The Fasta Pasta Connection II: Gaetano Del Giglio jailed for Adelaide to Cairns drug pipeline

It started with crates of cannabis mailed across the country to a Fasta Pasta – but this homegrown drug ring’s rapid expansion soon disintegrated into infighting.

Gaetano Del Giglio hadn’t felt the spray of the ocean on his face in years.

Long days of his multi-year prison sentence were spent staring at the wall of the cell, a long way away from the ocean on which he had spent much of his life.

But in June this year, two years and ten months after he was arrested in Queensland as part of an interstate drug trafficking operation, former Adelaide fisherman Del Giglio posted photos on social media of himself back on the water.

The road to release was not a short one, with several of Del Giglio’s associates pulled into the wake of his million dollar drug caper.

In March 2018, Queensland and South Australian Police along with Australian Federal Police brought to an end Operation Aymara – a targeted investigation into the flow of drugs from Adelaide to Cairns.

All up 34 people across both states were arrested and charged with 96 offences.

Police seized 3.722kg of methamphetamine, more than 250g of cocaine, 3051 MDMA pills, 921 LSD tablets, 7.5kg of cocaine and 250g of ecstasy.

The methamphetamine alone had a street value of up to $3.7m.

Police seized through the courts houses, motorbikes, cars and boats as the proceeds of crime.

At the centre of the operation was Del Giglio – also known as the “Cyclone” because he was always on the move.

Former Adelaide resident and convicted drug runner Gaetano Del Giglio. Picture: Facebook.

Gaetano Del Giglio (centre) with his co-accused Domenic Frisone. Both were linked to large-scale trafficking of drugs from Adelaide to Cairns.

Del Giglio had moved from Adelaide to Cairns in 2014. He had spent most of his life as a commercial fisherman was a certified master of coastal marine operations.

In Cairns, Del Giglio caught up with another Adelaide ex-pat – Valentino La Vista.

Mr La Vista had run the Salisbury Fasta Pasta before moving up to Cairns to take over management of a Fasta Pasta in the middle of the city.

Mr La Vista told a jury in Adelaide years later that he had believed Del Giglio was a self-employed boat charger manager and fisherman.

“He was always talking about bigger and better boats,” he said.

Del Giglio asked if he could get packages delivered to the Fasta Pasta, saying he lived 15km outside the city and it would be easier to pick the packages up from the city.

Mr La Vista, who is not facing any allegations of knowing what was in the packages, agreed.

Between January and November 2017, 39 consignments were delivered to the Cairns Fasta Pasta in Del Giglio’s name.

The container for each package was purchased at Officeworks in Parafield and Gilles Plains in Adelaide.

Mr La Vista was told the boxes contained fishing lures, but in fact they contained pounds of cannabis from Adelaide.

Gaetano Del Giglio – former Adelaide professional fisherman turned one-time drug kingpin.

Del Giglio was purchasing the cannabis for $2300 a pound and then selling it to two dealers for $3450 a pound.

Over the 10-month period Del Giglio imported 350 pounds of the drug and had a turn over of around $1.2m.

He sent cash totalling under $100,000 to Anthony Vitale in Adelaide – who was later convicted by a jury of receiving tainted cash.

Del Giglio was looking for a bagman and recruited former Queensland One Nation candidate Dominic Frisone – who collected around $350,000 cash from the dealers.

But even the best laid plans can go awry, especially when Frisone was punched in the face by Del Giglio for checking out his girlfriend.

Frisone pleaded guilty to money laundering and was given a two-year suspended sentence.

Del Giglio corresponded with his dealers and suppliers over the encrypted app Wickr but was occasionally careless and his messages would be intercepted.

In June 2017, Del Giglio looked to expand, introducing cocaine into his regular shipments to the Fasta Pasta and was importing ounces of the drug which he would sell for $8000.

When one of his prime dealers in Cairns, who ran his own syndicate of minor street dealers, received 100 pounds of cannabis but refused to pay $345,000 and was playing hard to get, Del Giglio called in the big guns.

In October 2017, Del Giglio sent messages to a supplier in Adelaide asking them to send a couple of “hard boys” up from Adelaide to put the frighteners into the dealer.

“He’s f***ed, they’re not going to stop at that, he’s finished,” Del Giglio wrote.

To play it safe, Del Giglio recruited a local tough – described as a six-foot-six, 140-kilogram Samoan man – and went to the dealer’s house where he camped out for two days waiting to enforce the debt.

Fortunately the dealer and his pregnant girlfriend did not return home.

Del Giglio was arrested in March 2018 as multiple houses across Adelaide and Cairns were raided.

He was released on bail but went to the house of one of his co-accused where a listening device had been covertly installed and asked him to sign a false statutory declaration saying no drugs had been delivered to the restaurant.

Del Giglio was arrested for a second time and this time remanded in custody – charged with attempting to pervert justice along with breaking into the dealer’s house, trafficking cannabis and supplying cocaine.

On October 26, 2021 Queensland District Court Judge Tracey Fantin passed sentence on Del Giglio.

MDMA tablets seized by police during the Oscar Aymara operation. Picture: Supplied

She has heard during submissions that Del Giglio was not addicted to drugs, but to making money off selling drugs.

“It must break your parents’ hearts to have you in custody, but, unfortunately, that is simply a product of your deliberate choice to commit these offences,” she said.

She sentenced Del Giglio to eight-and-a-half years in prison, but imposed a merciful non-parole of one third the head sentence – or 34 months in prison.

Del Giglio was eligible for parole in late May.

Originally published as The Fasta Pasta Connection II: Gaetano Del Giglio jailed for Adelaide to Cairns drug pipeline