Blood gushing from his neck and wearing only a claret-soaked white shirt and black underpants, the tattooed hulk of a man leaps from a balcony and runs directly into oncoming Wynnum Rd traffic.
Stunned bystanders watch in terror as he dodges cars coming towards him at 70kmh.
More than one witness urgently pulls out their mobile phone and shakily dials Triple-0.
It’s a scene that could be the climax of an action movie, except it’s happening at 11am outside the Quest serviced apartments – the type of place you stay if you’re on a business trip or a city holiday with the family – in sleepy Cannon Hill, a 15-minute drive east of Brisbane’s centre.
The man, who has the taut muscular frame of a gym junkie and eyes wide as dinner plates, is either running for his life or has a death wish.
When police arrive moments later he mutters that someone has slit his throat trying to murder him.
But when officers burst into room 207A expecting to arrest his attacker, no one is there.
Instead of a would-be killer they find a clip-seal bag containing 2.6g of white powder – which lab experts later analysed to be cocaine cut with animal de-wormer and local anaesthetic.
More white powder is strewn across the bedside table, next to two swipecard-style room keys.
Police speak to witnesses and uncover the surprising truth: The man has cut open his own neck while high on cocaine and jumped off his balcony before running fearlessly into traffic that humid morning in November 2019.
Fast forward to April this year and the same man is raging at South Brisbane’s Novotel Hotel.
Agitated at a concierge, he picks up an electric kettle and snarls “I am going to smash you now” while grabbing the terrified hotel staffer by the shirt.
All the concierge had done was request that the man pack up and leave the hotel because it was 90 minutes past check-out time.
Police who were called in to deal with the outburst found cocaine on the bedside table.
Welcome to the dangerous world of Zivko Stojakovic.
Brutal Comanchero bikie. Cocaine addict. Gangster. Bankrupt. Owner of a hair-trigger temper.
If you’re in any doubt, he’s got “Bad Company” – a Bandidos OMCG motto – tattooed in an elaborate script from his shoulder across the top of his chest.
There’s an AK-47 tattooed on the back of his neck – the barrel pointed into his left ear.
The ink that covers his back is both pure menace – two large pistols – and pure business – large dollar and cent signs with the slogan: “If it doesn’t make dollars it doesn’t make sense.”
This is a man you hope like hell you don’t cross paths with – particularly during one of his frightening, violent meltdowns, which happen a little too often around Brisbane.
A man who has been jailed five times for crimes including savage bashings – one the drunken assault of a police office – and, in his own estimation, has been hospitalised about 20 times for drug-induced psychosis.
This one-time newspaper delivery boy lists his official occupation as labourer. And Zivko has previously also been a plasterer, tiler and tattoo parlour owner.
But don’t expect to see him coming dressed in hi-viz.
Stojakovic’s fashion sense is decidedly more designer label than blue collar. Think Gucci not King Gee.
His on-again, off-again partner is bikini model and social media influencer – a one-time cover girl calendar cover girl in lad’s magazine FHM.
And he has good taste in holidays.
He missed reporting for bail at Annerley police station in February because he was catching the sun on tropical Hamilton Island. (He’d previously been accused of forging a medical certificate from his doctor another time when he was a no-show)
As a kid Stojakovic was a soccer prodigy, representing the Queensland Academy of Sport.
But now his most favourite pastime of all?
Finding trouble. And lots of it.
The Bosnian-born Stojakovic was jailed for two months after hitting a student in the back of the head and kicking him outside Fortitude Valley’s The Beat nightclub four days after Christmas in 2012.
He was at the scene of the infamous Broadbeach brawl in 2013 and is a former sergeant-at-arms of the Brisbane Bandidos Centro chapter, which became the Comancheros when the Newman government VLAD laws were brought to wipe out bikies in the aftermath of the beachside bikie clash.
And now he’s part of a motley crew of criminals that includes two killers, a violent robber, a cocaine trafficker and several nightclub brawlers, who are squarely the focus of a police operation that is watching their every move.
The Courier Mail and Sunday Mail can for the first time peel back the lid on the tight-knit Brisbane underworld after Queensland police exposed in court the names of 18 “recognised offenders” detectives allege are up to no good at some of Brisbane’s A-list spots.
Nine of these men have been charged with habitual consorting, including Stojakovic, high-profile bikie George Bejat, Coffee Club manager William Adib Samra, West End butchery shop owner Amein Odeh, labourer Paea Talakai, former timberyard worker Matthew Kevin Mackay, sales rep Grigori Kossian and personal trainer Mehran Faraji.
