Tony Mokbel’s explosive claim ‘Lawyer X’ Nicola Gobbo told him to flee

Carl Williams’ rage, a noisy jailhouse neighbour and rumours Nicola Gobbo was sleeping with cops — these are the best bits of Tony Mokbel’s evidence as he continues his fight for freedom.

Gangland boss, Tony Mokbel with his legal team Nicola Gobbo (left) and Con Heliotis QC (right) outside the Magistrates Court in 2004.

Drug kingpin Tony Mokbel is back in the witness box on Wednesday for his Supreme Court preliminary hearing before a future appeal.

One of Australia’s most notorious criminals, he is fighting to be released from jail because his barrister Nicola Gobbo, dubbed Lawyer X by the Herald Sun when it broke the scandal, was informing on him to police.

The convicted drug trafficker, 58, who became Australia’s most wanted man when he fled to Greece in 2006, is eligible for parole in 2031.

Here’s what we’ve learned on the second day of his evidence during a 12-week hearing before Justice Elizabeth Fullerton.

Carl Williams ‘hated’ Gobbo

Languishing in a Greek jail and charged with two murders, Mokbel confirmed he asked his lawyer Nicola Gobbo to go see gangland kingpin Carl Williams at Barwon Prison to help prove his innocence.

Just weeks after his arrest following a global manhunt in mid-2007, police charged a “very upset” Mokbel with the murder of kickboxer Michael Marshall — a charge they later dropped.

The convicted drug trafficker said he asked Gobbo to get a statement from Williams that Mokbel had “nothing to do with the murders” of Marshall and Lewis Moran.

Nicola Gobbo with Gangland boss Carl Williams (right) and underworld hit man Andrew `Benji’ Veniamin.

But Gobbo refused to visit Williams, saying they had bad blood.

“She didn’t explain (why) exactly, (she said) ‘I’ve got issues going to see Carl, me and him don’t get along’.”

He added that Gobbo “didn’t like what he was saying about her”.

Mokbel said at the time he had “no idea” Williams “hated” Gobbo, and confirmed that when he returned to Australia after his extradition, the baby-faced killer warned him off his barrister.

“He said to me, ‘Don’t trust her’ ... he said other things but I’ll leave that aside.”

Going back to June, 2007, when Gobbo refused to visit Williams, another lawyer tried to get his statement but Mokbel said this lawyer was “kicked out of Barwon”.

Around the same time, Office of Public Prosecution’s barrister David Glynn asked Mokbel if he’d heard allegations Gobbo was “sleeping with coppers and using drugs (and that you) told her you didn’t believe it”.

“100 per cent I didn’t believe it ... there was a rumour floating around, yeah,” Mokbel replied.

Asked by Mr Glynn whether he was being fed those rumours by people he trusted, he confirmed he was, but said, “I trusted her a million per cent Mr Glynn, I had no issue with Ms Gobbo.”

Questions of ‘truth’ over Gobbo’s info to handlers

Locked up in Greece, Mokbel repeatedly called his lawyer, Ms Gobbo, for help in fighting his extradition back to Australia.

Little did he know, the woman registered as informer 3838 was sending updates of every conversation they had to her police handlers.

In court on Wednesday, Mokbel rejected as “not true” the information she passed on, raising questions over whether Gobbo was telling lies to the cops.

Less than week after his arrest in Greece, the court heard Mokbel called Gobbo on June 10, 2007 and made “lots of apologies for not saying goodbye” when he fled Australia amid his March 2006 drug trafficking trial.

Mokbel called Nicola Gobbo several times while he was locked up in Greece.

Following this first conversation after his capture, Gobbo told officers, “Tony is considering talking to the police”.

“That’s not true ... 110 per cent,” Mokbel told the OPP’s Mr Glynn.

“She just made that up?” Mr Glynn asked.

“Me talking to the police? Yeah.”

On June 15, Gobbo reported another conversation they had, telling police: ‘Tony will plead (guilty) to ALL drug charges but ... will not plead to any murders’.”

“That’s not true ... I never said at any stage I was willing to plead guilty to any drug charges,” Mokbel replied.

The discrepancy led to a flurry of debate between lawyers about whether it could be accepted Gobbo was telling the truth to her handlers.

Justice Fullerton replied that the OPP could not rely on the fact that Gobbo was “truthfully reporting” what Mokbel said.

