Police to launch probe into Nicola Gobbo’s information on Carl Williams’ death
A police probe has been launched into information Nicola Gobbo gave to officers in 2010 about the Barwon Prison murder of gangland boss Carl Williams.
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A police probe has been launched into information Nicola Gobbo gave to officers in 2010 about the Barwon Prison murder of gangland boss Carl Williams.
The first witness at the Lawyer X royal commission, Assistant Commissioner Neil Paterson, on Wednesday revealed that Gobbo repeatedly gave information to detectives in the days after Williams was bludgeoned to death with an exercise bike seat by fellow inmate Matthew Johnson.
The Herald Sun has also been told that Gobbo later met four times with detectives from Taskforce Driver, which took over the investigation into Williams’ jail execution.
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WILLIAMS COMPLAINED TO TOP JUDGE ABOUT GOBBO
The development was detailed in a 71-page statement tendered by Mr Paterson, which also included a damning assessment of the police management of Gobbo by former chief commissioner Neil Comrie in 2012.
Mr Comrie’s report identified systemic issues with the police’s use and handling of Gobbo. Her handlers had “potentially encouraged” her to reveal information bound by legal professional privilege, and “may not have fully appreciated the legal and ethical issues” of using her, he said.
Carl Williams was murdered on April 19, 2010.
Mr Paterson said: “On 20, 22 and 28 April 2010, Ms Gobbo provided Victoria Police with information concerning the murder of Carl Williams.
“Taskforce Landow (set up to unravel the extent of Gobbo’s informing) is conducting further inquiries but, on the basis of the information presently available, it has not identified a nexus between the information Ms Gobbo provided to Victoria Police and Mr Johnson’s conviction,” Mr Paterson said.
FIRST CRIMINAL LAWYER X INFORMED ON WAS EX-BOYFRIEND
The Herald Sun has been told Gobbo met with detectives from the Ceja taskforce — probing corrupt drug squad detectives — while she was acting for druglords Tony Mokbel and Williams.
But the officers were suspicious of her motives, believing she was trying to get information from them to help her gangland clients.
Mr Paterson told the commission that one of the issues Taskforce Ceja discovered in its investigation of the police drug squad was inappropriate relationships with informers.
One of the officers investigated by Taskforce Ceja was corrupt cop Sgt Wayne Strawhorn — with whom Gobbo developed a relationship in 1997 after his drug squad arrested three of her clients.
NEIL PATERSON’S STATEMENT
Mr Paterson said drug squad officers assessed her on becoming a human source in July 1998.
But one detective said she was unsuitable because she was a solicitor, was “too overt in her desire to provide information to police”, and “her relationships with some officers were inappropriate”.
During her meetings with officers, she had alleged that her employer was involved in fraudulent activity, he said.
In 1999, police started Operation Ramsden — a fraud squad investigation against her then-employer. That year she was registered by detective Jeff Pope and assigned human source number MFG13.
The operation was abandoned without the laying of any charges.
Mr Paterson told the commission the first person Gobbo informed on was her de facto boyfriend, while she was a university student. But the sting operation was also abandoned because she was deemed a “loose cannon”.
Gobbo was arrested with Brian Wilson in 1993 when officers raided his Carlton home finding drugs and cash, and she was fined without conviction for drug offences.
GOBBO’S INFORMER FORM
GANGLAND PLAYER’S DEADLY MEAL WITH CARL
Although Mr Paterson told the commission there was no evidence she provided information on the 1993 arrest of Mr Wilson, she kept in contact with the arresting officer Trevor Ashton until 1995.
Officer Tim Argall and Sgt Ashton registered her as a human source by filling out a form, which said Gobbo was a law student living with a criminal, “was reliable and a genuinely wanted to assist police”.
She introduced Wilson to an undercover officer in 1996 but the operation was abruptly abandoned after Jack Blayney, then a senior sergeant and later an assistant commissioner, found her to be a “loose cannon” who was “making her own arrangements and not liaising with investigators”. Blayney also referred to her controversial involvement in a political scandal in 1996 that made national headlines. Mr Paterson said she was not considered reliable enough for the investigation to proceed.
Counsel assisting the commission, Chris Winneke, noted that in 2007 Mr Blayney sat on the Petra Taskforce steering committee — which investigated the murders of police informers Christine and Terence Hodson.