Operation Carnegie: the police bust that foiled Tasmania’s biggest-ever drug trafficking racket

A grandmother will spend years in a Tasmanian jail after running the biggest drug trafficking racket in the state’s history – but the case itself is still far from over. What we know so far.

A grandmother is due to spend years in a Tasmanian prison after she was foiled running the biggest drug trafficking racket in the state’s history – but the case itself is still far from over.

Last Friday, Jacqueline Pauline Fiala wept in the docks of the Supreme Court of Tasmania as she was jailed up to 15 years for her key role in moving up to $26 million of ice across the Bass Strait between 2019 and 2021.

The sophisticated operation used Vaseline, cryovac bags and spare tyres as tools of the trade – with Fiala recruiting a number of vulnerable “couriers” to smuggle drugs onto the island via the Spirit of Tasmania.

Several of those couriers, plus Fiala, have now been jailed.

But Tasmanians are yet to hear the full details of the case, with a sixth person yet to have her case finalised.

Until that day comes, her story – and the story of another courier – are suppressed from publication under a court gag order.

Gold Coast woman Jacqueline Fiala, 50, has been jailed after trafficking $26 million worth of ice into Tasmania. It's the state's biggest drug trafficking case in history. Picture: Facebook

How it worked

Fiala, 50, claimed she’d become “embroiled” in the scheme after initially trying to help her son out of a modest drug debt, the court heard.

But she said she increasingly felt unable to say no to the man at the top of the chain – a man she referred to as “the boss”.

Fiala, who developed a drug habit herself, recruited vulnerable couriers from New South Wales and Queensland to transport large quantities of ice – and sometimes cocaine and ketamine – onto the island via the Spirit of Tasmania ferry.

She paid her workers – most of whom were down on their luck – between $10,000 to $20,000 per trip.

Over the course of 13 trips, the couriers would usually take about 2kg of ice into Tasmania using cryovac bags, with a double-bagging technique and separated by layers of Vaseline, hidden in spare car tyres.

They would communicate with Fiala – who acted as a go-between for the boss, drug suppliers and her couriers – using encrypted messaging apps.

Fiala would typically book an apartment in Hobart, then meet her couriers there to collect the drugs, then send them back home with massive wads of cash.

In February, Fiala pleaded guilty to two counts of trafficking in a controlled substance.

Fiala’s couriers made 13 trips to Tasmania and back on the Spirit of Tasmania, with huge amounts of drugs and cash. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Sarah Matray

Kylie Ann Durban

Durban was the first person sent to jail over the racket, copping a minimum of one year and five months back in December 2021.

While sentencing, Acting Justice David Porter said the NSW woman, 50, travelled to Tasmania on the ferry in February the same year with an unknown quantity of ice.

Fiala flew to Hobart and collected Durban, taking her back to an apartment – unaware police had previously wired it with a surveillance device.

Police intercepted Durban at Deloraine, as she was making her way to the Devonport ferry, finding $762,465 in the car packed in several cryovac bags.

Acting Justice Porter said Durban had taken time off work to support her unwell son, withdrawing her superannuation funds to support her family – but things spiralled out of control, and she was ultimately evicted from her home and became homeless.

It was in this context that Fiala, who she had known since they were teenagers, offered her a $20,000 job transporting drugs and cash.

Durban said she felt she had “no way out” after Fiala told her outlaw motorbike gang members were involved, and that she could be hurt if she spoke out.

Durban, who pleaded guilty to trafficking in a controlled substance, was released from the Mary Hutchinson Women’s Prison on parole in September last year.

Meafou Leon Sipili and Candice Tapatuetoa

Queensland lovers Meafou Leon Sipili and Candice Tapatuetoa have been in a relationship for 17 years, but will spend the next few years of their lives in Tasmanian jails.

Sipili and Tapatuetoa, a beautician, had worked in legitimate businesses, but when the pandemic hit in 2020, they lost work and started gambling.

Sipili innocently began working for Fiala home and garden maintenance, but the trafficker became aware of their situation and offered them some “generosity”.

Fiala loaned the couple thousands of dollars and shouted them “a trip to Tasmania”.

The couple was unaware the car they drove on their return trip across the Bass Straight contained tubs containing money from the proceeds of drug sales.

But two weeks later in February 2021, they drove to Tasmania and back again, this time knowingly taking with them about $250,000 in cash.

They were busted after police located $594,000 in cash, almost 2kg worth of meth and 642 grams of cocaine over two trips.

While sentencing, Justice Robert Pearce noted Fiala had threatened both Sipili, 44, and Tapatuetoa, 39, and their families if they stepped away from their role as couriers.

They each pleaded guilty to trafficking in a controlled substance and dealing with proceeds of crime.

Sipili was jailed for four years and seven months, with a non-parole period of half that time.

Tapatuetoa was jailed for four years, with a non-parole period of two years.

The operation brought 26kg of ice, worth up to $26 million, into Tasmania over 18 months.

How the scheme was foiled

The whole ploy came crashing down under Operation Carnegie.

The task force was a joint effort between Tasmania Police and Australian Federal Police (AFP), which had Fiala firmly in their sights.

After wiring locations they knew the syndicate was operating from, and conducting covert searches aboard the Spirit of Tasmania, police nabbed the traffickers by intercepting them in the act.

After a series of raids of properties and cars in both Tasmania and Queensland, police announced in June 2021 they’d charged six people with major drug trafficking crimes.

“Working together we have been able to achieve a historic moment and prevent further harm to the Tasmanian community,” AFP Assistant Commissioner Bruce Giles said at the time.

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