Alex Lewenberg alleges Victoria Police tried to persuade his underground clientele

The former boss of lawyer-turned-informant Nicola Gobbo has alleged Victoria Police tried to frame him.

Alex Lewenberg says a number of his clients had told him they were approached­ by Victoria Police officers­ asking for evidence of money laundering and drug offences­ against the legal veteran. Picture: Paul Loughnan

The former boss of lawyer turned informant Nicola Gobbo has allege­d Victoria Police attempted to persuade his underworld clientele­ to provide evidence against him in exchange for dropping­ charges, according to new information released by the royal commission.

In a statement released by the Royal Commission into the Management of Police Informants, Melbourne lawyer Alex Lewenberg said a number of his clients had told him they were approached­ by Victoria Police officers­ asking for evidence of money laundering and drug offences­ against the legal veteran.

Mr Lewenberg, who hired Ms Gobbo as a young solicitor in 1995, further alleged he was told by then client Peter Reid that corrupt former drug squad detective Wayne Strawhorn offered to “clear his slate” if he planted one gram of heroin on his lawyer.

“While Ms Gobbo was a solicit­or at my firm, and shortly after a number of my clients told me that police officers had approache­d them and told them that their legal problems would go away if they could provide police evidence against me, relating either to laundering money or dealing with drugs,” Mr Lewenberg said in the statement.

“One of them, Peter Cecil Reid, told me he was told by Wayne Strawhorn that even one gram of heroin dumped on me would ‘clear his slate’ and he would be free.”

Mr Lewenberg said he wrote to the Director of Public Prosecutions and Victoria Police over the conduct of the officers but he didn’t receive a response.

Mr Strawhorn was jailed in 2006 for supplying a commercial quantity of pseudoephedrine, a precursor for the manufacture of amphetamines, to slain drug dealer­ Mark Moran.

Ms Gobbo was a high-profile criminal defenc­e barrister who represented underworld heavies such as Tony Mokbel at the height of Melbourne’s gangland wars in the mid-2000s.

The commission has previous­ly heard Ms Gobbo was registered as a police informant in 1995, 1999 and 2005.

In his statement, Mr Lewenberg said he became concerned by the young lawyer socialising with clients and police officers.

“Being rather conservative, I regarded a young single woman mixing with people who had been charged with criminal offences … and going out at night with them drinking, as not my idea of a right life for a single woman who I believe­ came from a very good family background,” he said.

Mr Lewenberg said Ms Gobbo, who is the niece of former Victor­ian governor Sir James Gobbo, disclosed to him that she served a good behaviour bond after the house she was sharing was raided by police in 1993.

He said on one occasion he saw Ms Gobbo enter a car with a man he pegged as an undercover police officer.

But he said he had no inkling Ms Gobbo was acting as a police informant and when he cautioned­ the young lawyer against fraternising with cops and crooks, she told him her social conduct was purely professional.

Mr Lewenberg’s statement was released on Friday ahead of former Victoria Police chief Simon Overland returning to the witness stand on Tuesday.