Rebel run as police warn of bikie boilover
SYDNEY Rebels bikies joined their counterparts from clubs across Australia on a national run to Melbourne that resulted in a massive police operation amid boiling tensions with the rival Comanchero.
NSW
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SYDNEY Rebels bikies joined their counterparts from clubs across Australia on a national run to Melbourne that resulted in a massive police operation amid boiling tensions with the rival Comanchero.
Members of the Rebels’ Liverpool chapter shared pictures on social media as they joined hundreds of bikers headed to the capital for a weekend marking 20 years of the club’s Melbourne chapter.
Bikers insisted they weren’t there to cause trouble, but just wanted to celebrate with the brotherhood.
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But as large number of police including Public Order Response units converged on a Melbourne industrial estate to conduct checks on riders, some appeared to take affront at the huge police presence that greeted them.
“They should invest taxpayers money into something a bit more productive, they would have spent that in fuel for the helicopters alone,” wrote one.
Officers made them queue near the Rebels’ clubhouse to undergo licence, registration, roadworthiness and helmet compliance checks as well as drug and alcohol tests.
Police assured the community that public safety was their priority.
State Police Commander David Clayton said: “Police will take immediate action to detect and disrupt any OMCG members who breach road safety laws, commit crimes or public order offences.”
While the weekend events were peaceful, one of Western Australia’s top cops warned officers to be extra cautious when approaching bikies as tensions boil between the rival groups.
Police Commissioner Chris Dawson revealed: “We’ve got some warnings out for our officers to take particular care because these tensions are emerging.”
Mr Dawson said the public should also be worried.
“What concerns me and should concern the community is particularly when firearms are being used out in public, as we’ve seen, and people being injured,” he said.
A suspected bikie war is brewing in Perth following a drive-by shooting last month in Calista which left a man aged in his 50s in hospital.
There were also five suspicious tattoo parlour fires between March and August.
After the shooting, it emerged the victim thought he was being pulled over by police.
Mr Dawson said the vehicle believed to have been involved in the crime was later found burnt.
Police recently charged bikies from both gangs, as well as associates, and seized 16 firearms, drugs and cash, Mr Dawson said.
In Sydney, interstate bikies were sent packing after allegedly threatening a police officer in August.
Armed police from the NSW State Crime Command’s Criminal Groups Squad hunted down more than 20 Rebels bikies from Western and South Australia after the incident at a western suburbs shopping centre on August 10.