Police probing 5G nuts over collapsed tower

5G conspiracy nutters are easy to ignore until they start setting fire to things. Now police are investigating the serious damage done to an NBN tower shortly before it collapsed.

The 5G conspiracy theorists must be the nuttiest of all the crackpots.

Mark Buttler and Andrew Rule with their weekly dose of scallywag scuttlebutt.

TOWERING INTELLECTS. NOT

It’s a tough call and a big field but the nuttiest conspiracy theorists of all must be the 5G cranks.

Those who believe Bill Gates is behind everything that goes wrong in the world are easy to ignore until they start setting fire to stuff.

Counter-terror agencies are now on alert for the loons who have set fire to metropolitan phone towers, including ones at Cranbourne and Mount Eliza.

Unfortunately, among these Mensa candidates are people who cannot count their own fingers, let alone toes, given they have previously set fire to a 4G installation.

As the saying goes, if brains were dynamite, they wouldn’t have enough to blow the wax out of their ears.

And they now seem to have hit the country circuit.

Police are investigating serious damage to an NBN tower at Mount Taylor, north of Bairnsdale, between October 29 and November 12.

It is believed there may have been a fortnight between the act of vandalism and the tower’s collapse.

A WOOD DUCK BORN EVERY MINUTE

News that the wonderfully named Fatai Salami has allegedly downloaded $1.4m from three trusting investors in a “diamond” racket brings back some favourite scam stories.

Police suggest that Fat Salami persuaded his new best friends that he owned a diamond mine in Sierra Leone, as you do.

It was an easy step, the prosecution will allege, to let his new friends share his good fortune — first by paying up for a share and then forking out for vital equipment and gifts for the alleged mine’s alleged workers.

Over four years, three “investors” lost between $100,000 and $1m each. Allegedly. A court, naturally, will decide if Salami was flogging smelly sausage meat as prime fillet steak.

Salami allegedly took $1.4m from three investors in a ‘diamond’ racket. Picture: Keryn Stevens

There have been cases in the past where those adversely affected have taken direct action. Consider the strange case of the boiled opals.

Some twisted genius worked out that if you boil certain inferior grade opals in glycerine for a certain time, it changes their appearance for the better … but not for long.

By the time delighted buyers pull them out of the drawer a few days after purchase, the handsome gems have reverted to worthless chunks of stone.

A legal source tells us that the deadly serious opal miners of Coober Pedy, or perhaps Lightning Ridge, were unimpressed by the rort, and made it clear that the rorter might end up in a mineshaft permanently if he didn’t desist.

The same lawyer’s favourite scammer is the entrepreneur who had a nice fresh sign painted with the name of a timber “investment” business he had cooked up. It reminded the eagle of Alan Bond’s trick of spray-painting sandhills a lush green.

The fake timber baron took his new sign to visit some big government-owned pine plantations far from Melbourne and fixed it neatly on a post (or perhaps a gate) in front of the magnificent pine forest and took many fetching photographs to imply he owned said plantations.

This was all he needed to bait the hook for the sort of gullible, greedy galoots who tumble for African diamond mines and unbelievably cheap opals.

There is a name for them. Wood ducks.

COPS TAP IN AS CRIMS LOG OUT

Listening to the bugged conversations of criminals under surveillance can have its moments — not all uplifting.

Crims are only human. Bugging their houses, as well as their cars and their phones, obviously leads to recording private plumbing procedures.

Deadline recently stumbled over some old transcripts from the gangland war of the early 2000s in which two heavy crime figures of the period are shouting at one another during a drug bender at the city apartment of Carl Williams.

Thankfully for Carl Williams, he was out of the apartment at the time.

A warning here: some readers may find the following material offensive, mainly because it is.

The conversation starts as Criminal B asks a question of Criminal A, who is busy punishing the porcelain in a big way.

Criminal A: “I’m having a ---.” (Rhymes with Edgar Britt)

Criminal B: “Eh, you’re having a ---.”

Criminal A: “I’ll only be a second.”

Criminal B: “Yeah, sure you will.”

Criminal A: “Uh.”

Criminal B: “I don’t even know if they’ve got (expletive deleted) toilet paper. I haven’t ------- for three days, mate.”

Criminal A: “They’re killing me. They’re four foot long.”

Gross.

There are many other surprises for those who monitor such moments, such as the officer legally eavesdropping on a notorious interstate criminal in a Crown Casino hotel room.

The crook brought in two visitors, high-profile sportsmen from Perth, before a couple of young women also dropped in.

Suspicious snorting noises ensued before an X-rated audio show filled the cop’s headphones. Amazingly, the sportsmen were not Test cricketers.

