Gun used in shooting on Stephen Dank found buried in backyard of bikie
A LOADED gun used in a shooting on disgraced sport scientist Stephen Dank’s home was found buried in the backyard of an outlaw bikie.
Law & Order
Don't miss out on the headlines from Law & Order. Followed categories will be added to My News.
THE gun used in a shooting on disgraced sport scientist Stephen Dank’s home was found buried in the backyard of an outlaw bikie.
The loaded Ruger GP100 revolver, wrapped in a T-shirt and in a plastic bag, was dug up by police at Comanchero Christian Hamilton’s Cranbourne West home in November 2016.
Ballistics experts linked the pistol to that used to pepper Dank’s Ascot Vale home with bullets just before 3am on July 23, 2016.
MORE NEWS: DRUG CASE AGAINST THOMPSON REVEALED
PRIEST A STEP CLOSER TO DEPORTATION
OCEAN GROVE DAD WILL ‘ONLY TALK FOR MONEY’
The shocking revelation surfaced as Hamilton, 33, faced Victoria’s County Court charged with his involvement in a cross-border drug ring allegedly lead by another Comanchero, Robert Ale.
The father of three was not charged over the Dank shoot-out.
He instead pleaded guilty to two counts of trafficking in a commercial quantity of a drug of dependence, and charges of trafficking and possessing a drug of dependence, and possessing a firearm while prohibited.
The court heard he hired a car and drove to Sydney where he collected almost a kilo of ice and 577g of cocaine — all on the promise he would be paid $10,000 from Mr Ale — on November 15, 2016.
He was arrested at a Euroa fuel station two days later.
A police raid on his home that night uncovered more ice and other drug paraphernalia, including 226g of blue ecstasy tablets.
It wasn’t until investigators tapped into conversations between Mr Ale and his then girlfriend in the days after that they were led back to Hamilton’s house to where the gun was.
On November 27, Mr Ale’s girlfriend visited Hamilton in a Shepparton jail, where he was being held on remand, to send him a message from her partner: “Sit tight and keep your mouth shut and it will be OK.”
Later, telling Mr Ale of the conversation she had with Hamilton, she revealed the prisoner was concerned about “the other tool” and revealed where it was, saying “it was urgent for what it was used for”.
When she asked Mr Ale why Hamilton would still have it, he replied: “Coz he’s a dumb c---.”
With the information at hand, police returned to Hamilton’s house and found the gun exactly where Mr Ale’s girlfriend had told Mr Ale.
Sentencing him to five and a half years jail for drug trafficking and weapons offences, Judge Paul Higham told Hamilton: “The firearm was kept by you on the instructions of others and for their ongoing criminal activity, not yours.”
Judge Higham condemned Hamilton’s offending as a drug courier, saying drug syndicates would not exist without willing participants like him.
“Those of us who sit in the criminal courts day after day are aware of this one simple truth: drugs are tearing the heart out of our community. So therefore, those who participate in what is an evil trade can expect to be punished,” he said.
Mr Ale was charged as the leader of the drug trafficking ring and will face court at a later date.
More than two years on police are yet to charge anyone over the Dank shooting.
The Herald Sun revealed a month after the shooting that police were looking into Dank’s links to the Comanchero motorcycle gang and that the shoot-out related to a debt he owed its boss, Mick Murray.
Dank, whose peptides program was at the centre of the Essendon Football Club’s 2012 drug scandal, vehemently denied the allegations.
“Certainly I don’t owe any money to Mick Murray or anyone else,” he told Herald Sun at the time.
He would not say whether he knew Murray, one of the nation’s most powerful crime figures.
Dank was hit in the head with a bullet fragment, suffering a broken nose and cut under his eye, in the shooting. His wife was asleep upstairs.
He told the Herald Sun after the attack that he would not be bullied or intimidated.