Mick Hawi funeral: Mourners gather to farewell slain Comanchero boss
CARRYING photos, flowers and wearing T-shirts bearing his likeness, mourners gathered to farewell former Comanchero president Mahmoud “Mick” Hawi, a week after he was shot dead. Dozens turned up in luxury cars — including Rolls-Royces, Bentleys and a Porsche — but completely absent were motorbikes: the one-time bikie boss’s funeral was a no-go zone for bikes.
NSW
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CARRYING photos, flowers and wearing T-shirts bearing his likeness, mourners gathered to farewell former Comanchero president Mahmoud “Mick” Hawi, a week after he was shot dead outside a Rockdale gym.
Hawi’s funeral was held as part of lunchtime prayers at Al Zahra Mosque in Arncliffe today.
A convoy of luxury vehicles — three Rolls-Royces, two Bentleys and a Porsche — rolled into the mosque, believed to be carrying his close family and friends.
But the one-time bikie boss’s funeral was a no-go zone for bikes. Not a single mourner entered on the motorbikes or wearing colours from the Comancharos or a rival outlaw gang.
One man who tried who tried to ride to the mosque’s front gate, was turned away by the mosque’s security staff.
Dozens of people also wore T-shirts with Hawi’s smiling face pictured above his name and the dates 29.05.80 to 15.02.18, and a wreath of flowers was sent from the “Brisbane chapter”.
A large group of mourners arrived a short time after, exiting three stretch limos and walking towards the mosque carrying a large framed photo of Hawi.
The underworld king pin began life in Beirut 37 years ago. It ended in a targeted hit a week ago — precise almost to the hour — outside Fitness First at Rockdale, in Sydney’s south.
A number of uniformed police stood in the street watching mourners arrive.
A masked gunman is believed to have run to the drivers’ side of Hawi’s black Mercedes 4WD and shot him multiple times in the face and chest as he sat at the wheel.
Paramedics got him to St George Hospital barely alive and he died that afternoon.
His killers burnt out the grey Mercedes getaway car just 1km from the murder scene and remain on the run.
Fink bikie ‘assaulted, threatened police’ in traffic stop
Hawi’s distraught family and many underworld connections have insisted a kind hearted family man was behind Hawi’s image as a burly enforcer.
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As national president of the Comanchero bikie club, Hawi was imprisoned over the bashing death of Hell’s Angels associate Anthony Zervas in a wild brawl at Sydney Airport in 2009. He was released in 2015 and kept a low profile with less obvious underworld relationships.
Authorities only released Hawi’s body in recent days, allowing his family could proceed with the funeral.
But nightly vigils and Islamic ceremonies have been held at a family home where hundreds of mourners in black spill onto the street, some clutching photos of the slain father.
Hawi’s grieving widow, Carolina Gonzalez, used social media to pray for God to grant the “love of (her) life” entry to the “highest levels of heaven”. “Only I, his close friends and family know how truly beautiful his heart was,” she wrote on Facebook on Monday.
► CHAPTER ONE: Inside the squad that beat Sydney’s gangs
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