High Court told Roger Rogerson confessed to being a serial killer

The jury that convicted disgraced detectives Roger Rogerson and Glen McNamara of murder should have been told how Rogerson once confessed to being a serial killer with a badge, the High Court has been told.

The jury that convicted disgraced detectives Roger Rogerson and Glen McNamara of murder should have been told that Rogerson had confessed to being a serial killer with a badge, McNamara has argued in the High Court.

McNamara, 63, said he should have been able to tell the jury of his former friend Rogerson’s “capacity for fearless lethal violence”.

Rogerson, 81, and McNamara were convicted and jailed for life in 2016 after a joint trial for the 2014 murder of drug dealer Jamie Gao, 20. Gao was lured to a Padstow storage shed where he was shot dead before the crooked cops stole his 2.78kg of crystal meth worth up to $19 million on the street.

CCTV captured the three men going inside the unit but only Rogerson and McNamara coming out. Gao’s body was later found floating off the coast.

Both men have lost appeals in the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal but McNamara has been granted special leave to appeal to the High Court after his lawyers argued it involved an important point of law.

Former Detective Roger Rogerson is led to a prison van at the NSW Supreme Court in Sydney, Friday, June 3, 2016. Picture: David Moir)

McNamara’s barrister Guy Reynolds SC has argued that it was a general law principle that even when there are two accused in a joint trial, there are two separate cases and that a defendant must be “completely free to meet the charge against him by all legitimate and relevant means”.

The trial judge ruled out McNamara’s sensational evidence of Rogerson’s alleged confessions to six murders or conspiracy to murder on the ground it would be too prejudicial to Rogerson.

Glen McNamara leaves NSW Supreme Court King Street after appearing in the stand during his murder trial, Picture Craig Greenhill

McNamara argues the judge was wrong.

McNamara has argued it added to his claim he had acted “under duress” because of Rogerson’s threats.

He said the judge was wrong to exclude his evidence that Rogerson told him he had killed or conspired to kill conspired to Michael Drury, Christopher Flannery, Alan Williams, Warren Lanfranchi, Sallie-Anne Huckstepp and Luton Chur.

Former drug squad cop Mr Drury survived being shot through the kitchen window of his Sydney home in 1984.

20 year old Jamie Gao, the UTS student believed to be mudered by former NSW police officers Glen McNamara and Roger Rogerson Pic: Supplied

Roger Rogerson and Glen McNamara captured on CCTV footage on the day of Jamie Gao's murder Pic : supplied

Hitman Christopher Flannery has not been seen since he left his apartment in Sydney’s The Connaught building in 1985.

Melbourne drug dealer Williams was a mate of Flannery’s.

Rogerson had previously claimed he had only shot Lanfranchi after the drug dealer pulled a gun on him in Dangar Place.

McNamara said Rogerson told him prostitute Huckstepp, who was drowned in Centennial Park in 1986, “had to go” because she had become a nuisance and he helped his “Chinese friends” get rid of heroin dealer Chu.

The trial judge had also ruled the jury could not hear McNamara’s claim that after he shot Gao, Rogerson told him: “I did Drury, I did Drury. I‘ll do you too”.

The Crown has argued the trial judge was correct and that the courts were familiar with joint trial where two co‑accused “seek to run cut‑throat defences – each seeking to inculpate the other”.

The High Court has yet to hear the appeal.