Gobbo: ‘Police won’t stop on murder charges’

Mokbel sensationally claimed on Tuesday that his barrister, Nicola Gobbo, told him to flee as police were planning to charge him with three murders, leading him to abscond to Greece.

On Wednesday, during cross examination from the OPP barrister David Glynn, he agreed he “wasn’t worried” about claims from Gobbo that he would be charged with murder.

“It’s what she said after that,” Mokbel said.

“At the end … what she said ... (was that police would) continue charging me with other murders until they find you guilty and they’ll give you life with life. I took off.”

The underworld figure said Gobbo persisted in these claims “on a daily basis” while she was representing him in court on cocaine smuggling charges.

“She didn’t stop,” he said.

Mokbel claimed his barrister Nicola Gobbo told him to flee the country.

“On a daily basis, ‘You’re still around?’ She just wouldn’t stop.”

He said she told him, “If you do get found not guilty for one (murder) Purana (taskforce) is going to continue to give you more charges for other murders” until he was found guilty.

“Are you cracking jokes or what,” he said he told Gobbo.

Asked by Mr Glynn if he took that as a warning to abscond, he said “anyone with a brain would have done that” and that he believed Gobbo was “100 per cent” trying to help him.

Mokbel agreed with Mr Glynn that he hid in regional Victoria when he fled in March 2006, was later smuggled interstate where he hopped on a yacht and sailed to Greece.

He said had he not been arrested in mid-2007, he’d still be hiding overseas.

Systematically exaggerating? Absolutely zero not!

There’s been some argy bargy over whether Gobbo was in fact acting as Mokbel’s lawyer when she was passing intel to police that he believed was legally privileged while he was in Greek lockup.

Mokbel told the court Gobbo was “part of the team”, that she was “involved in everything” and sourced information for his lawyers in Greece.

Barrister David Glynn for the Office of Public Prosecutions put to him that Gobbo was “not in court” in Australia acting for Mokbel during his extradition process, and that a different barrister actually knew more about the ins and outs of his case.

“You’re trying to water it down,” Mokbel told Mr Glynn, “and it’s not the case at all.”

“Just so you understand,” Mr Glynn hit back, “I’m putting to you that in fact you’re systematically exaggerating her role in what’s going on.”

“Absolutely zero not, I relied on her heavily,” Mokbel retorted.

Mokbel’s barrister Julie Condon KC jumped up, saying the DPP had already conceded that Gobbo and Mokbel were “in a relevant lawyer-client relationship”.

The court earlier heard Mokbel regularly called Gobbo from his Athens prison, that he asked Gobbo to fly to Greece but she declined, saying she was too busy, and that he organised for $5k to be paid in a bank account for her and another lawyer.

“She’s been paid every time ... she asked for money and I put money straight away in her account, there’s no problem,” Mokbel said.

Bad neighbours

Mokbel was feeling “quite understandably fairly fatigued” when he came to court on Wednesday for the second day of his evidence.

His barrister Julie Condon KC revealed that his jailhouse neighbour subjected him to “constant banging” on the cell next door at the Melbourne Assessment Prison overnight.

“He has had very little sleep (but) he’s ready obviously, to continue his evidence,” Ms Condon said.

Mokbel, who elects to stand in the witness box to give his evidence rather than sit, is being given 30-minute breaks to avoid fatigue.

Court sketch of Tony Mokbel in court on Tuesday. Picture: Nine News

Press problems

Justice Fullerton has lashed a member of the media for approaching Mokbel for a chinwag during a court break.

Her Honour hit out at the journalist, who hadn’t been identified to her, after she was told Mokbel was “approached while he was in the dock by a member of the press seeking to speak to him”.

“Be clear about this, that should not have occurred and that conduct will not be repeated,” Her Honour said.

She warned that if she was told anyone but his lawyers spoke to Mokbel, “the court will be closed, the livestream will be cut off.”

That’s a wrap

Mokbel’s evidence has finished for Wednesday, with a farewell comment from Justice Fullerton that she hoped he got “a better sleep tonight”.

Noting that it was a “testing time” for anyone coming from custody being on the stand all day, Her Honour said it was “a rather trying exercise for someone who hasn’t slept”.

Mokbel is expected to return to the witness box on Thursday and Friday.