Killer ex-cop Roger Rogerson says name taken in vain

HE jokes about police attempts to link him to a string of crimes — but when his name came up in connection with notorious drugs kingpin James Kinch even Roger Rogerson admitted: “It’s an amazing story.”

IT seems these days, disgraced cop Roger Rogerson has become something of an Ivan Milat character — the go-to guy to question about any unsolved crimes and murders anywhere in national crimes files since the 1970s.

Backpacker serial killer Milat has often publicly lamented how there were apparently so few crims and so many crimes in Australia that police kept coming back to him for questioning about missing persons and unsolved murders.

Rogerson too would joke — notably during his attempts at public stand-up pub comedy nights — that NSW police were so desperate for convictions they were even trying to pin the death of Jesus Christ on him.

Last week it was revealed, 77-year-old Rogerson wrote from behind bars at Long Bay jail to deny any wrongdoing after assisting police in the reinvestigation of the 1973 Whiskey Au Go Go firebombing that killed 15 people. It was alleged by those accused and convicted of the firebombing that they were verballed by investigating police back then, who produced a typed, unsigned confession. A new inquest is reviewing the case.

But this won’t be the last time the name Rogerson will make a guest appearance in unrelated cases.

The name of the nation’s most notorious disgraced detective sergeant keeps coming up because he was involved in so many aspects of Australia’s criminal milieu from both sides of the fence it’s inevitable he knows or could have been involved in some way.

Now following the completion of two unrelated drugs trafficking trials it can be revealed his tentacles, or at least his name, even stretched overseas.

Roger Rogerson during his trial for the murder of Jamie Gao, right. File pictures

In September 2016, Rogerson was jailed for life for the murder of 20-year-old wannabe gangster drug dealer Jamie Gao.

It was a final sign off in his police file, which notes suspicious links to various crimes, including an offshore Asian heroin trafficking plot through Darwin and movement and distribution to the streets of Sydney; an extortion bid involving property developer turned convicted murderer Ron Medich; evidence fabrication for the Ananda Marga conspiracy; and links to a motley crew of British criminals supplying drugs to Sydney’s affluent eastern suburbs and northern beaches from cargo consignments from Europe and Asia.

It can now be revealed NSW Police and the AFP had been secretly investigating Rogerson from between 2008 and 2012 and his links to UK drug movements and specifically a Manchester-based gang, which was allegedly attempting to hire the ex-cop as they point person in Australia.

Elements of the gang, which had based itself in Coogee on Sydney’s eastern beaches, were importing tonnes of amphetamines into Australia hidden in drums of olives from Greece when a large sum of money and drugs disappeared.

A police mug shot of James Henry Kinch. Picture: Supplied

Police had not made the seizure, with evidence of the concealment only coming up after the drugs had been distributed along the eastern seaboard, and the intelligence was discovered only later in an unrelated drugs conspiracy involving the same infamous British crime boss James Kinch.

In one exchange monitored by police surveillance, the transcript of which has been obtained by True Crime Australia, Kinch accused two of his own gang, known as Nick and Jimmy, of stealing from him and warned them his bosses suggested their hands be cut off.

“He also told me he knew ‘the Dodger’ who I know from a movie he showed me was a former corrupt police officer in Australia,” Nick was later recorded by police as saying.

“I took these comments by (Kinch) as warnings that I better be careful and give him a wide berth from now on.”

In a related recorded conversation Kinch had also bragged he had a top official from Sydney City Council on his quick dial “who has that much influence he would be able to organise anything”.

Police were never able to identify that person, if they indeed existed, nor establish how it was the Manchester criminals came to know Rogerson.

Roger Rogerson pictured in Surry Hills, Sydney, in 2009. Picture: Sam Mooy

In 2006 Rogerson was filmed meeting with associates of another Sydney-based group involving Kinch, corrupt then-assistant director of the NSW Crime Commission Mark Standen and Dutch traffickers, to discuss tracking down $625,000 in drugs proceeds that was moved offshore to the Bahamas for safe keeping but then stolen by another criminal gang there.

The meetings watched by police took place at The Rocks and later in Parramatta. Rogerson was overheard discussing sending a crew to the Bahamas to recover the money but the trip never took place and Rogerson’s association with the group ended abruptly.

“It’s an amazing story,” Rogerson said of the request for him to help Standen and others to track down the money, which had been sent to them by a Dutch criminal cartel to help establish a drugs trafficking operation.

He admitted meeting with former employees of notorious standover men Tim Bristow and Michael Pestano at a pub in Kensington who had asked him for help, but he later said he did not want anything to do with it.

He told News Corp Australia everyone asked him for help from time to time but at other times would simply use his name in vain, including without his knowledge, to gain notoriety or favour.

“It doesn't mean they really know me or me them,” he said.

Roger Rogerson stares out from a police vehicle as he is taken to court for the Jamie Gao case. Picture Craig Greenhill

Kinch would eventually be jailed in 2016 for more than 20 years for the conspiracy in association with Standen, to import chemicals hidden in sacks of rice from Pakistan to make $120 million of ecstasy and other Netherlands-related drug imports following a nine-year probe, one of the longest in AFP history.

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Around about the same time police were also investigating Rogerson and his association with another drug manufacturing conspiracy on the Northern Beaches of Sydney and Western Australia where two well-known identities were under police surveillance and again references to Rogerson cropped up in recordings. That probe involved police in Britain, Eastern Europe and the United Arab Emirates.

It was never discovered whether that was a case of name dropping or involvement.

Originally published as Killer ex-cop Roger Rogerson says name taken in vain