Pubdate: Sat, 24 Mar 2001 Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) Copyright: 2001 The Sydney Morning Herald Contact: GPO Box 3771, Sydney NSW 2001 Fax: 61-(0)2-9282 3492 Website: http://www.smh.com.au/ Forum: http://forums.fairfax.com.au/ Author: Darren Goodsir CHASING A YOUNG REBEL WITHOUT DUE CAUSE It was hailed as the biggest-ever sting operation against police. At one stage, 80 officers chased detectives in a $2 million investigation. But, as Darren Goodsir reports, the Internal Affairs inquiry has backfired - and careers may be on the line. The police station in Young, a cherry-growing community amid the wattle-stained countryside of south-western NSW, sits in a prominent position at the top of Cloete Street: up near the court and the town's other institutions of surety. But rather than being the symbol of proud authority, in the past four years the cop shop has become a tawdry template for a fractured town. It is all because of a failed police bust - a 30-month-old Internal Affairs operation touted as the biggest investigation of its kind mounted outside Sydney. The case is now unravelling in the courts, with police disclosing that an Internal Affairs undercover officer may have lied to get listening devices and taps on telephones. It's the most serious of claims: that a police untouchable provided false statements to Supreme Court judges in sting operations. "There are so many victims in this," said Les Canellis, a retired sergeant in the town for 17 years - pensioned out of the police because of his experiences. "It is incredible that so much has been done, and so little has come out of it - except losers and victims and no satisfaction. "And that there still remains so much to be done. This is a blight on the town and the police. It lives with many of us till this day." After scores of interviews with serving and former police, Internal Affairs operatives, councillors, lawyers, townsfolk and criminals, it is clear that this attempted police purge - this so-called purification of Young - was a juggernaut that was off the rails. The commander of Internal Affairs, Assistant Commissioner Mal Brammer, was no stranger to the town; he was a local. So was his father, who once worked at Highbank Station, a vast property on the town's outskirts. For years the father had been reporting to his son. Literally as if he was a police informant. Mindful of Brammer's powerful position and influence, locals were forever telling the father their problems. The Rebels motorcycle club had set up a clubhouse outside Young, and their arrival, it was suggested, had influenced young people to misbehave. Whether by chance, drugs soon became more noticeable in town. There was a succession of crimes that failed to be resolved to the community's satisfaction, including the shotgun death of Benjamin Walker, the current mayor's son - a case that the coroner recently said he could not investigate because of the police's poor initial efforts. Then a teenager was viciously attacked with a screwdriver, there was an alleged pack-rape and there were other crimes. Convictions were hard to secure, and a perception of a growing crime problem took hold. Influential local figures fuelled a sense of disenchantment, and much of that frustration was inevitably directed at the detectives in Young. Enter Detective Sergeant Terrence Henry Fraser, a local for 17 years, with a handlebar moustache, tattoos and a penchant for big motorcycles, looking more like the renegade bikies causing so much irritation than the policeman charged with keeping them in line. He lived with the former mayor's daughter. Perhaps because of his gruff appearance, he came to be seen as part of the problem. "It got to the stage where everyone blamed him for the town's woes," one police insider said. "It was a case that he looked like a bear and smelled like a bear - so, you know what comes next." Fraser was no backroom player. As part of his duties, he mixed with criminals and bikies, and such ties - even if they were for the purposes of soliciting intelligence on crime - only made the town's tongues looser. Brammer has previously confirmed his father, and other intelligence, influenced the formation of Operation Banks, the targeting by Internal Affairs of Fraser and the Young detectives. But the case was doomed from the start. It has now been disclosed in the Downing Centre Local Court that the Internal Affairs undercover officer who signed statements to get listening devices and bugs to initiate the operation may have lied to Supreme Court judges. Such a dangerous irregularity has seen the sudden adjournment of a drugs hearing against a man caught up in Operation Banks. And the Police Commissioner, Peter Ryan, is awaiting a report on the case, in which more than 50 officers have been formally interviewed. By June 1998, with warrants for electronic surveillance having been issued by Justices Henry Bell and Graham Barr, an integrity test was ready to be unfurled. Fraser was told by his boss, Inspector Alan Baker, there was information about drugs being dealt from a house down the road from the police. It was further indicated that the woman there accepted credit cards as payment for drugs. Fraser was told to immediately get a search warrant and raid the home, a place loaded with bugs and other devices. Primed for the integrity test, eight officers - one with a video camera - went on the raid. They could find nothing. But, once Fraser and his team left, another team was sent in and they found marijuana secreted in the home's washing machine. Fraser was declared to have passed the test. But he was marched into the police station the next day and, on the orders of the Southern Rivers region commander, Assistant Commissioner Eric Gollan, was suspended and dispatched. So too was another detective, Senior Constable Cliff Whiteman. Two people, Dianne Ewen, and Richard Gordon Tyler, were charged with drug offences. Tyler is still before the courts on a charge of supplying one kilogram of cannabis - to which he has pleaded not guilty. Gollan proudly announced the suspensions and arrests to the media, holding a celebratory news conference in which he pleaded for community assistance. "When the operation was launched, several targets were identified within the police force as well as the Young community. The investigation has involved modern policing techniques ... "It was the largest operation of its kind in country NSW. The community expects professionalism and the right attitude from police. "I feel for the police left over there. There are a lot of good police in Young ..." The new Young boss, Chief Inspector Harry Koster, now inherited the mess. Brammer and Internal Affairs quickly left town and left a heap of unresolved issues for others to investigate. Gollan set up Taskforce Lennonville, assembling 17 investigators to pore over old cases, briefs of evidence and to interrogate town identities. At its peak, 80 officers were on the case, raiding alleged drug farms and chatting to many people. Despite regularly asking for details on his plight, Fraser remained suspended without an adequate explanation for more than two years. His partner, Whiteman, pleaded guilty to an assault charge, having been caught on a bug planted in the police station thumping a juvenile in custody. Ewen pleaded guilty to drugs charges. Late last year, in a letter from Mr Ryan, Fraser was cleared but was chastised for breaching three minor police regulations, none of the breaches being sufficient to justify his dismissal. He was then urged to return to work. Instead Fraser put in a complaint and is on sick report. Fraser's complaint - based on the injustice of a two-year suspension with no result - has taken on a complexion of its own. Two weeks ago the man investigating his complaint, Superintendent Peter Gallagher, disclosed to Tyler's solicitor, John Bettens, information showing "at its highest" that lies were told to judges during Operation Banks. Mr Ryan is using a lawyer from the Crown Solicitor's Office to prevent the release of the documents already shown to Mr Bettens. Regardless, the Tyler case - which spanned six hearing days over more than a year, including evidence from 15 police officers - has suddenly been adjourned. Indeed, other senior officers spoken to by the Heraldhave been prompted to make their own complaints about allegations of police misconduct in Banks and Lennonville - and the Police Integrity Commission is monitoring an inquiry that has raised questions on the workings of Internal Affairs. Last year, acknowledging the damage caused by Banks, and the failure to put police scalps on sticks, the Deputy Police Commissioner, Mr Jeff Jarratt, visited Young. He talked to groups of young officers; and he spent moments alone with those whom he felt needed the extra bit of attention. And he promised full support to the town's police. But then, Young is all too familiar with promises. - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D