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Youth Crime: A Personal Journey | George Xynas · Real Crime with Adam Shand

0:05
Speaker 1: Apodge production, Welcome to Real Crime with Adam shand I'm
0:14
Speaker 1: Your Host Adam Shand. Sunshine and Melbourne's West produced some
0:18
Speaker 1: of the most notorious and brutal criminals.
0:21
Speaker 2: Victoria Police are under pressure after a series of shootings
0:24
Speaker 2: and a fire bombing in Melbourne's local residents are afraid
0:27
Speaker 2: they're getting caught in the middle of a gangland war.
0:30
Speaker 1: Names like Dino Debra, Mark Mehlia, Paul Calipolitis and Andrew
0:35
Speaker 1: Benji Venyumin have passed into history due to the underbelly
0:39
Speaker 1: story of Melbourne's gangland War. He had an extensive criminal history,
0:44
Speaker 1: including convictions for trafficking heroin and assaulting police. In running
0:48
Speaker 1: my book Big Shots on the Gangland War, I found
0:50
Speaker 1: myself immersed in Sunshine and the atmosphere that produced these fearless,
0:55
Speaker 1: dangerous criminals.
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Speaker 2: We say they believe the violences drug related, but have
0:59
Speaker 2: so far made no arrests.
1:02
Speaker 1: George Zionas, as a teenager, walked those same brutal streets
1:06
Speaker 1: and became known as the King of Sunshine, building a
1:10
Speaker 1: drug empire before he was old enough to vote.
1:13
Speaker 3: To the people on the outside, the are notorious characters.
1:16
Speaker 3: To people like me, their friends and family. My dream
1:20
Speaker 3: when I was a kid to die fighting. If I
1:23
Speaker 3: died fighting beside my brothers, that would have been the
1:26
Speaker 3: best day of my life. You put a knife to
1:28
Speaker 3: my throat, you put a gun to my head. There's
1:30
Speaker 3: no rules for me after that. I will never wrong you.
1:34
Speaker 3: But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
1:38
Speaker 3: If you just chopped my finger off, I will chop
1:41
Speaker 3: your hands off and your feet off.
1:43
Speaker 4: And to me, that was fair enough.
1:47
Speaker 1: He managed to get out and has decided to share
1:49
Speaker 1: his story. Thanks for joining me.
1:52
Speaker 4: George, Thank you, You're welcome.
1:54
Speaker 1: What's led you to decide to share what you did
1:57
Speaker 1: as a teenager?
1:59
Speaker 3: I suppose it'll be my book that I'm writing. I
2:02
Speaker 3: feel like I need to get it out there, get
2:04
Speaker 3: the story.
2:05
Speaker 1: Because it was brutal and traumatic, what you were involved in,
2:09
Speaker 1: what you saw. What Mark do you think it's left
2:11
Speaker 1: on you?
2:13
Speaker 4: What Mark?
2:14
Speaker 3: I can't say it stays with you for a long time,
2:17
Speaker 3: but it's been almost thirty years now, thirty years, that's
2:22
Speaker 3: a long time. So for me, I have to think
2:24
Speaker 3: about a little bit to remember how those times were.
2:28
Speaker 1: What was it about sunshine back in those days?
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Speaker 3: Sunshine I'll tell you one thing that you can say
2:35
Speaker 3: about the people of Sunshine that you can't help respect.
2:38
Speaker 3: There's no victim mentality people. They grow up, they're poor,
2:43
Speaker 3: their parents are working, their parents aren't home most of
2:46
Speaker 3: the time. Nothing to eat maybe, but they don't complain
2:50
Speaker 3: about it. They go out and do what they have
2:51
Speaker 3: to do. And a lot of kids at that time,
2:54
Speaker 3: and I think I remember the nineties was a recession
2:57
Speaker 3: and parents were working two jobs at a time and
3:00
Speaker 3: they couldn't be home all the time, so the kids
3:02
Speaker 3: were on the street a lot.
3:04
Speaker 1: So where did you get to in terms of the
3:06
Speaker 1: criminal empire that you created in Sunshine? Tell me at
3:09
Speaker 1: the height of.
3:10
Speaker 3: What and't call it a criminal empire. I just grew
3:13
Speaker 3: up in those streets and I just knew those people
3:18
Speaker 3: that you mentioned, and we grew up together.
3:21
Speaker 4: That's all.
3:22
Speaker 1: So what was your business though?
3:24
Speaker 4: My business as a kid.
3:26
Speaker 3: A lot of the times when you're hanging around Charlie's
3:28
Speaker 3: in Sunshine, they're a lot of the thieves and the
3:33
Speaker 3: drug addicts. They come through and they sell you stolen goods.
3:36
Speaker 3: That's most of the business that you did back then.
3:39
Speaker 3: I'd go to the shops bring back something that's worth
3:41
Speaker 3: one hundred dollars, give it to you for twenty or
3:43
Speaker 3: even ten dollars, and you sell it for twenty thirty.
3:46
Speaker 4: How you made some money.
3:47
Speaker 1: Because Charlie's was a pinball parlor in the main threat
3:50
Speaker 1: of sunshine there, but it became a lot more than
3:53
Speaker 1: just stolen goods. You found yourself going from that beginning
3:58
Speaker 1: into drug dealing. How did that happen?
4:00
Speaker 3: It was, like I said, the stolen goods. Whatever little
4:04
Speaker 3: crimes people did back then, it wasn't too bad. Maybe
4:07
Speaker 3: people got into selling marijuana heroine. I'm going to leave
4:11
Speaker 3: a lot of details for the book. I'll tell you that.
4:14
Speaker 1: How old were you when this started happening? And listen,
4:16
Speaker 1: I appreciate you if you're writing a book, but I
4:18
Speaker 1: think we need to sort of just touch on the
4:20
Speaker 1: development of your life at that time and how you
4:23
Speaker 1: found yourself. I mean, you're right at the center of it.
4:25
Speaker 1: This was a dangerous place that were full of people
4:28
Speaker 1: who were coming to buy drugs. There was some pretty
4:30
Speaker 1: notorious characters.
4:32
Speaker 3: To the people on the outside, the notorious characters to
4:36
Speaker 3: people like me, their friends and family, And to tell
4:40
Speaker 3: the truth, I met a lot of good people a
4:41
Speaker 3: lot of good people in Sancho.
4:43
Speaker 1: With quite a few people who were murdered over the
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Speaker 1: journey too.
4:46
Speaker 3: Yes, but if you think about it, when all that
4:49
Speaker 3: stuff was happening, it was, what was it, two thousand
4:51
Speaker 3: and two thousand and one. I was already out of
4:53
Speaker 3: Sunshine at that time. See with me, It started when
4:57
Speaker 3: I was twelve years old, So I was a teenager
5:00
Speaker 3: through the nineties, and I just used to hang out
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Speaker 3: at sh at Charlie's. And by the time it got
5:08
Speaker 3: really bad there I was, I was already out.
5:11
Speaker 1: But there was already some pretty bad things happening within
5:13
Speaker 1: Sunshine at that time, and you saw a lot of
5:15
Speaker 1: this there was.
5:16
Speaker 3: My first one was someone got murdered under the train station.
