Emin Yavuz admits to role in Canberra MDMA importing syndicate while locked up at the Alexander Maconochie Centre
An inmate in a notoriously badly-run Canberra prison was the mastermind behind a party drug importation scheme which was overheard making demands through the jail phone system.
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A prisoner at Canberra’s notoriously badly-run prison, the Alexander Maconochie Centre, was able to run a drug syndicate that imported more than 2kg of party drugs from Europe.
Emin Yavuz, 30, appeared by video link in the ACT Supreme Court on Tuesday for the latest in a series of protracted and interrelated sentencing hearings stemming from two 2017 drug imports.
Court documents reveal Yavuz, who has pleaded guilty to importing a commercial amount of MDMA, “directed the activities of the syndicate” while he was a serving prisoner.
The syndicate’s first drug consignment involved more than 400g of MDMA, which arrived from Germany in mid 2017.
The second saw 1.7kg of the same drug arrive by airfreight from the United Kingdom in November 2017.
Yavuz agreed that one of his co-offenders, Peter Poulakis, purchased bitcoin with money provided by a third man, Lamborghini driving builder Youssef Jabal.
Yavuz also agreed that Bilal Badr-Eddeen Omari, a former Australian National University staffer, monitored the consignments and arranged for them to be collected, although Omari is separately disputing his precise role in the syndicate.
A series of bugged phone calls show Jabal saying “What’s he want, fifty grand or something?” in relation to a demand from inside jail that he come up with cash to fund the shipment.
Cryptically-worded phone calls between the men show then discussing the shipment from their overseas supplier “Mr Sock”.
“Did Sock get his, um surgery?”, Yavuz said in a phone call recorded on the prison phone system.
The first consignment of drugs was delivered to ANU disguised as a paint tin.
Poulakis said in a call to Yavuz: “My mate Sock, he was sending me some – some
information on this … thing here.”
“It was – it was interesting. It just made more sense in regards to the work he does. Like the painting and sh*t”.
The second delivery was sent to ANU under the guise of a “camping pan set”, and in the days after it arrived, Omari told Yavuz he had “very good” news which would benefit them both.
Poulakis also told Omari he didn’t need to worry about selling off a block of land he owned because he would soon have enough money to put “five storeys on there”.
The court on Tuesday heard that Yavuz had been behind bars for five years, having been jailed in 2015 after importing around $250,000 worth of MDMA, cocaine and amphetamine.
Yavuz’s legal team argues he should be spared a “crushing” jail sentence, having spent many of his formative years locked up.
Justice Chrissa Loukas-Karlsson will sentence Yavuz at a later date.