for masterminding the murder of Zeljko Mitrovic and the accidental wounding a second man, Michael Bell, in 2013.
Basanovic's 21-year-old son, Wade, who fired the shots, was given 14 years for manslaughter and wounding.
Facing decades in prison on harsher charges than his triggerman son, Basanovic launched an appeal with prominent defence lawyer Abbas Soukie.
His 2016 murder conviction was set aside by the appeal court and he was ordered to face a retrial.
His legal team subsequently negotiated the murder charge down to manslaughter in exchange for a guilty plea.
Justice Richard Button, sentencing Basanovic on Wednesday, explained how the Bosnian-born bikie had been cooking the drug ice for Mitrovic in the years leading up to the shooting.
Justice Button said the "highly valuable meth cook" was entrenched in the "criminal milieu".
"He lived in the very profitable, very dangerous world of people who manufacture illicit drugs," he said.
The court heard relations between Mitrovic and Basanovic soured when the boss developed a distaste for one of his cook's mates - a man named Shovel.
Shovel died in 2010 but Basanovic kept pulling away from his boss and, early the next year, was beaten badly in a clubhouse meeting organised by Mitrovic, NSW Supreme Court documents state.
Basanovic decided to leave the Hells Angels following the attack but Mitrovic warned him things could "get nasty" if their dispute wasn't settled the documents state.
Threats followed Basanovic after he left the club and he feared for his life when, in January 2013, he and his son confronted Mitrovic in his office.
Wade pulled out a handgun and fired five shots - three hit Mitrovic in the chest, one went through a wall and the last one hit Bell.
Justice Button said Basanovic was clearly responding to a "well founded fear of death" but could not go to police because he lived in a "lawless world".
"That is why he inflicted death himself," the judge said.
"It was unsophisticated and straight forward in its brutality."
Basanovic's six years in custody have been spent in isolation and Justice Button said his sentence needed to partly reflect that all of his time behind bars would likely be spent alone.
"Some will say that's the result of his choices in life," he said.
"In my opinion his imprisonment will be very physically and psychologically constrained."
Justice Button warned Basanovic he would still hand him a "stern" sentence because his role in the manslaughter was "at least equal to that of his son despite fact (he) never pulled the trigger".
He was given a backdated 13 years and eight months in prison.
"(Basanovic) is very pleased with the result and is looking forward to the next chapter of his life," Mr Soukie told The Daily Telegraph.
He will be eligible for parole in 2023.