5:21
Speaker 3: There used to be an underpass in the train station there,
5:24
Speaker 3: and the guy got murdered, and the police came into
5:27
Speaker 3: Charlie's and they took us all out, and they lined us.
5:29
Speaker 4: All up and got all our details.
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Speaker 3: And I was very young at time, twelve years old,
5:34
Speaker 3: and I can remember the police putting us up against
5:37
Speaker 3: the wall and then making us sit down there for
5:39
Speaker 3: at least an hour or so, taking all our details,
5:42
Speaker 3: and eventually they let us go. But then I found
5:44
Speaker 3: out it was because of murder. But at the time
5:47
Speaker 3: they had a sitting there, I had no idea what
5:49
Speaker 3: it was for. Then you found out on the news
5:51
Speaker 3: after there was a murder.
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Speaker 1: This began to establish a us and their mentality in
5:58
Speaker 1: people in Sunshine. There was the police, then there was
6:00
Speaker 1: you guys.
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Speaker 3: Before you mentioned the King of Sunshine. Never have I
6:05
Speaker 3: said those words out of my mouth to anybody. I'll
6:07
Speaker 3: tell you how it started. The police used to come
6:10
Speaker 3: past and they used to pick on us a little bit,
6:12
Speaker 3: so they'll get out of the car and they'll push
6:14
Speaker 3: us around. At one time, this cop comes out of
6:17
Speaker 3: the car and he starts pushing me around, and he goes, look,
6:19
Speaker 3: I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And if you
6:22
Speaker 3: look in the back seat, there was a young lady there.
6:24
Speaker 3: They were doing a ride along, and you could see
6:26
Speaker 3: the surprise look on their face, thinking that's the King
6:28
Speaker 3: of Sunshine.
6:29
Speaker 4: It's a little boy, you know what I mean. And
6:32
Speaker 4: that's how it started. It happened twice.
6:34
Speaker 3: So the first time he was pushing around, slopping around
6:36
Speaker 3: a little bit. I didn't say not one word, didn't
6:39
Speaker 3: say anything. And the second time he said look, look,
6:42
Speaker 3: I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And I said
6:45
Speaker 3: to him, mate, this is no way to treat your majesty.
6:48
Speaker 4: You know what I mean. You're gonna stop it.
6:50
Speaker 5: You know.
6:51
Speaker 3: So that's how it came about because people heard him saying, look,
6:53
Speaker 3: look I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine.
6:56
Speaker 4: And that's how that started.
6:57
Speaker 1: But you were also highly connected. You were doing a
7:01
Speaker 1: lot of business back in those days. You were a
7:04
Speaker 1: connector between people who wanted to buy drugs and the
7:06
Speaker 1: sources that you could get them from.
7:09
Speaker 4: Yes, yes I was. I was.
7:12
Speaker 3: We started moving a lot of marijuana and heroin when
7:16
Speaker 3: I was about thirteen fourteen years old, very young. I
7:19
Speaker 3: didn't even know really what it was, and we pretty
7:23
Speaker 3: much started making a lot of money, a lot real quick.
7:27
Speaker 3: And as a young kid, when you've got a lot
7:29
Speaker 3: of money and you're very young, you know you don't
7:32
Speaker 3: know what to do with it, and there's not much
7:35
Speaker 3: you can do with it but spend it.
7:37
Speaker 4: So you learn how to spend money.
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Speaker 1: Because you must laugh now when you hear people talking about, oh,
7:41
Speaker 1: criminals are getting younger and younger. Now, this has always
7:44
Speaker 1: been the case back in your day. If he was
7:46
Speaker 1: still at school.
7:47
Speaker 4: Yeah.
7:48
Speaker 3: Always, It's always been like that, even before that, even
7:51
Speaker 3: the eighties, because I used to hang around Tom's. There
7:53
Speaker 3: was another place around the corner there that was my
7:56
Speaker 3: Auntie's place, and we started hanging around there when we're
7:58
Speaker 3: about seven eight years old.
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Speaker 4: And you'd see the older kids.
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Speaker 3: To us though older kids, but that was they were
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Speaker 3: young still thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old, but to us
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Speaker 3: they looked old. But they were selling drugs at the
8:12
Speaker 3: time too. And this was the eighties, because what sort
8:15
Speaker 3: of money were talking about.
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Speaker 1: Here was a thirteen year old boy. Suddenly you've got
8:18
Speaker 1: fist full of cash. Yeah, I couldn't really tell you
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Speaker 1: how much money, but it was a lot of money
8:24
Speaker 1: for a thirteen year old. It was.
8:26
Speaker 4: There was a lot of money.
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Speaker 1: Because people I've talked to from your background in Sunshine
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Speaker 1: all those years ago, people like Andrew ven Yum and
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Speaker 1: Johnny Orcello, those sort of people, they talked about money
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Speaker 1: and power being the motivator. Is the aphrodisiacs, Yes, that's true.
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Speaker 1: What role of that playing your life?
8:43
Speaker 3: Well, the money and it does come with power to
8:47
Speaker 3: the point where you can get anything done for a
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Speaker 3: little bit of money, and that's where the power comes in.
8:53
Speaker 1: Were you ever afraid.
8:55
Speaker 3: I probably was too stupid to be afraid. Kids at
8:59
Speaker 3: that age are so dumb they don't know anything.
9:01
Speaker 1: And you were building up a distribution network. You've made
9:04
Speaker 1: a life answers with other individuals from the Vietnamese community
9:08
Speaker 1: out there, that's right. And you were witnessing the struggle
9:14
Speaker 1: for the corners in Sunshine where people were selling drugs.
9:17
Speaker 1: Tell us a bit about that.
9:19
Speaker 3: Well, when it gets to the time when a lot
9:22
Speaker 3: of drug addicts are coming into one area, the other
9:25
Speaker 3: drug dealers can see that a lot of money is
9:27
Speaker 3: coming in, so they want it. And when they come in,
9:32
Speaker 3: you have to do something about it or walk away.
9:35
Speaker 3: So we did something about it. What sort of things
9:38
Speaker 3: would happen, Well, would push them out of the area,
9:44
Speaker 3: to say so, it would beat them up, and you
9:48
Speaker 3: know things like that.
9:50
Speaker 1: There were some pretty big confrontations. And understand that because
9:52
Speaker 1: when you talk about money and power, when you have money,
9:55
Speaker 1: you have the power to get people to do things
9:57
Speaker 1: for you. And so some of these fights would have
9:59
Speaker 1: been set up around bringing in heavier individuals, older guys
10:04
Speaker 1: to come fight for you.
10:06
Speaker 3: Yes, we did have a lot of people see, there
10:09
Speaker 3: was our group in Sunshine and there was a group
10:11
Speaker 3: in Suncho On West, and that's the people you're talking about.
10:14
Speaker 3: And a few times they came and helped us out,
10:17
Speaker 3: you know, with some fights. And when there was a
10:20
Speaker 3: lot of numbers on their side, we called in other
10:23
Speaker 3: people and Sunshine West they had the numbers. There was
10:27
Speaker 3: a lot of people in sun John.
10:28
Speaker 1: West and there were some very heavy guys that were
10:31
Speaker 1: useful in terms of your business. And you've been beaten up,
10:36
Speaker 1: you'd been kicked off your corners.
