Search for mystery cartel behind multimillion-dollar ice haul under way
An international manhunt for crime bosses who masterminded a multimillion-dollar ice shipment into Melbourne is under way. See the lengths the kingpins go to in a bid to get away with their crimes.
Police & Courts
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An international manhunt for the organised crime bosses who masterminded a multimillion-dollar ice shipment into Melbourne is under way in Southeast Asia.
Officers from the Australian Federal Police and Victoria Police swooped to arrest two men last week over the illegal importation of 154 kilograms of the lethal drug from Mexico — equivalent to a whopping 1.5 million street deals.
The Sunday Herald Sun can reveal that, although the drugs arrived from Mexico, the kingpins behind the mammoth stash of methamphetamine lead a crime syndicate based in Southeast Asia.
It is understood the syndicate, which has imported illegal drugs into Australia before, is made up of transnational organised crime figures and has no name which is known to police.
AFP officers based overseas are working with police forces across Asia to try and track down the syndicate leaders.
The seized drugs were worth more than $16 million.
“They exercise a high degree of operational security,” a source told the Sunday Herald Sun.
“They are very careful at what they do, they might send dummy shipments through – they send four containers with nothing in it just to make sure it is not going to be picked up.
“They are prepared to let their cargo go and go to great expense to set up the path into the country. They might do four of five dry runs.”
Australian Border Force officers found a suspicious shipping container which arrived in Melbourne from Mexico on January 23.
They then discovered the methamphetamine hidden inside 19 tonnes of silver concentrate.
Canadian-French dual national Alexandre Francoise Gerard Forcade appeared in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday charged with attempting to import more than 150kg of methamphetamine from Mexico.
The court heard police found a “significant amount” of his DNA on 111 bags of meth, weighing 1kg each, housed in a storage facility.
Mr Forcade is accused of facilitating the mass importation by acting as a “consignee” for the delivery and organising a commercial storage unit in Burwood.
The court also heard the 26-year-old was involved in distributing the cache of drugs, including to his co-accused, Sydney man Christopher Bond, 34.
Police from the Victorian Joint Organised Crime Task Force (JOCTF) captured the men exchanging a 25kg bag of the high-grade drugs on February 22.
Mr Forcade arrived in Australia on February 9, two weeks before his arrest.
He moved between temporary accommodation before police arrested him in Chadstone.
Investigators believe he travelled to Australia for the sole purpose of “receiving and distributing” the large shipment of ice.
He had been employed as a finance intern in Malaysia with British American Tobacco.
A spokesman for the tobacco giant told the Sunday Herald Sun that Mr Forcade’s employment was terminated earlier this year for taking absence without leave.
Police have cobbled together a vast amount of evidence as part of the sprawling drug trafficking probe.
Prosecutors said there was at least two weeks worth of audio from listening devices to be analysed.
Most of the conversations need to be translated from French to English, the court heard.
Five surveillance devices, including at the commercial storage facility, will also form part of the case.
Mr Forcade was allegedly captured on the devices entering and leaving the storage unit and unpacking and repackaging bags of drugs.
Prosecutors indicated there were ongoing inquiries overseas into the syndicate.
The court heard Mr Forcade had spent the last three weeks in Malaysia before arriving in Australia.
Mr Forcade has been charged with importing a commercial quantity of a border controlled drug, attempted possession of a commercial quantity of a border controlled drug and attempted trafficking of a controlled drug.
Mr Bond has been charged with attempting to possess a commercial quantity of a border controlled drug.
The pair will return to court in June.
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