Then there were the noted lawyers conducting a bugged meeting in chambers that sounded more like a get-together between John Belushi and Jim Morrison.

The legal eagles didn’t know how close they were to being dragged into court in the cocaine case that put their good-time friend Andrew Fraser behind bars, doing porridge instead of lines.

This reminds us of police (who had been listening in on a certain Melbourne office) who had a good laugh with their target years later, telling him they’d heard every sound as he’d hosted a female visitor on the desk.

LAST DRINKS FOR HOMICIDE ALL STARS

In police and crime circles, they were as well known as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. We refer to the all-star line-up of Legg, Maher, Rankin and Hughes.

They put the band back together for one last big night out when Mick Hughes — that’s former homicide boss Insp. Michael Hughes — retired last week.

Joining him for last drinks were fellow homicide legends Rowland Legg, Jeff Maher and Bernie Rankin, not to mention plenty of other names who have appeared in Coroners Court and Supreme Court witness boxes in hundreds of murder cases.

Homicide Squad Detective Inspector Mick Hughes. Picture: AAP

Mick Hughes started his first stint as a murder investigator 29 years ago before going on to head the squad.

He was part of the team that arrested and charged Frankston serial killer Paul Charles Denyer over the murders of young mother Debbie Fream and teenage students Elizabeth Stevens and Natalie Russell.

Other big cases included the shooting deaths of Kayleen McDonald and Andrew Johns by repeat offender John Lindrea at a Kinglake house-warming party.

Among former homicide squad luminaries who joined the old champ for a night of cold beers and hot war stories was the man who replaced him, detective Inspector Tim Day.

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FISHER SWITCHES CODES

Proof that there’s life after police work is the career of quiet achiever Brent Fisher, a tenacious investigator who took part in hundreds of murder, organised crime, drug and corruption inquiries with the force.

Now he’s working his way through the sporting landscape.

Fisher will soon finish up as Harness Racing Victoria’s integrity chief to take up a similar job with Racing Victoria, which runs the gallops.

He will head RV’s revamped investigations and intelligence unit. This follows a series of recommendations earlier this year from the Racing Integrity Commissioner Sean Carroll.

RV integrity chief Jamie Stier said he was delighted by the appointment.

“He brings a wealth of knowledge in racing and investigations to this critical role within our Integrity Services team,” Stier said.

The new broom will start sweeping in January. Which means he will be well established when the industry faces a thorny question: will D.K. Weir be relicensed in Victoria if he applies to resume training when his four year “holiday” ends next year?

And would he have a better chance if he moved to New Zealand for a while. The rumour is that the Kiwis might be more forgiving.

The Hells Angles have opened a new Melbourne CBD chapter.

NO SECRETS ON NEW NAME

The new Hells Angels CBD chapter is, as revealed in the Herald Sun this week, called Angel City.

Music trivia buffs and lovers of pub rock will know that this was the US name of mighty Aussie band The Angels when they went stateside and found that someone already had their name (as happened, incidentally, when middleweight band Mississippi found fame and fortune as bigtime Little River Band.)

RE the latest use of Angel City, there are not expected to be any copyright problems. There was always a bit of the outlaw about Angels frontman Doc Neeson.

NOVEMBER TO REMEMBER FOR SHEALES

Prominent barrister Damian Sheales has had a big week or two.

Last Wednesday, Sheales managed to secure a not-guilty verdict in the Supreme Court for northern suburbs identity Ahmed Al Hamza, who had been charged with the 2017 shooting murder of Anwar Teriaki at Roxburgh Park.

Someone bashed the 21-year-old Teriaki with a baseball bat before he was chased 300 metres, cornered in the doorway of a nearby home, and shot execution-style.

In another handy win during the week, Sheales represented top jockey Jamie Kah in winning her Supreme Court appeal over a long suspension for misleading Racing Victoria stewards.

The penalty related to an Airbnb party at Mornington and evidence Kah gave about the presence or otherwise of fellow hoop Mark Zahra.

At the start of the month, Sheales successfully fought a County Court appeal for harness racing driver Nathan Jack on race-fixing charges.

Jack, another member of the expanding two-first-names club, is now thought to be eyeing a return to the track.

THAT’S NOT GANGSTER, KIDS

Two teens busted for a weekend aggravated burglary need to think about heading back to school. Crime may not be their go.

The boys, 16 and 17, got into a house on Monument Boulevard in Clyde North on Sunday and stole keys for a car they could not start.

They then headed for Scenery Drive where they managed to steal another vehicle and took it for a spin.

Unfortunately, for them, they were stupid enough to head straight back to Monument Boulevard where Narre Warren police reviewing CCTV at the original crime scene recognised them.

Both were arrested nearby.