10:37
Speaker 4: I have, I have.
10:38
Speaker 1: What's that like?
10:40
Speaker 4: It's not a good feeling, but you get used to it.
10:44
Speaker 3: To tell the truth, you know, after you've been beaten
10:46
Speaker 3: up a few times, it's not that bad, you know
10:48
Speaker 3: what I mean. I remember my friend James. I used
10:51
Speaker 3: to tell him, you know, you have to fight. He
10:53
Speaker 3: never fought this guy. Every time there was a fight,
10:55
Speaker 3: he would run away. I said to him, look doesn't
10:58
Speaker 3: matter if you get beaten up, the pain goes away.
11:01
Speaker 4: It's not that bad.
11:02
Speaker 3: I remember one time he got caught chroming in his
11:04
Speaker 3: room and his dad beating him up really bad. And
11:07
Speaker 3: we'll have a nightclub that night. And he came out
11:10
Speaker 3: and his face it was rearranged. He looked like a
11:14
Speaker 3: different person. And he goes to me, George, I know
11:17
Speaker 3: now what you mean. It's not that bad. And I'm
11:19
Speaker 3: looking at him, like, are you you're kidding? That was
11:24
Speaker 3: so bad. I've never had a beating that bad. He
11:26
Speaker 3: goes to me, George, I know now, I'm not scared
11:28
Speaker 3: of getting.
11:28
Speaker 1: A beating, because the reality in Sunshine in those years
11:33
Speaker 1: was that if you got beaten up, if you got
11:35
Speaker 1: kicked off your corner, if you didn't back up, you
11:38
Speaker 1: were weak and you were finished.
11:39
Speaker 3: With one hundred percent must one hundred percent. I would
11:43
Speaker 3: actually challenge anybody to find one person that I have
11:46
Speaker 3: wronged who hasn't wronged me.
11:49
Speaker 1: You're a different person back then, I can tell. I
11:51
Speaker 1: can see your heart's changed completely. And I've seen this
11:53
Speaker 1: before a person.
11:54
Speaker 3: If I said more than ten words a day, I
11:56
Speaker 3: spoke too much. I would hardly say a word for
12:00
Speaker 3: about ten about twenty years of my life, I wouldn't
12:04
Speaker 3: say a word.
12:06
Speaker 1: Why was that?
12:07
Speaker 4: I don't know. I couldn't tell you. Was I angry?
12:10
Speaker 4: I don't know.
12:12
Speaker 1: But you were dealing with the trauma and stress of
12:14
Speaker 1: what you were involved in and the uncertainty of with
12:17
Speaker 1: the turmoil that must have been in your life because
12:19
Speaker 1: you're a kid. You're thirteen and fourteen now yeah, yeah, But.
12:24
Speaker 3: To tell you the truth, my dream when I was
12:27
Speaker 3: a kid to die fighting. If I died fighting beside
12:32
Speaker 3: my brothers, that would have been the best day of
12:34
Speaker 3: my life.
12:35
Speaker 4: I'm not even joking. That was my dream.
12:37
Speaker 3: And actually I had a couple of times it could
12:40
Speaker 3: have happened. So one time we ad a party in Albion.
12:45
Speaker 3: At the party were making too much noise, too much
12:47
Speaker 3: of a racket. So the person whose party it was,
12:49
Speaker 3: he said, look, we got to go for a walk
12:52
Speaker 3: because we're making too much noise.
12:53
Speaker 4: They're going to call the cops on us.
12:55
Speaker 3: So we go for a walker, went across the train
12:57
Speaker 3: tracks there at Albion and there was another party. Someone
13:01
Speaker 3: else was having a party, and there was this lady
13:02
Speaker 3: at the front and one of my friends it goes,
13:04
Speaker 3: can we come to the party, and she goes no, no, no,
13:07
Speaker 3: go away, go away, trust me, go away, And my
13:09
Speaker 3: friend kept in saysing no, we're going to want to
13:11
Speaker 3: come into the party, and she goes no, don't, don't.
13:14
Speaker 3: And about five or six bikers. They looked like bikers,
13:17
Speaker 3: you know, came out with machetes, and I wanted to
13:22
Speaker 3: run away too, But everybody ran away except my brother Peter.
13:26
Speaker 3: The first person who made the trouble. They were chopping
13:31
Speaker 3: in with the machetes and my brother Peter jumped on
13:35
Speaker 3: him and he started coppying the machetes to the head
13:38
Speaker 3: and I wanted to run away, but I saw that happening,
13:41
Speaker 3: so I ran towards it.
13:43
Speaker 4: And let me tell you the feeling that I had.
13:46
Speaker 3: Let's just say, you go home one day and you
13:50
Speaker 3: find your house is full of money, full of gold,
13:53
Speaker 3: full of diamonds. How would you feel excited, A bit
13:58
Speaker 3: of fear. That's how I felt. And if it happened,
14:03
Speaker 3: it happened. But it didn't happen. I ended up jumping
14:06
Speaker 3: on one of the guys and he started swinging me around.
14:09
Speaker 3: And at the time, I was probably about fourteen years old.
14:13
Speaker 3: And as he's swinging me around, I'm hitting the other guys.
14:16
Speaker 3: So I'm knocking out three or four people at a
14:19
Speaker 3: time while he's swinging me around. Believe it or not,
14:22
Speaker 3: they called the cops on us.
14:23
Speaker 4: These people.
14:25
Speaker 3: The police ended up coming to the house where we
14:27
Speaker 3: at this party, pushes around a bit, hit a couple
14:30
Speaker 3: of people with their torches and ended up arresting me
14:34
Speaker 3: because they said I was the one who caused all
14:36
Speaker 3: the trouble. And I believe that was the first time
14:40
Speaker 3: I spent overnight till my parents came in the morning.
14:43
Speaker 1: Because that was a feature of the guys in Sunshine
14:47
Speaker 1: and Sunshine West that they had done very little jail,
14:51
Speaker 1: They'd done very little time in police custody. They came
14:54
Speaker 1: to notice in the Gangland War as fully formed criminals,
14:58
Speaker 1: and most of the hierarchy and town had ever heard
15:01
Speaker 1: of them. So what was happening with the police out
15:04
Speaker 1: in Sunshine back in those days? Were they a part
15:06
Speaker 1: of the corruption or were they just not good at
15:09
Speaker 1: their jobs?
15:09
Speaker 3: No, no, I wouldn't say they were part of the corruption.
15:12
Speaker 3: There was a few people, I'm sure part of the corruption,
15:15
Speaker 3: but not that I know of. But we were underage.
15:19
Speaker 3: We're very young. So if you think about it, let's
15:21
Speaker 3: just say one of us gets caught shoplifting. You know
15:25
Speaker 3: what you got back then a five year good behavior bond,
15:28
Speaker 3: and a five year good behavior bond means nothing. You
15:31
Speaker 3: know what you get the next time the next day
15:33
Speaker 3: you get caught shoplifted again. The next day it's another
15:35
Speaker 3: five year good behavior bond. The one before didn't matter.
