Lawyer X Royal Commission: Police informer Nicola Gobbo ‘hurt our Hodson murders probe’

The Lawyer X royal commission has heard from a senior investigator that the murders of police informer Terence Hodson and his wife, Christine, were compromised by the use of police snitch and barrister Nicola Gobbo.

The probe into the 2004 murders of police informer Terence Hodson and his wife Christine was compromised by the use of Nicola Gobbo, a senior investigator on the case has told the Lawyer X royal commission.

Detective Sergeant Sol Solomon hit out at force command for impeding the investigation in order to protect its star informer.

It comes as files have emerged revealing that her snitching continued for years after top police officially axed her as an informer.

Victoria Police has found a new tranche of informer files relating to the gangland barrister. Handed to the royal commission on Monday, they reveal that information from Gobbo, deregistered as “Human Source 3838’’ in 2009, continued to flow until February 2012.

Sgt Solomon said he felt compelled to write a statement, in which he accuses force command of shutting down the Petra taskforce — formed to investigate the Hodson murders — before it had finished its work.

The murders struck at the heart of Victoria’s justice system. Terence Hodson, a police informer, was set to give evidence about police corruption when he was killed alongside his wife in their Kew home in May 2004.

Terence and Christine Hodson were murdered in 2004. Picture: Ian Currie

The Petra taskforce formed the view Gobbo had been involved in the dissemination of Hodson’s informer file three months before he and his wife were executed.

The Herald Sun understands that Petra detectives planned to question Gobbo, their witness, as a suspect in 2010.

“I have no doubt that the powers above did not like where we were proposing (to) take our investigation in relation to 3838 and our resistance to their instructions to cease all contact with her,’’ Sgt Solomon states.

“In any case, I believe that this was not only unethical, but may have been unlawful in the circumstances.

“The police investigation and prosecution … became infected by the rot which set in over her status. The interference which Petra investigators had to contend with … was breathtaking.’’

Petra investigators were made to sign a document that forbade them from compelling Gobbo to be a witness.

Sgt Solomon said there was evidence she leaked confidential police information to the underworld, which may have made her an accessory.

He even states that Gobbo once remarked to him: “If you only knew the truth” — a reference to her double life as an informer.

Terence and Christine Hodson. Picture: Ian Currie

Another four “information reports’’ relating to Gobbo’s intelligence have been handed over to the royal commission investigating Victoria Police’s management of informers.

The commission heard the intelligence from Gobbo occurred in February 2012, years after she was deregistered as a police informer in 2009.

Some of the intelligence was disseminated to a federal authority, and relates to jailed criminal Rob Karam.

He began appealing his convictions, for which he is serving a 37-year jail stint, over the Lawyer X principle in 2016. He was found guilty of numerous drug crimes including his part in the mafia-linked Tomato Tins syndicate that conspired to import 15 million ecstasy pills into Melbourne in 2007.

The Lawyer X royal commission has also heard that Gobbo:

ADOPTED one of her handlers as a “father figure’’ to fill the void left after the death of her own father when she was a teenager.

SPOKE to her handlers about studying FBI profiling techniques and even becoming a “talent scout’’ for new informers.

WANTED to become an air traffic controller.

WAS choked by Horty Mokbel, brother of Tony, over his suspicions she was double-crossing him.

It also heard that:

POLICE withdrew Gobbo as a witness against charged former police officer Paul Dale over fears a subpoena would lead to the Lawyer X secret being unravelled.

A HIGH-ranking officer in 2012 shut down the unit that handled Gobbo, and reported that despite their training they had “lost their way’’.

One of Gobbo’s handlers, who is giving evidence under the pseudonym Sandy White, was asked if Gobbo viewed him as a father figure.

Mr White said toward the end of the relationship Gobbo did view him in that way.

The Herald Sun revealed last year that Gobbo had tipped off the force about the massive Tomato Tins ecstasy haul in 2007.

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She photocopied and sent police the shipping document known as the bill of lading, given to her for temporary safekeeping by Karam, who was her client, while he went to a court appearance.

After those charged over the Tomato Tins ecstasy importation were prosecuted, Gobbo was involved in giving legal advice for a number of the accused.

She was later suspected by her peers of informing on those clients.

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