A further 11 – including convicted killers Marko Cokara and Bogdan Cuic, and former national level Bandidos powerbroker Sava Cvetkovic have been named by police as associates of the nine men in documents filed in the Supreme Court.
Four others – Laser clinic owner Abdullah Odeh, Jakov Beslic, Joshua Hardy and Harry Reynolds – have been identified by police and named in court documents as partying with the group.
The 2013 VLAD crackdown, with its solitary confinement, pink jumpsuits and mandatory sentencing was the booming loud speaker and iron fist of bikie crackdowns.
That was a show no mercy, Campbell Newman-style.
Eight years on, in Annastacia Palaszczuk’s Queensland, police are trying to tackle the gangs more quietly using her government’s consorting laws – which came into effect in March 2017 and make it illegal for a person to meet one or more recognised offenders in person or chat with them on the phone, or Facebook.
They don’t have to be meeting to plan a crime.
However, a revolving door of multiple consorting warning notices involving the same criminals – and the fact they need to be prosecuted for ignoring warnings – suggest these gangsters are hardly scared witless of the laws.
The aim of police is to get up in their faces and make their life difficult by deterring them from communicating.
But detectives have accused the group of blatantly ignoring warnings to steer clear of each other by catching up at events ranging from a baby’s christening celebration or sharing pizza in South Brisbane, to boozy nights out on the town at Brisbane’s trendiest rooftop bars.
Police have been making regular visits to these hangouts and told some of the men to leave, and banned them from the nightclub hotspot for 24 hours.
They allege some of them have intimidated patrons and staff at venues popular with regular Brisbane residents just out celebrating a special occasion.
And hoteliers don’t want this group taking up residency.
This is zero tolerance for a group of Brisbane bad boys, who shamelessly flaunt their lifestyles and wealth.
These are not Nike bikies, but Gucci gangsters and cocaine is not the only ‘Gram they’re into.
The guys are hiding in plain sight with selfies and photos chronicling their lives, rubbing shoulders with the city’s elite at Brisbane’s best restaurants and nightclubs, and faithfully posted on Instagram and Facebook for the world to Like.
In 2021, even the underworld is overexposed.
In one of his many images online, Stojakovic is wearing a shirt bearing an image of a skull and the slogan: “I am the guy your parents warned you about.”
According to documents filed in one of his many court matters last year, Stojakovic told his psychologist James Freeman that he was trying to kick his cocaine habit.
It was his mates, he told Professor Freeman, who introduced him to cocaine when he was 21. He became hooked and occasionally it made him psychotic.
The psychologist concluded that Stojakovic’s five jail stints could be traced back to “his alignment” with a negative “pro drug… peer support group” and cocaine addiction.
That’s professional speak for hanging with the seriously wrong crowd.
PROFILED: WHO THE BIKIES ARE
George Bejat, 34
Fish and chip shop owner and owns a personal training business at Goodlife Health Clubs. Lives in Newstead/Hamilton.
One of the most high-profile former bikies in Brisbane.
Former president of Bandidos Centro chapter, said to be the son of a psychiatrist from Sarajevo who later lived in public housing at Morningside after immigrating to Australia.
Used to own tattoo parlours in Milton with Zivko Stojakovic and used to drive a $165,000 yellow Lamborghini Gallardo.
Court documents state Bejat allegedly consorted with Zivko Stojakovic, William Samra, Mehran Faraji and Matthew Mackay between July 2020 and June 2021. The case is still before the courts
He has a colourful past with police.
Bejat was sentenced to two months’ jail, suspended for a year, for a “violent pack assault” of a former footballer outside Mr Mista nightclub in February 2020. Matthew Mackay and Paea Talakai were also convicted over the attack.
In 2018, he was sentenced to an 18-month jail term but released immediately on a five-year, good-behaviour bond for evading more than $74,000 in tax.
In 2016, he was fined for public nuisance for threatening to kill a Fortitude Valley security guard when he was denied entry to The Met, on Wickham St, about 2.20am on New Year’s Day 2015.
He pleaded guilty to public nuisance for his role in the Broadbeach bikie brawl in 2013 and was fined $1750.
He was charged over the extortion of celebrity hairdresser Fadi Haddad in 2013 but charges were dropped in 2016.
Bejat was previously romantically linked to lads model Krystle Kavvadas, 31.
Zivko Stojakovic (known as Cole online), 34
Labourer, from Woolloongabba.