15:38
Speaker 3: And also concurrently, so exactly so what was the first
15:42
Speaker 3: one for? And then you found out, well, nothing's happening.
15:46
Speaker 3: You can get away with anything underage. I shouldn't be
15:50
Speaker 3: saying that's true.
15:51
Speaker 1: It's happening again today. I'm we're seeing young criminals here
15:54
Speaker 1: in the streets of Melbourne who are getting bail on bail,
15:57
Speaker 1: on bail, they're going to youth Justice, they're not going
16:00
Speaker 1: to jail. And they're thinking, well, this is a lark,
16:02
Speaker 1: but this is not new you're saying it was back then.
16:05
Speaker 4: It was.
16:06
Speaker 1: It was because by the time people like Andrew Venyuman
16:09
Speaker 1: got uptown, he'd already been involved in violence, assaults, murders
16:15
Speaker 1: even I mean, he'd been involved, for instance, in the
16:18
Speaker 1: murder of Dino Dibrah in two thousand, he'd probably been
16:22
Speaker 1: involved in the murder of Paul Calipalitis in two thousand
16:25
Speaker 1: and two, and nothing had happened. And so when he
16:28
Speaker 1: comes uptown with carl Williams, he was a different breed
16:32
Speaker 1: and the guys in Carlton could not believe how willing,
16:37
Speaker 1: how much dash the guys in Sunshine had, there were
16:40
Speaker 1: complete revelation. Can you understand that?
16:42
Speaker 3: I understand that, bully. Why, I know exactly the type.
16:46
Speaker 3: If sunhohe West came through your area and maybe they
16:50
Speaker 3: hang out their little bit no chroming or something, you
16:54
Speaker 3: could do nothing or you'll be able to do his
16:56
Speaker 3: smile and let them do whatever they want to do.
17:00
Speaker 3: Sunhohn West, you didn't mess with back then.
17:03
Speaker 4: It was that simple.
17:05
Speaker 1: And they all died.
17:07
Speaker 3: No, there's a lot of them still around still. Yeah,
17:10
Speaker 3: what's happened to them? Productive members of society, believe it
17:14
Speaker 3: or not. A lot of the people, Yeah, smart people,
17:16
Speaker 3: smart guys. They weren't stupid even back then. They were
17:20
Speaker 3: just street kids.
17:22
Speaker 1: I suppose, well, yeah, because I mean you were a
17:24
Speaker 1: good student, yeah, but you couldn't see any future in
17:28
Speaker 1: staying in school. You were making too much money down
17:30
Speaker 1: at Charlie's and on your corners selling drugs. So, and
17:34
Speaker 1: you had ambitions you wanted to be You're interested in
17:36
Speaker 1: ancient Greek history, and you wanted to write and a lot
17:38
Speaker 1: sort of stuff. But you saw your future on the
17:41
Speaker 1: streets at that time.
17:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, I actually wanted to be a soldier back when
17:45
Speaker 3: I was a teenager, you know, Navy seal something like that.
17:49
Speaker 3: But yeah, that wasn't going to happen. I loved football,
17:53
Speaker 3: AFL football when I was a young kid, that was
17:55
Speaker 3: my thing. So through my young probably to say from
18:00
Speaker 3: six years old to about twelve years old, AFL was
18:03
Speaker 3: everything to me.
18:04
Speaker 4: Oh I was sports. It doesn't matter what sport it was.
18:06
Speaker 3: I had to play sports that day, you know what
18:09
Speaker 3: I mean my primary school times and if you talk
18:12
Speaker 3: to anyone through my primary school, it doesn't matter what
18:14
Speaker 3: sport it was.
18:15
Speaker 4: I was good at it, every sport and I had
18:18
Speaker 4: to play sport.
18:19
Speaker 5: You know.
18:20
Speaker 3: We used to have like an Olympic day that was
18:24
Speaker 3: the best day of the year for me. We used
18:26
Speaker 3: to go to it was called Albefeldi Park and it
18:30
Speaker 3: was like an Olympics high jump, long jump, hundred meters,
18:33
Speaker 3: really everything you can think of. And that to me
18:37
Speaker 3: was like if you were junkie and you had as
18:41
Speaker 3: unlimited drugs.
18:43
Speaker 4: That's how it felt.
18:45
Speaker 3: So that's how it felt to me, you know what
18:47
Speaker 3: I mean, A natural high, natural high for sports. I
18:50
Speaker 3: was crazy about sports. But I suppose you get over it.
18:54
Speaker 1: Well, other things came up and this opportunity and then
18:57
Speaker 1: you could see, I mean, you're also quite a commercially
18:59
Speaker 1: oriented young man, and you could see at a ridiculously
19:03
Speaker 1: young age that you could apply the demand. And obviously
19:06
Speaker 1: heroin was booming in Melbourne across Australia ACTA at that
19:09
Speaker 1: time as well. You could see an opportunity that took
19:12
Speaker 1: you right away from that righteous path of sports and study.
19:17
Speaker 1: Wanted to be a soldier, and boy, what a dark
19:20
Speaker 1: place you ended up.
19:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, but even during those times, I knew this isn't
19:24
Speaker 3: the path. I knew I got to get out. I
19:27
Speaker 3: knew I had to think of something, I had to
19:29
Speaker 3: do something else. I knew this, But until I was
19:33
Speaker 3: about eighteen nineteen, I was still involved.
19:38
Speaker 1: It is difficult to get out. And I know from
19:42
Speaker 1: the Sunshine Crew that I knew that where there was
19:46
Speaker 1: a little bit of doubt about you, there was no doubt.
19:49
Speaker 1: And one thing they really looked down upon was people
19:52
Speaker 1: who were snitches on pain of death, and that's really
19:55
Speaker 1: that caused several of the murders. So how difficult was
19:59
Speaker 1: it to get out knowing that your associates would be saying, hey,
20:02
Speaker 1: George's out but is he going to snitch on us now?
20:05
Speaker 3: No, they knew me, They knew me, they knew the
20:08
Speaker 3: type of person I was, and they knew they would
20:10
Speaker 3: not happen. One time we had a fight at a
20:13
Speaker 3: footscrape McDonald's and the police ended up coming during the
20:18
Speaker 3: fight and they arrested me and about to put me
20:22
Speaker 3: in the back of the police divvy van and I
20:24
Speaker 3: started running, and as I was running, a few of
20:29
Speaker 3: the Sunshine boys stole the things in the police car.
20:33
Speaker 3: Believe it or not, I ran so they could they still.
20:36
Speaker 3: I believe it was a mobile phone and a few
20:39
Speaker 3: other things. But the sergeant then at the time, he
20:43
Speaker 3: wanted his mobile phone back, so he used to come
20:46
Speaker 3: to my house, take me to the police station and
20:49
Speaker 3: slap me around a bit until I gave him the name.
20:52
Speaker 3: And I wouldn't do it. So for three months, whenever
20:55
Speaker 3: they found me, they took me to the police station,
20:58
Speaker 3: slapped me around a bit, and let me go. The
21:01
Speaker 3: last time it happened, I said, guys, this is going
21:04
Speaker 3: to happen forever. I don't know who took the mobile phone.
