Private detective who investigated Whiskey au Go Go firebombing feared for his life
Private detective Walter Cromwell wrote his life was ‘at high risk’ after revealing the criminals convicted of the deadly 1973 nightclub attack didn’t act alone.
A private detective who investigated the deadly Whiskey au Go Go firebombing in Brisbane feared for his life if his findings were made public.
The report written by Walter Cromwell following the 1987 Fitzgerald Inquiry into Possible Illegal Activities and Associated Police Misconduct claimed the criminals convicted of the crime didn’t act alone.
The Australian’s investigative podcast The Gangster’s Ghost revealed Regan – who was gunned down in Marrickville in 1974 – masterminded the 1973 firebombing, which saw 15 innocent people killed.
Cromwell was engaged to investigate claims James Finch – who was convicted of the arson alongside John Andrew Stuart and sentenced to life in prison – had been framed for the crime by corrupt police.
“Before embarking onto the summary, it is imperative that the reader, your good self, understands that once the enclosed becomes common knowledge to others, my life becomes at high risk,” Cromwell wrote in his final report.
The private detective ultimately found Johnny Regan and John ‘Ratty’ Clarke firebombed the Whiskey on orders from Sydney crime bosses Lennie McPherson and Abe Saffron, who were keen to take control of a protection racket in Brisbane.
Cromwell concluded Stuart and Finch were arrested, charged, and convicted of the Whiskey au Go Go firebombing at McPherson and Saffron’s direction. Saffron, in particular, was well-connected in the NSW and Queensland Police forces, meaning he had an avenue through which to deflect attention away from himself.
The pair were sentenced to life in prison with hard labour and spent much of their incarceration protesting their innocence.
Stuart was found dead in Brisbane’s notorious Boggo Road prison in early 1979 following a six-day hunger strike.
Finch was released in 1988, having served 15 years in prison, and deported to his native England, where he eventually confessed to his involvement of the crime but maintained he’d been verballed by police in the days following the attack.
He recanted his confession when it became apparent he could be extradited back to Australia to face additional murder charges related to the Whiskey firebombing.
Former Queensland Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath ordered a fresh inquest into the Whiskey firebombing in 2017 after Regan associate Vincent O’Dempsey and Garry Dubois were convicted of the murders of Brisbane mother Barbara McCulkin and her two daughters, Vicki and Leanne, in 1974.
Justice Peter Applegarth concluded Barbara McCulkin was killed by O’Dempsey and Dubois to prevent her from revealing their involvement – and the possible involvement of others – in the firebombing.
An informant told Cromwell Regan and Clarke had been spotted a coffee shop in Kings Cross by an associate, along with a corrupt cop named Jimmy.
Jimmy Yates – the brother of Regan’s de facto wife, Margaret – was known to impersonate a police officer. He was also good friends with James Finch.
His purported presence at a meeting where the Whiskey bombing was openly discussed suggests he may have been aware of the plot.
“[The associate] said that he had heard them talking about the Whiskey fire and that Jimmy had asked if there were any problems with the job,” Cromwell wrote.
“Regan plainly said that there hadn’t been any major problems … [and claimed] Regan had boasted freely about the fire to just about anyone in the Cross because it made him the man in town.”
Revelations made by senior reporter Matthew Condon in The Gangster’s Ghost podcast for the first time implicate Johnny Regan and his associates in the crime – Australia’s worst mass murder until the Port Arthur Massacre in 1996.
Subscribers get Episode 9 exclusively at gangstersghost.com.au. Or hear Episode 7 of The Gangster’s Ghost on Apple and Spotify now.
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