Underworld murder of Willy Thompson toppled the Carl Williams empire
IT’S the forgotten murder in Melbourne’s bloody underworld war. But the execution of bit-part actor Willy Thompson set in motion a train of events that would topple Carl Williams’s empire.
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MELBOURNE’S underworld war was a conflict full of violent chain reactions.
Lewis Moran died to avenge the death of Andrew Veniamin.
Jason Moran died as payback for shooting Carl Williams in the leg.
But few of the murders of this bloody era would have the kind of long-term impact generated by the execution of Willy Thompson in July 2003.
Thompson had just left a gymnasium in Chadstone when his killers struck as he climbed into his $80,000 Honda convertible.
His fancy wheels became a deathtrap — the strong and fit Thompson left with nowhere to run as a van and a Ford Falcon boxed him in on Waverley Rd.
Within seconds, a gunman had pounced to complete Melbourne’s umpteenth gangland ambush of the era.
But because of who he was, the matter was never going to end there.
As well as being an accomplished kickboxer, the low-key Thompson was respected and extremely well-connected in the underworld.
His mates included old schoolmate and drug lord Tony Mokbel and a group of veteran armed robbers, sophisticated criminals linked to major heists over many years.
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There is no doubt they would have been enraged by what had happened to their friend.
Two months later, a man with nothing to do with the killing was condemned to death in a meeting at a suburban fast food restaurant.
There to discuss cold-blooded revenge over hot BBQ chicken were a gangland A-list of Mokbel, Carl Williams, his father George and three other people.
One was later to tell investigators that Mokbel believed a drug dealer and hot-dog salesman called Michael Marshall was responsible for Thompson’s death.
The witness said Mokbel offered Carl $300,000 for Marshall’s murder, a contract the younger Williams was happy to accept.
“When I shook hands with Tony, he passed a piece of paper to me which had the details of Marshall’s address. It also said he drove a white Hi-Lux,” the witness testified.
Williams, known for his keen sense of humour, might have had a private chuckle to himself as the offer was made.
Only he knew Thompson died on his orders and he was now copping $100,000 of the kill fee to help Mokbel get square.
What wasn’t so funny was that the job would also prove his undoing.
The two men he engaged for the killing were already under heavy scrutiny over another Williams-commissioned crime, the murders of Jason Moran and Pasquale Barbaro at a children’s footy clinic at Essendon earlier that year.
Homicide squad crew two — aware something big was afoot — had organised surveillance in the car ultimately used in the Marshall killing.
When he was gunned down at South Yarra in front of his five-year-old son, both shooter and wheelman were arrested within hours.
They were both to later implicate Williams and bring his empire crashing down.
Mokbel, now doing time for high-level drug trafficking, was later charged with the Marshall murder but the prosecution was ultimately dropped.
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