Murdered Sydney gangster linked to most wanted criminal James Dalamangas
Slain underworld figure John Macris was seen clubbing with one of Australia’s most wanted men James Dalamangas just weeks before his street execution in Greece. Dalamangas tops the list of the nation’s Seven Deadly Sinners, wanted for questioning by NSW police over two brutal Sydney murders.
Underworld figure John Macris who was dramatically executed in Greece last October had been in contact with one of Australia’s most wanted men James Dalamangas.
Macris, who led an international drug syndicate, moved to Athens in 2009 about the time Dalamangas, known as Jimmy to his mates, was put at the top of the NSW Police most wanted list, with a $200,000 bounty on his head.
The NSW man tops the list of the nation’s Seven Deadly Sinners who with cunning, contacts and disguises have eluded capture by police and in some instances other crims who they have crossed.
Dalamangas, on the NSW Police most wanted list, has been living in Athens since he fled Australia in 1999, initially to work as a bouncer in the Greek capital before quickly moving back into the local criminal mileau.
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The dual national was in 1997 suspected in the execution-style murder of bouncer and concreter Tim Voukelatos, shot five times in the head as he sat in his car in the Sydney suburb of Campsie
Two years later Dalamangas allegedly stabbed to death father of two George Giannopoulos who had been innocently attempting to intervene in a fight between Dalamangas and another male in a fight at a Greek community evening at a Sydney nightclub. The 32-year-old gentle giant George was knifed in the neck and stomach at the Pariziana club at Belmore in Sydney’s south west.
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Dalamangas then used a false passport to get out of the country. He has been described by those that knew him and also investigated him as one of the most violent people they have ever encountered,
News Corp Australia can now reveal the 48-year-old and Macris began moving in the same organised crime circles including expat Aussies and even at a time lived in the same Voula district.
The pair was seen together at a number of nightclubs just weeks before Macris was gunned down.
“We know he is there in Athens and on the islands but getting extradition from there is really difficult,’’ a senior NSW Police officers said.
Macris was shot dead in October last year with dramatic footage captured by CCTV of the assassin running up to his car and blasting him through the driver’s window before Macris staggered out of his car and tried to run away before being shot further. A murder investigation continues.
Known to some as just the head of a legitimate security firm, on Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) files Macris was boss of an international drug-smuggling syndicate whose membership reads like a Who’s Who of the Sydney underworld including notorious figures Comanchero bikie gang president Mark Buddle, a senior Hells Angels figure and NSW’s most wanted fugitive Hakan Ayik.
His drugs trafficking empire stretched from Spain and Greece to Sydney and Dubai where his profits were laundered by associates and many Australian criminal fugitives live and play, notably about the resorts at up-market Jumeirah district.
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