Exclusive look inside the Bandidos 2022 national run in Ballarat
After years of living on the fringes of the law, police hounded outlaw bikies out of NSW. But now the boss of one club wants back in and he says he is prepared to change to make it happen.
NSW
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A dusty tent on the fringes of Ballarat is the Bandidos bikie gang’s temporary “hacienda”. For a few days at least it’s their clubhouse, a place where they can “party like it’s 2009”.
They’re there because it’s out of reach of the head-kickers of the NSW Police — the Raptor Squad – who have done everything they can to wipe out the bikie culture in this state.
After years of blood and chaos on the streets of Sydney and NSW, the police crackdown and introduction of non-consorting laws here meant bikies no longer had the right to wear their colours, congregate in groups and own a clubhouse.
Raptor enforcers set out to shut them down — smashing drug deals and other major crimes and charging outlaw bikie gang members with every minor offence they could pin on them.
The tactics worked. And now the Bandidos concede they have to change or risk “becoming extinct”.
They say that means no drugs and no violence — at least against the “common man” — and no “shooting people up”.
Given their history and the current gang wars raging on Sydney streets, it’s a difficult message to believe — and the police especially are not buying it.
“Don’t be under any illusions when it comes to outlaw motorcycle gangs and their activities,” says Raptor boss Superintendent Andrew Koutsoufis.
There is no apology for the tactics Raptor has used in their ongoing battle against bikie crime, and police say gatherings like the one in Ballarat — and claims times are changing — are a blatant recruitment tool.
“Raptor Squad will always be on the front foot when it comes to targeting OMCG members who wish to disrupt the peace and commit criminal acts,” he said.
But when about 400 Bandidos from around Australia made the trip last weekend to Ballarat, their first run in three years, the club’s re-elected national president Tony “Big Tony” Vartiainen vowed to transform the organisation.
Speaking publicly for the first time, Mr Vartiainen, El Presidente, told the Saturday Telegraph in Ballarat the Bandidos needed to change or face being run out of NSW.
“You have to move with the times or you’ll be extinct,” he said.
“I’ve told everyone if we don’t, then there will be no more bikies.”
The Sydney-based bikie took control of the club four years ago after a volatile period for the club.
Under his and Newcastle-based Graham “Grey” Norman’s leadership, the Bandidos have gone from a once-feared power of the bikie world in disarray to a club navigating a new level of policing.
National secretary, or El Secretario of the Hacienda, Mr Norman said things had changed.
“We deny the ‘gang’ in the outlaw motorcycle gang tag that police use against us,” he said.
“Police see us as anarchy and lawless, but we have a code of conduct and ethical standards in our constitution.
“We are the 1 per cent of (bikies) that are proper and good.”
It was Big Tony who invited The Saturday Telegraph to go to Ballarat, to try to prove his point.
Walking among them at the Bell Tower Inn, the hotel they have taken over for the weekend, they were impeccably behaved.
The older bikies, who chain-smoked for what felt like the entire two days they allowed us in, were more than happy to talk about the “good old days” before the police crackdown, “when blokes were blokes”.
The younger blokes were mostly there to party hard. And they weren’t shy with a camera in their face.
“Organised crime? More like models mate,” one joked.
“We call it Mexico down here, once you cross that border it’s great,” said a Newcastle-based Bandido who wanted to to be known as “Davey”.
“That’s why we had to sneak over the border at 2am or 3am to get here, because they harass us,” one bikie said.
Interestingly, when Mr Vartiainen met with both Raptor and their Victorian counterparts, Strike Force Echo, ahead of their annual jamboree, he told us they were two very different conversations.
Mr Vartiainen said NSW Police promised to harass any Bandido crossing the border for the event, while Victoria Police offered to work on seeing the weekend go smoothly.
“They’re trying to drive us out,” he said of NSW Police. “Just getting over the border, f..king hell, with some of the defects they got the boys on — it’s a load of crap.
“That was just to stop us getting here.”
Even the most senior among them jokes that of the police attention they get “85 per cent of it is probably warranted”.
Despite not having the numbers of the Rebels, the Bandidos are firmly in the sights of police. Earlier this year, police in Leeton tore down a Bandido clubhouse and seized dozens of shirts, jumpers, leathers and several motorbikes.
In May, Raptor Squad officers arrested and charged 50-year-old Sydney Bandido Glenn Hammond with possessing a firearm and breaching his firearm prohibition order.
As recently as last month a senior Bandido from Victoria was charged with threatening to kill police who pulled him over.
Around the same time, a blitz on their mid-north coast chapter in NSW saw the Raptor Squad charge several members with possessing firearms and tasers.
Last May, five Hunter Bandidos were charged with possessing drugs, rifles, shotguns and steroids after a crackdown on their operations.
In June that same year, several Bandidos were charged over a knife-wielding brawl in the heart of Leichhardt.
But asked if he is as dangerous as the NSW Police say he is, Big Tony Vartiainen has a blunt answer.
“That’s all bullshit,” he said.
“We’re a family club and we’ve gotta travel all the way to this place to prove we’re a family club.
“This is the only place we can come because of the laws … we need to get the community back on side. The only reason they’re not is because they’ve tarnished us all with the same brush saying we’re all gangsters and criminals.
“Everyone in this club pays tax and rides bikes … everything else is a load of crap.”
Despite being subject to regular firearm prohibition order searches, Big Tony said he refused to leave his home state of NSW.
“Nah. I am happy where I am, that’s where I live,” he said.
If the push to clean up their act is legitimate, Mr Vartiainen has the authority to pull it off.
The towering gold-toothed El Presidente has a menacing laugh and immense power within the club.
Walking around the Bell Tower Inn, Mr Vartiainen is a celebrity. Almost as much as founding member Charles Sciberas, who was at the infamous Milperra massacre of 1984.
He arrived not on a bike but with a cane. He had few words to say, other than he was “so happy to be here”.
Big Tony does not walk more than five metres without young prospects and chapter members from across the country stopping him for a chat and to show him their bikes.
When he means business, there is no messing around.
At 1pm sharp Mr Vartiainen says nothing but casually walks to his bike and revs the engine.
Immediately 400 Bandidos stop what they are doing and follow suit, preparing for their run around Ballarat.
Inside the tent “Grey” Norman is making sure every young bloke is behaving himself.
Mr Norman probably knows what to look for, given he has been shot twice.
The gangland veteran tells us he is now sober and living a law-abiding life.
He even says he has dedicated himself to a series of charitable endeavours.
But, rather than their charitable work, most of the others talk about NSW’s Raptor Squad.
Some bikies from Sydney were so scared of breaching NSW anti-consorting laws that even in Victoria they did not want to be pictured together.
“It’s terrible,” Newcastle bikie Davey said.
“Where I live in town, you start your bike and ride for two minutes and you’re getting pulled up … you can’t do nothing.”
The only brief moment of police interaction saw dozens of Bandidos scramble back to their rooms when a police car pulled up with sirens blaring.
They re-emerged laughing when they found out the car was stopping traffic nearby to let a parade of vintage cars through the street.
In a sign of changing times their road to redemption finished with a traditional welcome to country and a haka.
Maybe it was just the smoke, but there were a few tears in the eyes of even the toughest bikies.
News tips: anton.rose@news.com.au
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