The ‘snitch’, the Marconi Club and a probity inquiry being kept secret

Burlesque dancers in mirror dresses shimmered across the floor, saxophones belted out tunes and guests feasted on sushi, paella and Italian sweets. The West is Best for Business cocktail event at Club Marconi’s Bossley Park headquarters last March was a dazzling display of hospitality from one of the largest sports clubs in Australia.

But among the attendees who gathered downstairs afterwards for a nightcap, there was growing unease. It was an open secret that club president Morris Licata was the subject of an internal investigation for unknown reasons. And according to two written accounts later submitted to the club, one local tradesman who fiercely supported Licata was on the warpath.

Club Marconi began as a small bocce club and has grown to 38,000 members.Credit: Rhett Wyman

“Anyone involved in this f---ing investigation is f---ed and they will get theirs,” he allegedly warned a colleague of the ex-police officer conducting the investigation. Then he glanced at the club’s executive assistant, who was standing nearby, and spoke loudly enough for her to overhear, “She’s the snitch.”

Earlier in the evening, the tradesman had informed the executive assistant that he was connected by blood to a prominent underworld family, in what she had interpreted as a veiled threat. Now as she watched his conversation with the security consultant become heated, she took out her phone to take photographs of their interaction.

At that moment, the tradesman jumped up. “I’ve got you now, you f---ing snitch,” he cried, and demanded that she hand him her phone, which he summarily tossed frisbee-style over the fence and into the stadium.

“Charge me for that, you f---ing bitch, interview me for that, I don’t give a f---, I’ve got you now,” he said. Resisting attempts by others to de-escalate the situation, he called the chief executive on the spot.

Her employment was suspended the next day.

The executive assistant retained a lawyer and ended up resigning on confidential terms that are widely believed to have included a $40,000 payout in her favour. Contacted by the Herald, she declined to comment.

Little did she know it, but the assistant had tramped into a carefully cultivated system of favours, allegiances and quid pro quo at Club Marconi. But above all, secrecy.

The Herald can reveal that when the board received the findings of the investigation two months later, numerous claims against Licata were substantiated.

But a year on, Licata is still the club president, members remain in the dark about the findings, and the board – which was criticised for turning a blind eye to Licata’s behaviour – has rejected calls for the report to be made public. It decided to forward the report to Liquor and Gaming NSW instead of taking action against Licata.

Club president Morris Licata was found to have used an executive assistant’s card to buy meals at the club when his own expenditure was questioned.Credit: Facebook

Club Marconi began as a bocce club for the Italian community in 1956 before flourishing into a cosmopolitan sporting club with 38,000 members, and it has a long history of controversy.

Prominent members include property developer Pat Sergi, who was found by the Woodward Royal Commission to have exchanged real estate using funds that had been “improperly obtained” by drug trafficker Robert Trimbole, corrupt former Labor MP Joe Tripodi and former Soccer Australia president Tony Labbozzetta, who was banned from the club for a year in 1999 after a magistrate found that he had exploited the club for his own benefit during his presidency.

Following the Labbozzetta affair, an audit committee was formed to identify misconduct, and it was through that mechanism in February last year that former Assistant Police Commissioner Mal Brammer was appointed to investigate Licata. But when directors voted not to take action against Licata, audit committee chair Frank Olivieri felt he had no choice but to resign from the board.

“The board put together an audit committee to ensure that no wrongdoing occurred, given the history of the club,” Olivieri told the Herald.

“The fact that the board decided not to take action was enough for me to walk away in disgust.”

Substantiated allegations against Licata include that he borrowed money from the club’s cleaner while she was tendering for her contract to be renewed, placed excessive expenditure on his directors’ meal card and that he asked the executive assistant to put the meals on her card when the board raised concerns about his spending.

Brammer found that he contravened club policy by asking the club’s suit supplier to provide him with three suits, instead of the standard one, prompting the supplier to ask the club who would be paying for the two extras. He also “continually and unreasonably disregarded and delayed payment” of a $1335 bill owed to the club’s bottle shop for 22 months until the day the board was due to discuss his excessive expenditure.

Master politicians: Club Marconi president Morris Licata, flanked by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen.Credit: Facebook

When offered free tickets to an Elvis tribute concert at the club in July 2022, Licata organised for his guests to be seated in front of row A, angering people who had paid to have an unimpeded view of the show, Brammer found.

He also entertained the club’s wine supplier at the club’s expense for the purposes of discussing a potential soccer sponsorship, without seeking approval from the board or advising the club’s football subcommittee or football manager that he intended to do so.

But the executive assistant emerged as one of the few witnesses prepared to help Brammer with his inquiries, and several other claims could not be substantiated.

Even the club’s cleaning contractor, who had allegedly complained to Olivieri that Licata borrowed $7000 from her in several instalments and that she could not afford to keep paying him, had memory failure. Before her interview with Brammer, she allegedly told Olivieri that if she was going to tell the truth she needed to know he had her back “because the club works differently to what he thinks”. At the interview, she could not remember the amounts she had lent Licata, and insisted that he had paid her back.

“In the investigator’s opinion her responses were seemingly influenced by her concerns about her telling the truth and her perception about the consequences for her contract with the Club if she did so,” Brammer reported.

The Brammer report also called into question the willingness of the directors to overlook allegations regarding Licata over many years. Olivieri and another director had called for an investigation in late 2021, but it had never eventuated and issues of excessive expenditure continued unabated, it opined.

“The unresolved historical, prevailing and recent suspicions, allegations, rumours and innuendo affecting Mr Licata, and the incumbent risks of inaction … placed the board and club management in an indefensible position in the face of scrutiny,” Brammer found.

Club Marconi and Licata declined to answer detailed questions from the Herald.

“Liquor and Gaming NSW are investigating allegations pertaining to various matters raised in your email,” the club’s spokesman said.

“Accordingly, the club, the board and its president are not in a position to comment on any of the matters raised.”

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