21:06
Speaker 3: Of course I knew who took it, but I said
21:08
Speaker 3: to him, I don't know who took it. You're not
21:10
Speaker 3: going to get a name from me. It's that simple,
21:12
Speaker 3: you know what I mean?
21:12
Speaker 1: Because what would have happened to you had you given
21:14
Speaker 1: that name.
21:15
Speaker 3: Well, I couldn't tell you. I couldn't tell you the person.
21:19
Speaker 3: Nothing good, nothing good, of course. But the person who
21:21
Speaker 3: actually took it wasn't even a friend of mine. He
21:24
Speaker 3: was my good friend's cousin, you know. But I knew that,
21:28
Speaker 3: and I could have easily just given the name. Easy,
21:29
Speaker 3: they will stop harassing me. And in this time I
21:32
Speaker 3: couldn't do anything, and I stayed over friend's houses. But
21:35
Speaker 3: in this three months they only got me about five
21:37
Speaker 3: six times because I stayed at friend's houses. But I
21:42
Speaker 3: could have easily just given the name. How many people
21:45
Speaker 3: would have done it, you know what I mean? Easy.
21:48
Speaker 3: I didn't even care for the guy, you know what
21:50
Speaker 3: I mean.
21:51
Speaker 1: But also the reality was that police knew that you
21:55
Speaker 1: were a tall poppy, a young tall poppy. But they
21:58
Speaker 1: could also let people know that you were a snitch, yes,
22:02
Speaker 1: and destroying you.
22:03
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's what they do.
22:05
Speaker 3: The times when you're in the police station and they
22:08
Speaker 3: got you for some crime, the person in the other room,
22:12
Speaker 3: they'll tell them that person in the other room is talking.
22:15
Speaker 4: He's told us everything.
22:16
Speaker 3: You might as well just tell us he's told us,
22:19
Speaker 3: and a lot of people fall for it, you know
22:21
Speaker 3: what I mean. Plus, when you're young, you don't know
22:23
Speaker 3: any better, but I knew better, you know what I mean.
22:26
Speaker 3: And when you don't say anything, you walk. It's that simple.
22:29
Speaker 3: When a police officer says to you, make it easy
22:32
Speaker 3: on yourself, he means make it easy on himself, you
22:35
Speaker 3: know what I mean. That's what he means. If they're
22:38
Speaker 3: there talking to you and they're trying to get something,
22:40
Speaker 3: they've got nothing. So if you keep your mouth shut,
22:43
Speaker 3: you'll walk. It's that simple.
22:45
Speaker 1: Yes, you're right, George. There's not much they can do
22:48
Speaker 1: unless people are giving evidence against you. And you were
22:51
Speaker 1: quite a big operation by this time, but you were
22:53
Speaker 1: flying below the radar. All of a sudden that changes
22:57
Speaker 1: because some of your workers decide to give you up.
23:00
Speaker 3: What happened, Yeah, so a few workers bus, they've got raiders,
23:05
Speaker 3: five of them, and they also got a few clients
23:08
Speaker 3: at the same time, three, so it was eight people altogether,
23:11
Speaker 3: and seven of those eight gave witness statements and they
23:16
Speaker 3: picked me up on the back.
23:16
Speaker 1: Of that and what did they say?
23:18
Speaker 3: We know everything, we know what you're running, we know
23:21
Speaker 3: what you're doing, we know it all.
23:23
Speaker 1: And you've been doing this now for three or four
23:25
Speaker 1: years at this point, at that point, about five years,
23:30
Speaker 1: five years. You were sixteen at.
23:32
Speaker 4: This time, yeah, sixteen, about seventeen.
23:34
Speaker 1: Ye staggering, isn't it that you were that young and
23:36
Speaker 1: you've been doing it for five years and the police
23:39
Speaker 1: hadn't managed to nail you. But so what did your
23:42
Speaker 1: so called faithful workers say about you?
23:45
Speaker 4: Yeah?
23:45
Speaker 3: The faithful workers are you know a lot of them.
23:47
Speaker 3: They were all talked tough before this happened. If you
23:50
Speaker 3: talk to them, oh, don't worry about the belize, don't
23:53
Speaker 3: the police. And the one who never talks, he's quiet,
23:57
Speaker 3: he doesn't act tough, nothing. He's the one that didn't
23:59
Speaker 3: say anything. It's amazing.
24:01
Speaker 4: Yeah.
24:01
Speaker 3: The four that talked tough all talked, but the one
24:05
Speaker 3: who never talks didn't talk at that point.
24:09
Speaker 1: And so they come to you. Where were you when
24:10
Speaker 1: they when the police descended?
24:12
Speaker 4: Believe I was in Sunshine.
24:15
Speaker 1: Just another business day the day for me.
24:17
Speaker 4: Yeah.
24:17
Speaker 3: They came and arrested me from there and took me
24:20
Speaker 3: to Sunshine Police, which was the old police station at
24:22
Speaker 3: that time, and they took turns slipping around a bit,
24:27
Speaker 3: beating me up a bit to get something out of me.
24:29
Speaker 3: And they did it one at a time, so only
24:31
Speaker 3: one police officer was in the room. And when my
24:35
Speaker 3: barrister came, when I was talking to him, he said,
24:38
Speaker 3: I think I had a mark, but it wasn't from
24:40
Speaker 3: police hitting me or anything. And he said, did they
24:43
Speaker 3: did the police beat you up? And I said yeah,
24:45
Speaker 3: like this was normal because that happened all the time.
24:47
Speaker 3: It's no big deal. If you're in the boxing ring,
24:49
Speaker 3: you get hit a few times, you can't complain And
24:52
Speaker 3: I said yeah. He goes, oh, which ones? And the
24:55
Speaker 3: names were on the paper in front of him, and
24:57
Speaker 3: I tapped the paper, said this, and he ended up
25:01
Speaker 3: rolling with that and ended up taking those officers to court.
25:05
Speaker 1: And what happened about that without me telling him to
25:07
Speaker 1: do that.
25:09
Speaker 3: So the day we went to court and I saw
25:11
Speaker 3: those three there, I said, what are they doing here?
25:14
Speaker 3: He said, you're going to testify against them? I said
25:18
Speaker 3: I'm not doing that. He said, yeah, but they beat
25:21
Speaker 3: you up. We're going to try and get your charges
25:23
Speaker 3: dropped and all this stuff. I said, yeah, I'm not
25:27
Speaker 3: going to testify against them, and I left it at that,
25:30
Speaker 3: and they left.
25:32
Speaker 4: They heard obviously I wasn't going to go forward with it.
25:34
Speaker 3: And we got a charge of community service two hundred
25:39
Speaker 3: and fifty hours and we're happy with it.
25:40
Speaker 1: And what were you charged with?
25:42
Speaker 4: Heroin trafficking? Organized crime?
25:44
Speaker 3: It was like something about running an organized crime syndicate
25:48
Speaker 3: and things like that, just crazy charges, but they ended
25:52
Speaker 3: up it was like ten charges or more. But then
25:55
Speaker 3: they just went down to a few of them which
25:57
Speaker 3: was just drug trafficking and things like that.
25:59
Speaker 1: So it's gone from like pretty serious down to fairly mind.
26:02
Speaker 3: I will tell me twenty years. You're going to get
26:04
Speaker 3: twenty they're telling me. I didn't believe that straight up.
