Melbourne crime boss Ahmed Al Hamza living the life of luxury in the Middle East

A 27-year-old underworld figure who stays off social media and is regarded as an “extremely clever guy” has had his staggering wealth highlighted in one photo.

Low-profile organised crime figure Ahmed Al Hamza (right) in Dubai.

Feared Melbourne gangland boss Ahmed Al Hamza has built staggering wealth in the two years since he left Australia.

A photo taken in recent weeks shows Al Hamza relaxing with a Melbourne mate at the Brave CF kickboxing event in the Persian Gulf state of Bahrain.

The Herald Sun has been told the watch worn by the 27-year-old in the expensive designer clothes is a Richard Mille timepiece worth USD $1m ($1.6m AUD).

Crime boss Ahmed Al Hamza (right) with a mate at a recent kickboxing event in Bahrain.

The Richard Mille watch retails for $1.6m AUD.

Underworld sources say Al Hamza – who with his criminal expat mate Kazem Hamad is causing fiery Melbourne tobacco war chaos – now does his travelling by private jet.

They say the low-profile organised crime figure has engaged former Russian military men to provide security and counter-surveillance.

Al Hamza – who is suspected of being the mastermind of major drug importations – is understood to have based himself in Kuwait, where he is well-connected.

He has been a frequent visitor to the United Arab Emirates desert city of Dubai.

Those who know of his activities say criminal profits from back here have enabled Al Hamza and another Melbourne crime figure to invest in a $100 million property development.

Al Hamza’s lifestyle has been built at a high cost in Melbourne.

“He’s directed serious violence here, there’s no two ways about it,” one police source said.

“He’s no different to the historical gangland figures but he’s doing it from somewhere else.”

Unlike some of his counterparts, none of Al Hamza’s activities surface on the internet.

“(He’s an) extremely clever guy … anti-technology and social media life,” one source said.

Al Hamza is among the most formidable of a growing band of local organised crime figures who have moved overseas but seamlessly operate their Down Under empires by remote control.

A decade ago, he was just another teenage northern suburbs MEOC player on the rise but is now a major target of Australian law enforcement.

“In terms of influence, he sits right at the top and although he’s younger, much younger, than all the players, he’s earned himself big respect,” a source said.

Despite leaving two-and-a-half years ago, Al Hamza remains deeply plugged into Melbourne’s underworld where he is believed to be in conflict with some big players.

One of them is prominent Middle-eastern organised crime identity Sam “The Punisher” Abdulrahim, who was almost killed in an ambush at his cousin’s funeral at Fawkner Cemetery in June, 2022.

Sam ‘The Punisher’ Abdulrahim is believed to be in conflict with Al Hamza. Picture David Geraghty

Two teenagers suspected of being responsible flew to Dubai soon after the Abdulrahim shooting.

There are unconfirmed claims Al Hamza has renounced his Australian citizenship since getting out and is the subject of Interpol scrutiny.

Al Hamza had attracted heavy police interest in the years before getting out of Australia.

A Supreme Court jury acquitted him over the 2017 murder of Anwar Teriaki, a young drug dealer who was shot execution-style after being cornered in the porch of a Roxburgh Park home.

In 2018, Al Hamza told detectives a pistol hidden in a fire cabinet near his Docklands apartment was for his own protection.

Despite being banned from having a gun, he had been caught holding weapons stolen in a frightening armed robbery at a Thornbury firearms store.

Al Hamza remains of interest in a number of major crimes back in Victoria, among them a non-fatal shooting outside a Coolaroo futsal venue.

That incident, in which players ran for their lives as one man was wounded, was investigated by police as an attempted murder.

The Herald Sun has been told he had been infuriated by an attack on the home of a close family member at the time.

There is persistent underworld talk of acrimony over other matters, including the stabbing of someone close to Al Hamza by a violent MEOC figure.

A man involved in that incident has since been severely bashed and an armed home invasion carried out on a northern suburbs home wrongly thought to be linked to his family.

Al Hamza’s name came up again this month after the ambush murder of bikie-linked triggerman and extortionist Hawre Sherwani.

A hit team posed as police and intercepted Sherwani before opening fire as he sat in his car at Caroline Springs.

Sherwani was a suspect in the 2016 shooting of Al Hamza near the Al Diwan cafe in Campbellfield.

The Al Diwan was where a syndicate of underworld figures, including Hamad, ran a heroin distribution ring during that period.

Hamad, who was deported from Australia in 2023 and has been the architect of Melbourne’s tobacco wars, remains close to Al Hamza.

The older Hamad mentored Al Hamza when he was a teenager carrying out crimes with Jesse Marrogi, the younger brother of Notorious Crime Family gang boss George Marrogi.

Al Hamza would later fall out with Jesse, who has previously been reported to be the subject of a big-money murder contract.

There were underworld suggestions of deadly animosity between the two camps in the aftermath of the May, 2022, shooting murder of Korey Kesici at Mickleham.

One motive theory mooted was that Kesici, who had been linked to NCF, died because he had been talking to Al Hamza affiliates.

Originally published as Melbourne crime boss Ahmed Al Hamza living the life of luxury in the Middle East