Stojakovic is the former sergeant-at-arms of the Brisbane Bandidos Centro chapter.
Born in Bosnia, he used to own tattoo parlours in Milton with George Bejat.
He lives in the Palazzo Brisbane high-rise apartment building and is often found living in various hotels around Brisbane.
Last year he said he was working as a labourer.
He was sentenced to one year in prison with immediate parole in August 2021 for consorting with George Bejat, William Samra, Sava Cvetkovic, Mehran Faraji and Matthew Mackay.
This sentence includes a conviction for assault by grabbing a hotel concierge and threatening to smash him, and possession of cocaine at Palazzo Versace.
He is currently charged with driving unlicensed along Cavendish Rd, Mount Gravatt East, on October 15, 2021, at 7.42pm. He was charged by Taskforce Maxima officers for this unlicensed driving.
His previous history with police is also colourful.
He was jailed for two months in 2014 after he pleaded guilty to assault occasioning bodily harm after hitting a student in the back of the head and kicking him outside The Beat nightclub, in Fortitude Valley, in the early hours of December 29, 2012.
Stojakovic was wearing a shirt with a Bandidos insignia at the time.
Maxima police found 1.64g of cocaine in the front right pocket of his pants as Stojakovic sat at a table in the pool area with five other alleged bikies at Hellenika, in The Calile Hotel, on July 19, 2020. He told police it was “salt”. He was convicted and sentenced to six months’ prison in August 2021 with immediate parole.
In August 2021, he was convicted for possession of cocaine at Quest apartments Cannon Hill over an incident in November 2019, and was convicted for a $60 taxi fare evasion and ordered to repay the debt.
In April 2021, he was convicted of common assault charges of a Novotel Brisbane South Bank concierge manager. He got 12 months’ prison with immediate parole.
He was charged with faking a doctor’s certificate so he did not have to report for bail, but this charge was later dropped.
He was bankrupted in 2018 over a $250,000 tax debt and remains bankrupt today.
Police accused Stojakovic of extorting celebrity hairdresser Fadi Haddad in 2013 over a construction debt. However, prosecutors dropped the extortion charge in 2015.
He was also charged over the Broadbeach bikie brawl in 2013 but the charges were dropped.
His partner of seven years, with whom he has an on-again off-again relationship is Mel Jordan, a former Zoo Magazine bikini model turned Instagram influencer. They have a daughter Rainha, aged four.
He once told his psychologist “when I’m fully clean we will get back together”.
He completed primary school in Bosnia, moving to Australia in 1999 with his parents.
He went to Coorparoo and Cavendish state high school where he completed Year 12.
He played state level soccer and went to the Queensland Academy of Sport and played soccer nationwide.
He delivered newspapers aged 14 before working as a plasterer and tiler from 18 to 19 before buying and running two tattoo stores with George Bejat.
His cocaine habit and a tax debt saw him sell them.
He has back tattoos of “if it doesn’t make dollars it doesn’t make sense” and a neck tattoo of a gun.
William Adib Samra, 32
Coffee Club manager and supermarket manager, from Doolandella.
On October 15, he was convicted of consorting with George Bejat, Zivko Stojakovic, Matthew Mackay and Sava Cvetkovic after being given consorting warning notices containing 15 names.
He was not punished as he had already served jail time on remand when bail was refused earlier.
Samra has a 1 per cent tattoo on his right lower leg.
He pleaded guilty to affray in court in March after he grabbed a man by the collar while his mate punched him to the back of the head, kicking and stomping on the man, who was later taken to hospital with head injuries. The man had spat at his Samra’s sister, Vanessa.
The attack occurred at Fortitude Valley open-air rooftop restaurant-bar Maya Mexican.
William manages The Coffee Club, at Forest Lake, in Brisbane’s western suburbs and also manages a barber shop in the area, performing both jobs along with his father Andre, who ran Ipswich’s Switch Nightclub for three months until it closed in December 2017.
Sister Vanessa is the former girlfriend of Ivan Tumara, a flashily-dressed carers pensioner who was found guilty of charges including trafficking in ice and cocaine between December 18, 2017, and February 5, 2019.
She opened trendy West End Lebanese restaurant Beirut Bazaar in May and is the godmother of Cali Mackay, the daughter of Matthew Kevin Mackay.
Mehran Faraji, 36
Personal trainer and former financial advisor, from Kangaroo Point.
He went to Cavendish Road SHS at Holland Park. He was born in Iran.
