Operation Ironside: US names Aussies in AN0M sting

A fugitive Sydney drug lord and an Adelaide olive grove worker are among seven Australians the FBI has named as critical in the spy app which smashed global crime rings.

Former Comanchero sergeant-at-arms Baris Tukel, businessman Domenico Catanzariti, and fugitive Sydney drug lord Hakan Ayik have been accused by the FBI of playing important roles with “AN0M Enterprises’’, the group behind the spy app which has brought down the criminal underworld.

In a grand jury indictment unsealed overnight in the US, the FBI revealed it had hit 17 people with racketeering charges in relation to the distribution and administration of AN0M, including seven Australians.

This includes Ayik, who is on the run in Turkey, Tukel, who is also in Turkey, and Catanzariti, who is based in Adelaide where he works for an olive-growing business.

Domenico Catanzariti works for an Adelaide olive-growing business. Picture: Adelaide Advertiser

According to the indictment, the defendants were all involved with the encrypted AN0M app, which News Corp revealed on Tuesday was being secretly run by the FBI and monitored by Australian Federal Police in Canberra.

The FBI alleged the group behind the app had described it to potential clients as “designed by criminals, for criminals.’’

It said the 17 defendants were “leaders, members and associates of a criminal organisation – hereon known as the AN0M enterprise – where members engaged in activities involving drug trafficking, money-laundering and obstruction of justice.

“Since October 2019, AN0M has generated the Defendants millions of dollars in profits by facilitating the criminal activity of transnational criminal organisations and protected these organisations from law enforcement,’’ the indictment continues.

Fugitive Sydney drug lord Hakan Ayik.

The Australians hit with RICO charges are:

*Hakan Ayik, listed as Turkish citizen Joseph Hakan Ayik. He is accused of being an administrator and influencer who promoted AN0M.

*Domenico Catanzariti, from Adelaide, who is accused of being an administrator.

*Baris Tukel, a former Sydney Comanchero sergeant-at-arms who now resides in Turkey, who is accused of being a distributor and influencer.

*Erkan Yusef Dogan, who lives in Turkey and is accused of being a distributor and influencer.

*Shane Geoffrey May, who lives in Indonesia and is accused of being a distributor.

*Edwin Harmendra Kumar, from Australia, who is accused of being a distributor.

*Osemah Elhassen, who lives in Colombia, who is accused of being a distributor.

In a press conference in San Diego on Tuesday local time, Acting US lawyer for the Southern District of California, Randy Grossman said eight of the indicted defendants have been arrested and nine remained fugitives.

“(The defendants were) leaders, members and associates of a criminal organisation … AN0M Enterprise” who “operated throughout the world including Australia, Colombia, The Netherlands, Turkey, Thailand, Sweden, Spain and throughout the United States”, the indictment reads.

In Australia, the devices were sold for a subscription fee of A$1700 per six-month period, the court document says.

According to Mr Grossman, one AN0M user used the platform in February 2021 to talk with another user in Armenia about plans to shop six kilograms of cocaine from Carlsbad in north San Diego County to Australia using a legitimate business address to conceal the deal.

Mr Grossman said AN0M was used to exchange an invoice from a Lowes’ store in Carlsbad and to send a photo showing the bricks of cocaine.

“Operation Trojan Shield (the FBI inquiry) shined a light into the shadowy industry of hardened encrypted devices,” he added.

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