Equal-opportunity antagonist gets Deadline in his sights
A big-noting, big-haired restaurateur with a Little Richard bouffant who made headlines with an alleged threat against Mick Gatto on TikTok has turned his attention to Deadline.
Police & Courts
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Mark Buttler and Andrew Rule with the latest scallywag scuttlebutt.
Genghis Khan he ain’t
Excitable entrepreneur Jamal Khan has been arguing with Carlton identity Mick Gatto over financial matters for some time but Jamal is nothing if not an equal-opportunity antagonist: he now has Deadline in his sights.
Jamal Khan is the big-noting, big-haired restaurateur with the Little Richard bouffant who made headlines late last year with an alleged threat against Gatto on TikTok.
Early this year, Deadline published a legitimate streetscape photograph of Jamal’s bayside address with a 4WD parked across the entrance mounted with what looked like a mocked-up “bazooka” on its roof (as made by kindergarten kids, maybe).
The photograph was taken by an amused passer-by and passed on to Deadline as an oddity. Two months later Jamal is getting all het up, causing him to send the letter reprinted below:
“It has come to my attention that you have been illegally taking photographs of my residence at 3 Anita Street, Beaumaris Victoria, and gathering information about my movements, which is a breach of my privacy, to inform your associate Mr Dominic Mick Gatto, who has attempted 3 times to physically hurt me and assassinate me, your actions taking images of my home and my vehicle, involves you to assist your associate Mr Gatto, to assist him in his planning to assassinate me.
“I am in process of proceeding criminal & legal actions against you, and will publish in the media and lodge my complaint against you in the Australian Press Council for providing assistance to underworld figures, for my assasination (sic).
“I would like to give you an opportunity to explain to me, what caused you to take photos of my residence and why did you interfere with my privacy , and why did you provide this information to other people, who have intentions to harm me.
“I am expecting a response from you by COB tomorrow 5/7/2024.”
Of course, Deadline did none of the above. And there is absolutely no suggestion that Jamal’s allegations that Mick Gatto wants to “assassinate” him have the faintest skerrick of truth.
Gatto associates report that “Mick” is holidaying in Bali and is amused and bemused by the whole episode.
Late-breaking news that Jamal Khan is now lobbying the Prime Minister’s office and members of parliament to have him (Gatto) deported because of his criminal record might also raise a laugh in the Gatto household. Given that Gatto was apparently born in Parkville, unlike a certain rogue senator.
Garry the gorilla lost and found
It’s great to hear that Garry the Gorilla has been returned to his rightful home at a St Helena retirement village.
The giant man-made silverback went missing last week. After heartfelt pleas from his elderly custodians, Garry was tracked to a backyard in the jungle otherwise known as Reservoir.
About that time, a 33-year-old Heidelberg Heights man handed himself in, possibly spooked by the kind of widespread media coverage most of us can be confident of not attracting if we go missing.
Cops were jumping out of the trees to be in on the action when the pretend primate was located by a police chopper, whose pilot must have been taking a rare break from chasing live teenagers in stolen German-made SUVs.
Footage shot as Garry was carted out of the Reservoir home indicated that half the local police division turned out.
The arrested fellow was interviewed by appointment and charged with theft, handling stolen goods and driving while disqualified.
We’re told that by the end of the saga, there had been more than 1000 media stories, many in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Among the UK inquiries was a journo wanting to know whether our Garry was related to a Garry the Gorilla stolen from a garden centre in Lanarkshire, Scotland, earlier this year.
That Garry (McGorilla?) was returned to the Reynard Nursery after being found abandoned in a layby near Dundee.
Laughable, you may think, but Deadline has examined the photos and was struck by the resemblance between the two Garrys.
Then again, maybe they all look the same.
It’s a wise father who knows his child
Quite a few sons (and daughters) of police and clergy have ended up on the wrong side of the law. But not many of them quite so grievously as Gregory “Bluey” Brazel, a copper’s son who became a triple killer and armed robber and has spent most of his very bad life in very tough prisons for very good reasons.
Brazel, one of the most violent and manipulative men in the prison system, was born in Blacktown in Sydney and went rogue after joining the Army in the 1970s.
Deadline first saw him as a young prisoner from Pentridge’s H Division, giving (or not giving) evidence at Brunswick Magistrates’ Court over the stabbing of Mark Brand “Chopper” Read in prison. Read’s mother, incidentally, was a devout Seventh Day Adventist, daughter of a senior clergyman, and his father Keith Read and grandfather “Bull” Read were war veterans.
Brazel was cunning and vicious but not especially brave. The three murders he committed were all of defenceless women.
Perhaps inheriting his policeman father’s skill at giving court evidence, the redheaded “Bluey” became something of a jailhouse lawyer. In that regard he was like Peter Allen, one of the many sons of one-eyed crime matriarch Kath Pettingill, who has learned law by being on the wrong side of it for most of his life.
Police force rumour has always had it that more than one of Kath’s criminal sons were fathered by serving police she consorted with as a barmaid and sex worker.
That bunch would include Peter’s brother (or half-brother?) the evil Dennis Bruce Allen, also known as “Mr Death”. The tales that DNA could tell.
Paddle pop poop scoop
A regular Deadline contributor recently completed an open ocean swimming challenge that few people manage.
It’s a gruelling Victorian course through dangerous, exposed waters with heavy currents. It takes determination and guts. Our man hung to his determination to the end but, sadly, lost his guts.
We’d love to congratulate him by name but events after he reached the finish mean it might be best not to.
Our hero, a respected figure in the legal district, lost control of his bowel movements in all the exertion, leaving a messy situation.
Hugs from assembled family members were postponed as he made a beeline for the showers.
Abdulrahim sidelined
Underworld figure and boxer Sam “The Punisher” Abdulrahim missed a fight in Thailand late last month after being injured in the lead-up.
The reason could be one of the more unusual reasons for a sporting figure being sidelined from competition.
Word reaches Deadline that Abdulrahim hurt his elbow in the lead-up to the title fight when shots were fired at him outside his Thomastown home.
None of the bullets found their mark so we can only assume Abdulrahim was injured as he took cover or pursued the fleeing shooters in the aftermath.
Gangland gun-for-hire jailed over ‘brutal’ daylight stabbing attack
Decades after Sean Sonnet was convicted over a failed hit on underworld figure Mario Condello, it can be revealed his life of crime has continued.
Dealers caught, $1.5m drugs seized in desperate bid to clean up St Kilda
Hundreds of St Kilda’s most prolific drug dealers and users have been arrested as part of a major police sting aiming to clean up problem areas such as Acland St. See video of the operation in action.