How Cobram detectives busted Josh Eddy and his Mongols drug ring

Police and “pissed off” Cobram locals were fed up with the outrageous displays of wealth and intimidating behaviour of Josh Eddy and his cronies. So these detectives decided to do something about it.

Josh Eddy might have been trouble as a kid, but locals probably never expected he would bring organised crime to Cobram.

It was in 2019 that Eddy patched up with the Mongols outlaw motorcycle gang, around the time detective Sgt Marcus Boyd of Cobram CIU and “pissed-off” townsfolk took serious notice of his ostentatious displays of wealth.

If he wanted to stand out in the border town, cruising around in a white 2019 Mercedes C63 AMG and adorning himself with chunky, expensive jewellery was an excellent start.

Eddy was the bloke who ran a Colgan St vehicle detailing business called Cartel which – for police at least – must have seemed provocative branding.

Josh Eddy’s sprawling drug empire was dismantled. Picture: Facebook/Cartel

Josh Eddy at work at Cartel.

It would have been especially so for a man free on bail for trafficking a commercial quantity of 1.4-butanediol, a dangerous industrial solvent marketed as GHB to users.

Senior members of the Mongols bikie gang started to turn up in the town and took an unexplained interest in one prominent business.

More attention was attracted when locals – who had watched Eddy grow up in the town – had a number of intimidating experiences at takeaway shops in which the aggressors wore Cartel hoodies.

Some of them had an inkling Eddy’s other job was as sergeant-at-arms of the Riverside chapter of the Mongols, regarded as one of Australia’s “big-six” outlaw motorcycle gangs.

“They (Cobram townsfolk) wanted to see action,” Sgt Boyd said.

“They were pissed off and assumed we were lazy country coppers.

“The fact he was so overt and so brazen; people don’t like that sort of thing.”

Not many people get around Cobram in fancy Mercedes vehicles. Picture: Facebook/Cartel

Thugs dressed in Cartel hoodies were harassing people around Cobram. Picture: Facebook

Eddy had grown up among them, raised in an unstable family background marred by substance abuse and exposure to violence, a court would later hear.

He left the local high school at the end of year seven, around the time he developed a drug habit, before working at a fish and chip shop, in a pine factory, as an electrician’s assistant, in demolition and driving forklifts.

It was years later that he somehow became enmeshed in the bikie life and set up Cartel, described as a “main syndicate hub” where drugged-up social gatherings were held and product and cash were stored.

Sgt Boyd and the locals had seen enough, leading the veteran detective to contact Victoria Police crime command in the hope it would take an interest, a move which would ultimately kill the Cobram cartel.

At the same time Eddy and co were starting to make waves locally, he had come onto the radar of organised crime detectives after the 2019 police shooting of an associate in Melbourne.

The bikie and Fadi Diab were together in a Volkswagen Jetta with cloned plates when it was pulled over by two Australian Federal Police officers at Greenvale in the early hours of September 12.

Diab opened fire on the cops and missed. They returned serve and did not, wounding him in the neck.

The Mongols ran much of the river town.

Cobram locals were fed-up with the visible police inaction.

It was agreed that Echo would run an operation Serpere, an investigation which would be strategically delicate in a town with a population of 5600.

Eddy had built a tight crew including his father, sister, uncle, cousins and other associates who knew police methodology.

It was crucial they not find out Echo had an interest in them while the case was being built.

Overt monitoring of the suspects and any contact with them was done by local officers so they would sense nothing unusual.

Meanwhile, the organised crime officers worked from a distance and began building a picture of the sprawling network linked to Josh Eddy, using phone taps, physical surveillance and undercover members.

“We didn’t want them to stop what they were doing,” Detective Acting Senior Sergeant Dave Shannon said.

“You try to find a way in, and we found a way in with Josh, he wasn’t quite as polished as the other guys.”

It would become clear the gang — helped by affiliates from a Mongol feeder club called the Raiders — was moving plenty of product locally and way beyond.

On October 7, 2020, police intercepted Kyle Assigal with 195.7 grams of cocaine soon after he left Cartel.

The vehicle during the intercept of Assigal. Picture: Supplied

Some of the gear seized when Assigal was intercepted. Picture: Supplied

Forensic testing later showed bags holding the drugs bore the DNA of Eddy.

“That was a good turning point for our investigation. We knew we were on the right path and it gave us an idea of the quantities he was moving,” Ciaran Durea said.

Months later, gang ‘gofer’ Montather Al Mousawi made a succession of cocaine sales totalling 224 grams to undercover officers planted by Echo.

Eddy had supplied the drugs, which changed hands for almost $60,000.

It would later emerge that the Cobram crew was involved in big transnational drug deals.

Eddy pleaded guilty to trafficking cocaine, a charge of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring the commission of commercial methamphetamine trafficking and negligently dealing in the proceeds of crime.

Eddy’s County Court Judgement outlined how in 2021 he recruited Samuel Wood for a 9.9kg methamphetamine run to West Australia.

The Mongol drove Wood to a meeting in Melbourne where the syndicate’s work was outlined.

Wood was put in touch with Matthew Peagram, who was to collect the ice when it got to Perth.

From there, and with Serpere officers watching, things unravelled with a succession of blunders during the five-day trip.

Wood headed across the Nullarbor in a vehicle fuelled only by LPG and, when he ran out near isolated Madura, found out it was hard to get gas out there.

His only choice was to get a tow to Norseman so he contacted Eddy, who supplied the fee while sweating bullets.

“He (Eddy) was quite stressed,” detective Sgt Ciaran Duryea of Echo said.

Police found $888,000 when they swooped on Matthew Peagram. Picture: Supplied

From there, Wood continued on to Perth, arriving on April 10 where he collected Peagram at a shopping centre.

They went to Blackadder Creek Reserve and made a “dead-drop” of the black sports bag containing the meth under a footbridge, removing a black box full of cash.

Peagram and Wood were intercepted soon after by WA investigators who seized $888,650 and their encrypted devices.

They were holding the baby but the contact of previous days and earlier had left Josh Eddy heavily incriminated.

“You were associated with Mr Peagram and closely associated with Mr Wood, recruiting Mr Wood and putting him in contact with Peagram,” Justice Harper of the County Court said in sentencing Eddy.

“You counselled Wood along his journey from Victoria to Western Australia using telephone and encrypted communications. When Wood’s car broke down, you directed and counselled him about how to deal with the situation.

“Telephone intercepts on 10 April, 2021, show that you held an interest in the transaction being completed successfully. You held intimate knowledge about the interstate trip, knew that it involved the commission of a serious well-organised crime. You were a facilitator and a conduit between Wood, the courier, and others who organised the operation and owned the drugs.”

Josh Eddy is serving a maximum sentence of nine years and six months.

Wood got a maximum 11-year prison term and Peagram was handed nine when they last year pleaded guilty in the District Court of West Australia.

Eddy’s father, sister and sundry other relatives and associates were also arrested and had findings made against them in court as a result of what had begun as a local policing issue.

Sgt Boyd said the relief from townsfolk when the cuffs went on was palpable.

He said they voiced their appreciation face-to-face, saying it was a job well done and about time.

“It (the criminality) was so overt, so brazen. People don’t like that sort of thing,” Sgt Boyd said.

“It was a win for the good guys. A win for the town.”

Originally published as How Cobram detectives busted Josh Eddy and his Mongols drug ring