26:07
Speaker 3: First of all, I'm sixteen, seventeen years old. I knew
26:10
Speaker 3: that wasn't gonna happen. I ended up just getting two
26:12
Speaker 3: hundred and fifty hours of community serving, which was good
26:15
Speaker 3: for me actually at the time. Come work into the work.
26:18
Speaker 1: What did you have to do?
26:20
Speaker 4: At science works?
26:21
Speaker 3: There was this guy who collects the dead bodies who
26:24
Speaker 3: jumped from the West Gate Bridge and he collects them
26:27
Speaker 3: and the people.
26:28
Speaker 1: That had jumped off the bridge and committed suicide. Okay.
26:31
Speaker 3: He says that people around that area they get like
26:34
Speaker 3: eight bodies a week. And I couldn't believe it because
26:36
Speaker 3: you don't hear about on the news.
26:37
Speaker 4: Nothing.
26:38
Speaker 3: And he opened up the drainage hatch and he said,
26:41
Speaker 3: this is where we're going to get the bodies from.
26:44
Speaker 3: I've never taken up, but I saw them do it
26:45
Speaker 3: one time. But removing bodies from where was this Science Works?
26:49
Speaker 3: This is just near the West Gate Bridge. There they
26:52
Speaker 3: were storing the bodies that people had committed suicide. No, no,
26:54
Speaker 3: they washed up in their drainage system. And there was
26:58
Speaker 3: this big hatch at the back of Science Works and
27:01
Speaker 3: you go down a ladder. It's like a sewage system,
27:04
Speaker 3: and that's sometimes the bodies get caught up there.
27:06
Speaker 1: And what was your job in relation to that?
27:08
Speaker 4: I was supposed to help him pull them out?
27:10
Speaker 1: Goodness me.
27:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, but we're also also doing landscaping around the front
27:14
Speaker 3: of the place and back of the place. And he said,
27:17
Speaker 3: if there's a dead body, you've got to come and
27:18
Speaker 3: help me. It's a bit of gardening, bit of body retrieval. Yeah,
27:21
Speaker 3: two and fifty hours. I mean it's remarkable because I
27:25
Speaker 3: mean most ordinary people would say, ah, you should have
27:28
Speaker 3: given evidence against the police. But I know in Sunshine
27:31
Speaker 3: at that time, you didn't give evidence against anybody, be
27:34
Speaker 3: it your friends or the police, because you always had
27:36
Speaker 3: to go back to Sunshine.
27:37
Speaker 4: Exactly, and you have to live with yourself. It's that simple.
27:39
Speaker 3: But giving evidence against the police wouldn't bother me that much.
27:42
Speaker 3: I just couldn't do it. I just didn't feel it
27:43
Speaker 3: was right. They beat me up a bit so wide,
27:46
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, that's how it's meant to be.
27:48
Speaker 3: But what I hated the worst about this cop that
27:51
Speaker 3: I took the court. Three months later, he arrested a
27:54
Speaker 3: friend of mine right in front of me, and as
27:57
Speaker 3: he's got him in handcuffs taking him to the car,
27:59
Speaker 3: he says, he yells out to me, thanks for your help, George.
28:03
Speaker 3: Are you just trying to get me killed?
28:04
Speaker 1: Yeah? That was a common tactic, wasn't it, to say
28:06
Speaker 1: that you've been.
28:07
Speaker 3: Helped, because obviously something's gone wrong with his career, he
28:10
Speaker 3: can't get promoted, or something's happened because there was a
28:13
Speaker 3: someone's complaint against him, So he's held a grudge, this guy.
28:17
Speaker 1: And in those years, you had a lot to lose
28:20
Speaker 1: you had built up this empire. You work all the
28:22
Speaker 1: King of Sunshine, however reluctantly you were His Majesty, if
28:25
Speaker 1: you like. So to see that wrenched away from you
28:29
Speaker 1: and your reputation destroyed was a powerful incentive to stay staunch.
28:35
Speaker 3: Yes, but I knew I had to get out one day,
28:38
Speaker 3: sooner or later. I knew I had to get out.
28:39
Speaker 3: So I knew it was going to end. I just
28:41
Speaker 3: didn't know how it was going to end.
28:44
Speaker 1: Well. For a lot of those guys out there, or
28:46
Speaker 1: a number of them, it ended up in the mortuary.
28:49
Speaker 4: It did.
28:50
Speaker 1: It did, And you had that experience when I went
28:52
Speaker 1: out there the first time, I saw how many houses
28:55
Speaker 1: in that area had roller shutters. They're like little fortresses.
29:00
Speaker 1: People feared retribution for various things, and I number one
29:04
Speaker 1: crook there told me that you could fear the police,
29:08
Speaker 1: but you had more to fear from your mates.
29:10
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, I suppose.
29:14
Speaker 1: You had a couple of instances where people tried to
29:16
Speaker 1: take your life.
29:17
Speaker 3: Yes, robberies. There was a lot of standover men at
29:21
Speaker 3: those times. We were little kids were easy targets, you
29:23
Speaker 3: know what I mean. Your pockets are full of money,
29:26
Speaker 3: easy targets, So standover men in the nineties was a
29:31
Speaker 3: normal thing and most of the things would do that
29:34
Speaker 3: people would look at that it's very bad. Was beating
29:38
Speaker 3: up a standover men, you know what I mean? And
29:41
Speaker 3: people would say, sometimes we'll go a bit too far.
29:44
Speaker 3: And that's why people thought you were so bad, because
29:47
Speaker 3: you're beating up all these people. But they actually tried
29:50
Speaker 3: to rob you. So to me, the rules are gone
29:53
Speaker 3: to me, I can do whatever I want after that.
29:55
Speaker 3: You tried to rob me. You put a blood field
29:57
Speaker 3: to ringe to my eye, you put a knife to
29:59
Speaker 3: my throat, you put a gun to my head.
30:01
Speaker 4: There's no rules for me after that. You're lucky if
30:04
Speaker 4: I let you live. To tell you the truth. That's
30:06
Speaker 4: how angry I get. I used to get back then
30:09
Speaker 4: I can.
30:09
Speaker 1: See how painful this is. The memories are difficult because
30:12
Speaker 1: it was Yeah, it does come back, and I'm sure
30:15
Speaker 1: one moment does come back. When you were at home
30:17
Speaker 1: there and there's a drive by on your house.
30:20
Speaker 4: That's right. Yeah, what happened to your story? Yeah?
30:23
Speaker 1: Funny.
30:24
Speaker 3: Yeah, I actually heard something in the front yard and
30:30
Speaker 3: I went to look out the window, and I thought
30:33
Speaker 3: it was my brother pushing me down.
30:35
Speaker 4: But it wasn't. No one was there.
30:38
Speaker 3: My brother was laying down sleeping, and I was about
30:42
Speaker 3: to look exactly where that bullet was, exactly right between
30:46
Speaker 3: the eyes, but something pushed me down. Believe it or not,
30:51
Speaker 3: it's so weird.
30:53
Speaker 1: So the shot passed through the front of your house
30:56
Speaker 1: and over your head where you'd just been.
