‘Granny Evil’ blasts man freed over her son’s murder
Underworld matriarch Kath Pettingill, famously known as Granny Evil, has revealed she penned a personal letter of thanks to Mick Gatto at the height of the Gangland War.
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Underworld matriarch Kath Pettingill has hit out at Faruk Orman — the man freed over the killing of her son, Victor Peirce.
Pettingill, 84, says she wants no sympathy from Orman who walked free after having his conviction for the murder of Peirce quashed as part of the Lawyer X scandal.
Mrs Pettingill said she read Orman’s statement that he was “sorry for your loss”.
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“I saw what Orman said about our trauma. It’s bull----,” she said. “We don’t need or want his sympathy. It’s beyond belief (Nicola) Gobbo acted in this way, lagging to the cops on her own clients.
“As for the cops, I still find it amazing they were so stupid … to use Nicola Gobbo as an informant. They were told from the start it would end in tears.”
Mrs Pettingill was famously known as Granny Evil during her brutal family’s campaign of terror across Melbourne in the 1980s.
She had eight sons including Victor, who was charged over the Walsh St police murders, and Dennis Allen who was thought to have murdered up to 13 people.
But she now lives a quiet life on a remote part of the Gippsland coast.
Mrs Pettingill said one of the few policemen she had any respect for, former homicide detective Ron Iddles, had warned against using Gobbo as an informant.
“Iddles always knew what he was doing. If he told them they were playing with fire with Gobbo, they should have listened,” she said.
“Now look at them. Half the top crims they’ve put inside are going to be out, same as Orman, just because they were too stupid to listen to good advice. “
Mrs Pettingill said if Orman wasn’t the getaway driver, then someone else was.
“Are the cops going to go after them? If there was someone else I want them brought to justice.
“I’ve never got over the way Victor was gunned down by that coward Veniamin. He got his whack from Mick Gatto, so that’s been taken care of.
“But if it wasn’t Orman, and someone else was driving the getaway car for Veniamin, they need bringing to justice. One way or another.
“If Mr Gatto hadn’t seen to Veniamin, someone else would. I’m not saying who or how, but the way he strutted around, he had it coming.
“He’d never have lived with my Victor if he hadn’t snuck up behind him the way he did. He would never have had the guts to meet him face to face.”
Nicola Gobbo, known as Lawyer X, has sparked a royal commission both into her conduct and her use by police as an informant.
Orman was childhood friends with Veniamin, and was charged with murder after being accused of driving the getaway car used in Peirce’s murder.
Orman’s conviction was quashed in the Court of Appeal last month after Director of Public Prosecutions Kerri Judd spoke of a “substantial miscarriage of justice” involving Gobbo’s role in ensuring a witness gave evidence against Orman.
After his successful appeal, Orman issued a statement saying: “I understand there is a victim in this matter, and his family. I am sorry for your loss. I hope you get the appropriate support and care that you need because I understand that this process will have been just as traumatic for you as it was for me.
Thank you letter for Gatto for killing ‘coward’ Veniamin
It was Australia’s most unlikely thank-you letter.
Kath Pettingill has revealed she penned a personal letter of thanks to Mick Gatto after he shot Andrew “Benji” Veniamin.
Underworld hitman Veniamin was widely known as the executioner of her son Victor, killed in his car in Port Melbourne in 2002.
“Yes I wrote to Mick Gatto,” Mrs Pettingill said.
“I can’t remember exactly what I said, it was so long ago, but I wanted him to know I was grateful to him.
“Veniamin was a terrible person and Mick Gatto did everyone a favour by getting rid of him, and I wanted him to know that.
“As far as I remember he never replied to my letter.”
Gatto was charged with murdering Veniamin in the back of a Carlton restaurant in March 2004, but was found not guilty at trial on the grounds of self-defence.
Of her eight boys Mrs Pettingill was closest to Victor. When eldest son Dennis turned against her during his drug binges, Victor was on hand to intervene.
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In 1978, Kath had her eye shot out and Victor threatened to shoot the two women responsible. Dennis stopped him.
When she was kidnapped in the mid-1980s, held captive by three of Dennis’s ex-soldiers, Victor appealed for her rescue.
She never told Dennis her kidnappers’ names. “I don’t know if Dennis would have killed them, but I know someone else who would have,” she said, referring to Victor.
Adrian Tame is a veteran reporter and the author of The Matriarch: The Story of ‘Granny Evil’ Kathy Petingill, first published in 1996 and newly revised and updated.