Deadline: Unfortunate case of Nadia Bartel blowback
It’s been a tough few days for a woman with the same name as Nadia Bartel’s friend. Andrew Rule and Mark Buttler with the latest crime buzz.
Police & Courts
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Melbourne’s top crime writers Andrew Rule and Mark Buttler with their weekly dose of scallywag scuttlebutt.
LINES OF COMMUNICATION
It’s an unfortunate case of mistaken identity for someone with the same name as a close friend of Nadia Bartel.
In the wake of last Friday morning’s white powder and Kmart plate hoo-hah, Ms Same Name had clearly racked up way too many messages intended for the Bartel associate.
By the afternoon she had captioned her account with the message: “I did not do nose beers with Nadia Bartel”.
But Ms Same Name isn’t the only innocent party to cop Bartel blowback.
Confidential’s Jackie Epstein reports Bec Judd’s clothing brand Jaggad was targeted, with a series of comments on Jaggad’s social media referencing the footage of Bartel snorting a white powder.
“Does everyone get free drugs with purchase?” one person commented.
Another asked: “Does it come in a baggie?”
Judd and Bartel are in business together with tanning company Spray Aus.
DID SOMEONE FINALLY COTTON ON?
Cheeky harness racing fans are calling it “another Fine Cotton”.
They’re referring to a recent race in South Australia in which a well-backed horse won after the hot favourite was “taken on” by a stablemate of the eventual winner.
At first, it sounds like a simple case of illicit team driving, which is allowed in Europe but not here.
But this case is more serious than that, according to the grapevine.
The dogs are barking that the stablemate that did the hard yards to soften up (meaning tire out) the favourite was in fact an average horse racing under the name of a better horse: let’s say, for example, that Slowpoke Brown secretly stood in for Speedy Bay, whose name was in the race book.
According to the rumour mill, the plan was for Slowpoke and Speedy to be confused for one another right through the race meeting … the pay-off being that Speedy would run in Slowpoke’s place (and attractive odds) two races later. Allegedly.
If the switch was discovered, it might all be dismissed as a stupid case of mistaken identity because of the fact the trainer of the three horses concerned wasn’t at the race meeting, giving his deputies the chance to accidentally mix up two of his many horses.
Whatever the reason, someone might have rumbled the switch — or got cold feet — because “Slowpoke” was a sudden late scratching from its race.
Which was another leg of the quadrella.
For educated money, getting favourites beaten in two legs of the quaddie would be a chance for a betting bonanza, especially if such information reached exotic betting markets around the globe.
If the trainer of the three horses — Slowpoke, Speedy and Lucky — was a Sunday school teacher with a spotless record, the idea of a clumsy mistake might be credible.
But he is a lunatic with a record longer than Ivan Milat’s.
If the authorities don’t keep it all in-house, police might take a look at some people’s connections with organised crime. Bikies or mafia or both?
These hypothetical police might also have a long talk to those who worked at the race meeting. Horses can look similar to each other — but the big numbers freeze branded on their necks are very different.
Whether it was a mistake or huge rort, if the switch happened it means someone didn’t check the brands.
ARRESTING ATTIRE
It can be hard to look your best when inconsiderate cops pounce and whack on the cuffs without notice.
That’s how it was for a 19-year-old arrested at his Melton home for alleged hoon driving early last Thursday.
Young Leadfoot was bundled into a divisional van wearing a blue garment known as an oodie, complete with pretty penguin patterns.
Ned Kelly it ain’t.
He looked like an over-size eight-year-old being detained for what would be, in the current environment, a highly illegal sleepover.
Penguin oodie boy is the latest of a long line of contenders to do the “perp walk” in an arresting fashion parade.
Russell Cox looked like the real thing, though a bit second-hand, in his ripped T-shirt when armed robbery squad police grabbed him at Doncaster in the 1980s.
His mate, Raymond John Denning, was bloodied and shirtless when scooped up by the law.
Chris “Ball Bearing” Coelho donned stylish Hells Angels attire before being escorted from the gang’s Heidelberg Rd stronghold in Fairfield some years ago.
Carl Williams probably looked a lot better in his casual cotton shirt and below-knee shorts before the Purana task force rolled him around on the grass down by Port Phillip Bay.
Deadline recently featured a Cobram member of the Mongols rocking some fetching club merchandise featuring the exclusive SYLM logo.
It stands for “Support Your Local Mongols” but did not appear to work.
Support was notably absent.
FAST FUGITIVE WON’T BEAT SLOW JAIL TIME
Killer hit-run driver Puneet Puneet must be wishing he could have things over again.
It is 12 years since the Indian student bolted from Australia after pleading guilty to killing Gold Coast man Dean Hofstee in a smash on City Rd, Southbank.
Puneet was drunk and speeding but there is little doubt he would have served his time by now.
Instead, he chose a long legal fight which would have burdened him with huge stress before last week’s inevitable ruling that he be returned to Melbourne to face justice.
Deadline’s sources say his pig-headed selfishness has taken a huge toll on his family.
The convoluted legal battle has destroyed his family’s finances, ultimately for nothing.
CASH CONVERTERS
There is always a new angle in the world of vehicle crime, as several dozen victims have found out lately.
They have had their cars’ catalytic converters — devices that cut emissions — stolen after parking at or near railway stations in southeastern suburbs.
There is a black market for the converters, something that led transit divisional response unit police to mount an operation.
They have now arrested and charged three men, a 21-year-old from Cranbourne, a 24-year-old from Noble Park and a 20-year-old from Cranbourne North, over thefts between March and August.
Most of the thefts happened in the Dandenong and Casey areas.
The thieves also helped themselves to clothes, tools and jacks, but the catalytic converters are readily converted to cash.
So much so that their theft has been a hot item in foreign jurisdictions for some time.
In the US, the state of Ohio is looking at making it illegal to sell a converter without proof of ownership.
SON OF A GUN(MAN)
Interesting who gets caught up when police come knocking over a bikie killing.
The recent sweep of arrests by a task force investigating the suspected murder of Kerry Giakoumis last year at the Hells Angels’ Thomastown stronghold has turned up some characters who would rather not be found.
One of those caught up in the matter because of an alleged theft was the son of one of Melbourne’s most notable hitmen of the past.
And a couple of the bikie world’s elder statesmen also received a visit during the operation, though there’s no suggestion they have anything to do with what happened to Giakoumis.
Police popped by the homes of Peter “Skitzo” Hewat and Stephen “Stiffy” Rogers to check they were complying with firearms prohibition orders.
It seems they were.
No offence detected apart from those nicknames.
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