30:58
Speaker 3: Just been, and I was about to look. I was
31:01
Speaker 3: about to move the curtain and look in that exact
31:03
Speaker 3: spot that bullet went, but I felt a hand on
31:07
Speaker 3: my back push me. I really don't care people believe
31:11
Speaker 3: that or not, but that's that's what I felt like,
31:13
Speaker 3: you know what I mean?
31:14
Speaker 1: You had a guardian angel. Maybe maybe that could also
31:19
Speaker 1: be interpreted as a sign that it was time to
31:21
Speaker 1: get out. Did you get out?
31:23
Speaker 4: Yes? I did. I did get out. Was not at
31:25
Speaker 4: that time?
31:26
Speaker 1: It took a bit longer.
31:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, well you can't do that and get away with it. Yeah,
31:30
Speaker 3: something has to happen, you know what I mean.
31:32
Speaker 1: So what happened?
31:34
Speaker 3: Well, I didn't murder it. I've never murdered anybody, you
31:37
Speaker 3: know what I mean. Even if you have, no one's
31:39
Speaker 3: going to say, yeah you have. But I used to
31:43
Speaker 3: get pretty angry if somebody because I'll tell you this,
31:47
Speaker 3: I will never wrong you. Never will I ever wrong anybody.
31:51
Speaker 3: But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
31:56
Speaker 3: I looked at it like this, If you just say
31:58
Speaker 3: chop my finger off, I will chop your hands off
32:01
Speaker 3: and your feet off. And to me, that was fair enough,
32:05
Speaker 3: and I would think with most people would be fair
32:07
Speaker 3: enough because I will never wrong you leave me alone,
32:11
Speaker 3: you know it, won't even know I exist?
32:13
Speaker 4: Is that simple?
32:15
Speaker 1: Because that was the law of the streets in Sunshine.
32:18
Speaker 1: I heard stories, for instance, about if there were debtsode
32:21
Speaker 1: or things had been done to people's family and so forth,
32:24
Speaker 1: and you could find people who could do these things
32:26
Speaker 1: for you. For the amount of money that you would pay,
32:28
Speaker 1: you could get these jobs done. And Andrew Venuman was
32:31
Speaker 1: very experienced at this, shooting people in the buttocks, bashing people,
32:36
Speaker 1: and more or less acting like a little local police
32:38
Speaker 1: force if you like.
32:39
Speaker 3: Yes, I suppose I've never actually hired him to do
32:43
Speaker 3: a job like that, but I'm sure people have.
32:45
Speaker 1: Yeah. But like I said, he and people like Debrah
32:49
Speaker 1: were regarded as just next level. They had dashed that
32:52
Speaker 1: people did not see, and when they came down, when
32:55
Speaker 1: they began to knock off the cart and crew. The
32:58
Speaker 1: cart and Crew were rich crooks, they were comfortable, they
33:02
Speaker 1: were knitted into the fabric of Melbourne. But these renegades,
33:06
Speaker 1: these guys from the streets of Sunshine, who did not
33:08
Speaker 1: give a shit and they were prepared to do what
33:10
Speaker 1: others were. And that's why Carl Williams made his relationship
33:15
Speaker 1: with Dino Dibborh and then with their new venumin because
33:19
Speaker 1: that experience you had anothers on the streets of Sunshine
33:23
Speaker 1: was next level.
33:25
Speaker 4: They were.
33:25
Speaker 3: They were, But to tell the truth, there was a
33:28
Speaker 3: lot of people like them, but you just don't hear
33:29
Speaker 3: about them. The actual worst people, the biggest criminals. You'll
33:33
Speaker 3: never hear about him.
33:35
Speaker 4: Never.
33:35
Speaker 3: No one will ever hear about him. It's that simple.
33:40
Speaker 3: And did you hear that Carl Williams just to hang
33:42
Speaker 3: out in Sunshine? Remember that link I sent you? Yes,
33:45
Speaker 3: Carl Williams. See people believe anything they hear. Yeah, it's amazing.
33:49
Speaker 3: So apparently he grew up in Sunshine, hang out at
33:52
Speaker 3: Charlie's through the nineties and I've never met the man.
33:55
Speaker 1: No.
33:55
Speaker 3: I was there every day through the nineties and I've
33:58
Speaker 3: never met the man. But people believe he was from Sunshine.
34:02
Speaker 3: People will believe stories.
34:03
Speaker 1: I mean, he grew up in broad Meadows and a
34:06
Speaker 1: very different situation to Sunshine completely. And he was not
34:10
Speaker 1: a tough guy. He did not run with street gangs.
34:13
Speaker 1: He was a businessman who needed people like Andrew Venyuman
34:16
Speaker 1: and Debra to do his dirty work for him. Even Underbelly,
34:20
Speaker 1: which portrayed him shooting Mark Moran, that's absolute rubbish.
34:23
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, you've met Carl Yeah, and new.
34:25
Speaker 1: Car back in the day. Of course, you know, during
34:26
Speaker 1: that period when he was still with Benji and running
34:28
Speaker 1: hot on the streets. And I spoke to him the
34:30
Speaker 1: Saturday before he was murdered. And even then it was
34:33
Speaker 1: his mate that murdered him, Matthew Johnson in jail there.
34:37
Speaker 4: I was a friend of his.
34:38
Speaker 1: He was a friend of his. He was He said
34:40
Speaker 1: to me, there's issues about the media knowing that the
34:45
Speaker 1: state was going to pay for my father's tax bill
34:49
Speaker 1: if I would cooperate and things like that, and that
34:51
Speaker 1: was going to come out, and that was the reason
34:53
Speaker 1: he was murdered. But he was killed again by his friend.
34:56
Speaker 1: But he was never a tough gun. He was never
34:58
Speaker 1: in Sunshine. So let's put that on the record right now.
35:00
Speaker 4: Yeah, he I can say that for sure.
35:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you would have known him if he was
35:04
Speaker 1: out there, he'd been a arrival to you or.
35:06
Speaker 4: A friend or a friend if you grew up there.
35:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if he were smart, you'd be his friend.
35:11
Speaker 1: By the sounds, it was the whole area was going
35:14
Speaker 1: to fall to death and mayhem. It looked that way,
35:17
Speaker 1: and you could see the future. Yeah, how did you
35:20
Speaker 1: go about changing your life? Changing your heart? You know?
35:24
Speaker 3: Two thousand and one, you know, there was a big
35:26
Speaker 3: drought in Melbourne and a lot of people stopped then.
35:31
Speaker 3: I believe it lasted for over a year, two years,
35:35
Speaker 3: so most people stopped using. Most people it was like
35:40
Speaker 3: the lockdown, how the lockdown was, and people just stopped
35:44
Speaker 3: using heroin drought exactly, And that's how it was. Then
35:46
Speaker 3: there was a heroin drought and people just stopped using
35:50
Speaker 3: and stopped dealing.
35:51
Speaker 1: Ruined your business.
35:53
Speaker 4: Not that I cared, I didn't care. I think it
35:56
Speaker 4: happened for a reason.
35:58
Speaker 1: Is what was going to happen to you? George?
36:02
Speaker 3: I couldn't tell you, And at that time I couldn't
36:04
Speaker 3: care less. That's how stupid kids are. Yeah, I couldn't
36:09
Speaker 3: care less.