Faraji is a keen Muay Thai kickboxer.
Facebook shows trips to Spain, Brazil, Thailand.
He intends to plead guilty on December 1 in Brisbane Magistrates Court to consorting with George Bejat and Zivko Stojakovic .
Faraji was found not guilty of two rape charges and had two rape charges discontinued at a District Court trial in 2011.
The charges were in relation to the alleged gang rape of a 17-year-old girl in an inner city Brisbane apartment in 2007. His co-accused were also acquitted.
On May 29, 2020, police from the tactical crime squad found a taser in Faraji’s apartment in the Spire Residences on Queen St, in Brisbane’s CBD, and he was also pulled over the same day on Ann St in the city for driving without a licence.
He was given a three-month suspended prison sentence for the Taser and a $400 fine for driving without a licence.
Just days later Taskforce Maxima police searched his home and found unlawfully obtained erection drugs Tadalafil and Sildenafil at Faraji’s Queen St Brisbane apartment. He was fined $450 by the court.
He was sentenced to three months’ prison, suspended for two years, in magistrate’s court on December 4, 2020, for unlawful possession, weapons, and possessing drug utensils.
Matthew Kevin Mackay, 32
Used to work at Bootle Timber, lives in Hamilton.
He will enter his guilty plea in court on November 25 to consorting with George Bejat and Zivko Stojakovic.
Mackay was convicted for affray last year over punching a former footballer as the man lay unconscious on the road outside Fortitude Valley’s Mr Mista nightclub on February 23.
Mackay was also convicted of possessing steroids and the party drug fantasy on the same date. This attack also involved Bejat and Talakai.
He has a previous conviction over a brawl for punching a soldier outside Casablanca nightclub in Caxton St, Paddington, in February 2012. He donned his Bandido leather vest and punched the soldier, and his two Bandido mates joined in.
In September 2018, he successfully overturned his conviction for assault occasioning actual bodily harm after a nightclubber was sucker-punched on September 25, 2016, at Blackbird, on the river at Eagle St.
The nightclubber who accused Mackay told the court that men called Amin and Mehran were also present at the club that night. They were not charged.
His partner is Jasmine Mackay who has a hair extensions business. They have a daughter.
Paea Langiotu Talakai, 30
Labourer, from Logan Central.
On August 31, Talakai was charged with consorting with George Bejat and Zivko Stojakovic at The Calile Hotel, in Fortitude Valley, court documents state. The case is still before the courts.
His previous convictions include August last year when Talakai was sentenced to six months’ prison suspended for 15 months for affray at the Mr Mista nightclub in February last year.
He was also handed a 12-month banning order, banning him from Fortitude Valley.
In 2018, a magistrate in the ACT concluded that Talakai was a member of the Comancheros when Talakai pleaded guilty to affray after he was involved in a brawl at Capital Men’s Club, a strip club in Canberra on August 20, 2017, after the Comanchero’s annual run to Canberra.
Amien Odeh, 30
From Woolloongabba. Runs and owns butcher shop in West End.
Amien Odeh has been charged with consorting with Zivko Stojakovic, and George Bejat at The Calile Hotel, in Fortitude Valley, court documents state. The case is still before the courts.
He is married to a former Commonwealth Bank teller-turned drug trafficker Mary Vincent Molloy.
Last year, Molloy was given a suspended three-year sentence for trafficking in MDMA and selling cocaine. The suspended sentence was partly due to the fact that she was six months pregnant.
Amein was convicted of possessing cocaine at The Calile Hotel, in Fortitude Valley, on July 19 last year, when he was charged with consorting. He pleaded guilty and he was sentenced to three months in prison, suspended for nine months. A conviction was recorded. In January 2017, he was convicted of weapons possession, and drug possession and was sentenced to two months’ prison, suspended for a year. In September that year he was sentenced to 18 months’ prison for wounding in November 2014, but was released on immediate parole.
Grigori Kossian, 33
A sales rep, from Bridgeman Downs.
He was charged with consorting with Bejat, Zivko Stojakovic, Samra, and Cvetkovic at Hotel x, 458 Brunswick, St Fortitude Valley.
He is the godfather of Matthew Mackay’s daughter, and is manager of Bejat’s fish and chip shop.
He used to sell bodybuilding shakes from his Supplements Lounge store in Fortitude Valley – from the site of the old Whiskey Au Go Go nightclub.
He was charged over the Broadbeach bikie brawl but the charges were later dropped.
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