Deadline: The Melburnians fighting back aginast home invasion scourge

How long can it be until one of Melbourne’s army of young thugs picks the wrong home and comes to serious grief? The old defence of self-defence may get another workout in our courts.

Mark Buttler and Andrew Rule with the latest crime buzz.

Do ya feel lucky, punk?

Surely it can’t be long before one of Melbourne’s army of young thugs picks the wrong victim and comes to serious grief.

There have been a couple of prime cases recently where crims with gangster delusions have found themselves way out of their depth when confronted by a tooled-up response.

One prolific teenage car thief in the south-east was lucky not to become a statistic himself not so long ago.

A vigilant homeowner found the young thief about to drive away in his luxury car, a situation the owner found unacceptable.

The burglar spent a short but frightening period with a knife at his throat before being let go, presumably never to return.

There was another example at a Flemington tobacco store where the operator had been under serious standover threat.

When an intruder broke into his store, the businessman was waiting with an axe.

A big, strong fellow, he dragged the cowering culprit out of the store and threatened to go full Jack O’Toole on him.

Unfortunately, somebody came back on Monday morning and tried to set fire to the Racecourse Rd shop, which could have had fatal consequences.

So, how long before the old defence of self-defence gets another workout in our courts?

It has certainly been used with considerable success over many decades and could be wheeled out again if charges are ever laid over a certain shooting in which one of a group of intruders was fatally wounded.

Sticks and stones

The combatants haven’t exactly laid down their guns and jerry cans but there is more evidence that gangland sniping via social media has become quite the thing.

Those who have been unable to get to Melbourne crime figures have in the past year taken to doing the next best thing — lampooning them on a range of platforms.

The latest TikTok video doing the rounds appears to have a crack at the Brothers For Life gang, which has been revived in Melbourne of late.

It shows a dog in a cage wearing a B4L T-shirt, apparently intended as some kind of insult at members of the expanding outfit.

“Good boy … f%#@ the Brothers for life,” an accompanying voiceover says.

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

The recent breakthrough in the 47-year-old Easey St double murder saga has attracted the attention of a generation not even born when Suzanne Armstrong and Susan Bartlett were butchered in 1977.

Among sharp-eyed watchers is Eamonn Gunning of Melbourne Marvels, a podcast that ranges across famous and infamous unsolved crimes.

Eamonn has spent many late nights checking through electoral rolls and the like, and has come up with some interesting points about the family movements of Perry Kouroumblis, the former Collingwood man arrested in Rome late last month.

Perry Kouroumblis has ben arrested over the Easery St double murder. Picture: Facebook

Electoral rolls are not necessarily proof of someone’s actual movements, but it seems that if members of the Kouroumblis family left Melbourne to return to Greece in 1977, then most of them were back by 1984.

But not back to Collingwood.

Like many another migrant family, they headed from the old inner suburbs to new building blocks of Bulleen, Doncaster and Templestowe.

The electoral roll of 1984 places the entire family at 10 Lincoln Dr, Bulleen. At that time, brother Andrew (Andreas) was listed as a labourer, Tony (Antonios) as a driver, their father Nicolas as a pensioner and mother Maria without specific employment. Brother Perry (Periklis) was also listed at that address.

Eamonn notes that in 1991 and 1995, the same five family members are listed for 10 Lincoln Dr but in 2000 Antonios’s wife Poonam appears on the roll. By 2002, Maria the mother and Andrew were no longer on the roll, suggesting that by then they were permanently in Greece — where, in fact, they might have been for years before that. Especially given that there is no death or burial record of Nicolas in Australia, which suggests he died in Greece.

Meanwhile (according to the roll) Antonios and Poonam (and their daughter) found a new address at 37 Kenneth St, Bulleen, with the unmarried Perry. And have been there ever since.

Bloody hell!

A Deadline spy caught a bit of the Australia’s Most Dangerous Prisoners TV show last week.

The program highlighted some particularly brutal individuals and the violent deeds which had put them behind bars.

Among them was Matthew Charles Johnson, the man who bludgeoned Carl Williams to death at Barwon Prison more than a decade ago.

So, who better to be promoted in a break from the carnage than the Red Cross, which does a fine job running our nation’s blood donation services.

Anyone wanting to donate can call 13 14 95.

Carl Williams has just moments to live as Matthew Johnson creeps up behind him with a weapon.

Crooked? Roger that

Yet another interesting insight has emerged into the murky world of notorious Sydney cop Roger Rogerson.

The late Rogerson makes an appearance in The Consultant, Jay Malkoun’s new book on his long life on the wrong side of the law.

In it, the former Victorian Comanchero boss talks of being at a 2010 meeting in Sydney attended by a bunch of absolute rogues from across Australia.

The gathering was convened by John Kizon, the intimidating West Australian with cross-continental underworld reach, who wanted to talk nightclub security.

Perth bikie Troy Mercanti — the man said to have once given Tony Mokbel a fearful hiding — was another with a seat at the table.

Then there was Queensland outlaw motorcycle gang enforcer Greg “25” Keating, a Finks enforcer with a well-earned reputation for violence.

And there was Rogerson, though Malkoun does not explain the reason for his presence.

One thing is guaranteed: it wasn’t because he was shouting the drinks.