36:12
Speaker 1: How do you end up putting a new value on
36:14
Speaker 1: your life and seeing a future because that's what you did.
36:18
Speaker 3: Good people, good people around you. If you always have
36:21
Speaker 3: good people around you, you'll do well. It's that simple.
36:25
Speaker 1: But you gave up money and power, position opportunities. You
36:31
Speaker 1: could have been one of those big swinging crooks.
36:34
Speaker 3: They used to say that would I will be a
36:37
Speaker 3: lot of the Vietnamese, a lot of people in the area.
36:39
Speaker 3: They're going to say this guy, he's going to run
36:40
Speaker 3: Melbourne one day. And I used to think in my head, no,
36:42
Speaker 3: I'm not. I can't wait to get out of this shit,
36:44
Speaker 3: you know. But like I said, yeah, good people, and
36:48
Speaker 3: I think it all happened for a reason. So I
36:50
Speaker 3: feel like I got to write this book and I
36:53
Speaker 3: want to start my charity. I want to stop kids
36:55
Speaker 3: from going down this.
36:56
Speaker 1: Road because there are a lot of children now. Children.
37:00
Speaker 1: It's hard to believe you can get people who are
37:02
Speaker 1: doing these aggravated burglaries, seriously violent assaults and so forth.
37:06
Speaker 1: There's still children. But you've been in that place. How
37:10
Speaker 1: do you think Melbourne and Australia should address the issue
37:14
Speaker 1: of youth crime.
37:15
Speaker 3: Stop pointing the finger that's for sure. That's for the
37:17
Speaker 3: first thing, society points the finger in the direction of children.
37:21
Speaker 3: Imagine this, the eels of society. We point our finger
37:26
Speaker 3: at twelve year olds. Doesn't make sense. How do we
37:29
Speaker 3: get beyond that? Well, first of all, we can't blame them.
37:33
Speaker 3: We can't blame children for the eels of society. It's
37:36
Speaker 3: that simple.
37:37
Speaker 1: Because you were merely supplying a demand for.
37:40
Speaker 3: Drugs exactly exactly so where we were at the time,
37:44
Speaker 3: they would come to you and they would ask you
37:47
Speaker 3: for certain things, and you think, why you're here, you
37:49
Speaker 3: might as well supply that demand.
37:53
Speaker 4: And that's how it started.
37:54
Speaker 1: What would have made a difference in your life at
37:56
Speaker 1: that stage, if.
37:57
Speaker 3: Anything, sports Stay playing sports and stay at school. That
38:04
Speaker 3: would make a difference. Stay off the street. And you know,
38:09
Speaker 3: I've got some really good friends that I grew up
38:10
Speaker 3: with from the street. And because I was about to say,
38:14
Speaker 3: don't hang out with these certain type of people from
38:16
Speaker 3: the street, but the best people I've ever met were
38:18
Speaker 3: from the street. You know what I mean, Maybe one
38:21
Speaker 3: day you'll meet them and you'll see these people, unbelievable people.
38:25
Speaker 1: You know, it's like that old Bob dylanline. He said,
38:27
Speaker 1: if you're going to be an outlaw, you have to
38:28
Speaker 1: be honest.
38:29
Speaker 3: At least I used to think, at least be honorable.
38:32
Speaker 3: If you're going to do it, do it honorably. You
38:34
Speaker 3: know what I mean?
38:35
Speaker 1: How's your life now?
38:37
Speaker 3: I've got no money, I'm a nobody and I've never
38:42
Speaker 3: been happier.
38:43
Speaker 4: That's simple. What does the future hold anything? Anything? I want?
38:50
Speaker 1: Not money and power anymore.
38:52
Speaker 3: I can care less for money, so money's gone. I
38:56
Speaker 3: can care less if I make money.
38:58
Speaker 1: Because this is a problem for not just criminals, but
39:01
Speaker 1: everyone in society. Everyone's interested in money and power and materialism.
39:05
Speaker 1: But you've got to a different level in your life
39:08
Speaker 1: where you can be grateful.
39:11
Speaker 4: Doesn't everybody get there?
39:12
Speaker 1: Not everyone, afraid, not everyone, A lot of people, don't
39:15
Speaker 1: you know. But I think in your life you've got
39:17
Speaker 1: the love of a very loyal woman who's helped you
39:21
Speaker 1: to get beyond what you used to be. That's right, yeah,
39:25
Speaker 1: and that was a big help. I think you better
39:28
Speaker 1: thank you while you're here. Don't you think you'd have
39:31
Speaker 1: to name her? But what difference did your partner make
39:34
Speaker 1: in your life?
39:35
Speaker 3: She knows words from your mouth means nothing, words that
39:38
Speaker 3: mean anything, So.
39:40
Speaker 1: What advice would you give parents who've got young children
39:44
Speaker 1: who are headed down the road.
39:46
Speaker 4: Don't judge.
39:47
Speaker 3: Don't think that your kid is the worst kid out there,
39:50
Speaker 3: because I always considered the worst kid to tell the truth. Parents, teachers, police,
39:57
Speaker 3: social workers, religious figures. They would say I was the
40:01
Speaker 3: worst kid at school. The teacher would say, keep it up,
40:04
Speaker 3: and you end up in George's gang.
40:06
Speaker 4: You know what I mean? You think maybe I am.
40:10
Speaker 3: You know, people keep saying that, You keep thinking that,
40:13
Speaker 3: you know, so don't judge, don't be too hard because
40:17
Speaker 3: people can change, you know what I mean. A teenager
40:20
Speaker 3: going through crime or whatever they're going through, they can
40:24
Speaker 3: get out of it. Believe me, a lot worse people
40:28
Speaker 3: than me have got out of it, and they're really
40:30
Speaker 3: good people.
40:31
Speaker 4: You know what I mean.
40:32
Speaker 1: Well, you're giving yourself another chance, and I'm fascinated to
40:36
Speaker 1: see where you go with telling your own story and
40:39
Speaker 1: carving in your future. Thank you so much for sharing
40:42
Speaker 1: your story. I think you're a brave man full of
40:44
Speaker 1: courage to do that, and I look forward to hearing
40:48
Speaker 1: more about it soon.
40:49
Speaker 4: You're welcome.
40:51
Speaker 1: That was George Zionist. They used to call him the
40:52
Speaker 1: King of Sunshine, but now He's the king of his
40:54
Speaker 1: own life, king of his own future. And I think
40:57
Speaker 1: this is a really important message to family out there.
41:00
Speaker 1: Don't give up on your kids. Keep working hard. They
41:03
Speaker 1: can have a future and you've just got to have
41:05
Speaker 1: a bit of faith in it. This has been real
41:07
Speaker 1: crime with Adam Shan. Thank you for listening. If you'd
41:10
Speaker 1: like to get in touch with me with stories and ideas,
41:12
Speaker 1: please email me at Adam Shann writer at gmail dot com.
41:16
Speaker 1: If you've got some information that you need to share
41:18
Speaker 1: with the police, do it at crime Stoppers one A
41:20
Speaker 1: one hundred, triple three, triple zero. Thanks for listening.
41:35
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