Drug kingpin Tony Mokbel’s shock bail bid

The 59-year-old is aiming to walk out of prison within weeks as he waits for his appeal to be heard over the Lawyer X scandal.

Gangland boss Tony Mokbel will make a bid for bail as he fights to overturn his major drug convictions.

Mokbel, 59, is aiming to walk out of maximum security Barwon Prison within weeks as he waits for his appeal to be heard over the Lawyer X scandal, which he hopes will quash his 26-year jail sentence.

His push for bail comes after a damning ruling by NSW judge Elizabeth Fullerton in December over Victoria Police’s use of lawyer-turned-supergrass Nicola Gobbo to sting him and his illicit drug cartel.

Gobbo, as informer 3838, “rolled” several of Mokbel’s criminal associates while acting as their lawyer but secretly working as an agent of police.

Those criminal associates provided crucial evidence against Mokbel, his family and other members of the cartel.

Tony Mokbel (left) is aiming to walk out of maximum security Barwon Prison within weeks as he waits for his appeal to be heard over the Lawyer X scandal. Picture: AAP Image/Joel Carrett

Mokbel has already had one of his convictions quashed, but he needs to overcome three more drug trafficking raps to win his freedom.

Gobbo began informing on the Ferrari-driving Mokbel just months before acting for him in a trial in 2006 as he faced charges over the importation of cocaine imported from Mexico.

Towards the end of that trial, Mokbel alleges Gobbo warned him of imminent murder charges he was going to be hit with and urged him to flee Australia, via Victorian country town Bonnie Doon.

Mokbel’s escape sparked one of the biggest international manhunts in Australian history.

His 15 months on the lam involved being smuggled across the country and onto a luxury yacht dubbed the Edwena at Geraldton, Western Australia, en route to Greece.

The fugitive spent much of his time at sea below deck in a custom made compartment and suffered sickness as crew sailed the 57-foot yacht across the Indian Ocean and through the Suez Canal before arriving in Greece.

Mokbel was joined by his then girlfriend Danielle McGuire in Athens where she gave birth to a daughter.

Mokbel’s escape sparked one of the biggest international manhunts in Australian history. Picture: Greek Police / AFP Photo

Gobbo actively tried to locate Mokbel for her police handlers while he was on the run.

After his capture in 2007, she gave him legal advice and passed those conversations on to her police handlers.

After challenging his extradition to Australia on human rights grounds, Mokbel was flown into Melbourne in 2008 on a privately chartered gulfstream jet under escort by federal and Victorian police.

Former Victoria Police chief commissioner Simon Overland has been heavily criticised for his part in Gobbo’s recruitment and use as a “human source”.

The Fullerton findings, delivered in December, could give Mokbel a road map to challenge his remaining drug trafficking convictions committed between 2005 and 2007, known as Quills, Orbital and Magnum.

Justice Fullerton also detailed how four police officers took part in a “joint criminal enterprise” with Gobbo – also known as Lawyer X – to pervert the course of justice by setting up a Mokbel drug cook known by the pseudonym “Mr Cooper” to turn him into a snitch.

Mokbel’s appeal is set to be heard this year.

Originally published as Drug kingpin Tony Mokbel’s shock bail bid