Ashleigh Wilson - From: The Australian - June 13, 2008
SENIOR criminal investigator Mark Standen was refused bail yesterday amid concerns his links with criminal identities and elite knowledge of law enforcement techniques could help him skip the country.
Standen, a 51-year-old assistant director of the NSW Crime Commission, faces three charges over his alleged role in trafficking a commercial amount of illegal drugs.
He was arrested last week _ along with his alleged co-conspirator, Bakhos Jalalaty _ over claims he was involved in a conspiracy to import 600kg of pseudoephedrine.
Standen appeared in Sydney's Central Local Court yesterday via videolink as his family sat in the back of the room.
His lawyer, Paul King, applied for bail, saying Standen wanted to be able to care for his ill wife and prepare for the upcoming case against him.
Standen currently spends 24 hours a day in his cell.
"While it can be said that the circumstances leading up to the charging of the accused are suspicious, in fact gravely suspicious, they are yet to amount to proof beyond reasonable doubt,'' Standen's bail application said.
Mr King also said a police search earlier this year of a container imported into Australia had found no drugs as expected. However the court later heard that Standen had also expected to find drugs in the container.
Magistrate Allan Moore said there was a substantial Crown case against Standen and refused bail.
"I can't ignore his position within the Crime Commission,'' Mr Moore said. "He has information about methodology which could assist his departure from the country.''
Mr Moore's decision came after police claimed in a statement of facts tendered to the court that Standen had maintained contact with "known Sydney criminal figures''.
"Police are concerned about the extent of contacts Standen has within organised criminal syndicates and the potential to use thse contacts to abscond,'' the police facts sheet said.
Police also said Standen had been heard discussing a pension fund that could be used to evade bail conditions.
The court heard that Standen had two brothers living overseas, in Canada and Hong Kong. The latter worked as a pilot.
Outside court, Mr King said he was disappointed with the magistrate's decision to refuse bail.
"He's entitled to a presumption of innocence and even though there's a presumption against bail for this type of offence, the court still is entitled to grant it as satisfied,'' Mr King said. "Obviously, the court wasn't satisfied that we had jumped the hurdle.''
Friday, June 13, 2008
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Jailed cop linked to drug runner
June 8, 2008 Source
The AFP investigation into Mark Standen began in exactly the same month New Zealand authorities had intercepted his friend Anderson's cocaine shipment enroute to Australia from South America.
ACCUSED corrupt cop Mark Standen is now facing a second investigation - this time into his long friendship with a jailed drug runner suspected of a rape and murder.
Homicide detectives want to quiz Standen - placed behind bars this week for his alleged role in a $120 million global drug conspiracy - over his close relationship with underworld identity John Anderson.
Career criminal Anderson is also behind bars, awaiting sentence over an attempt to smuggle $7 million worth of cocaine into Australia.
Investigators from Manly police stumbled upon the NSW Crime Commission deputy's extraordinary connection to the 68-year-old crook three weeks before he himself was arrested by federal police.
Detectives were following a cold-case lead that Anderson was involved in the rape and murder of a Sydney teenager 30 years ago when their routine enquiry found Standen's son Matthew staying in the home of Anderson's estranged wife Susan.
Now NSW Police want access to Standen in jail to question him over any knowledge he had of Anderson's criminal activities.
Anderson was charged with trying to smuggle 27 kilograms of cocaine into Australia chained to the hulls of cargo ships including the infamous Tampa in 2006. His son Michael, 30, was spotted by police attempting to dive under the Tampa before he too was arrested. Michael Anderson is also awaiting sentencing.
Standen has been a close friend of Anderson for at least 30 years and was a regular visitor to his Central Coast home, The Sun-Herald has learned.
Former neighbours of John and Susan Anderson, by co-incidence, had also known the Standen family in Sydney years before. They told how they often saw Mark Standen at the Andersons' home.
"We saw Mark there a number of times but I didn't recognise him as a top policeman until I saw him on the news this week," said the neighbour, who was too scared to be identified.
Anderson and his wife Sue, who hosted lingerie parties, were members of the local gun club and keen divers. Their passion for diving was shared by Standen's 22-year-old son Matthew, who stayed with them. There is no suggestion Matthew had any knowledge of any criminal activity.
Matthew Standen refused to comment when approached at the Standen family home on the Central Coast, where his mother Lynn was being comforted by friends and relatives last week.
The family has been rocked by revelations that Standen, one of Australia's most senior law enforcers, had been accused of attempting to bring in 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine, used to make the drug ice.
It is alleged the 51-year-old father of four had massive gambling debts and had set up the deal, uncovered by Dutch authorities, while on a luxury trip to Dubai with his mistress, Louise Baker. She works for the Independent Commission Against Corruption. but is not considered a suspect.
Standen has been in trouble in the past. Almost 30 years ago he was departmentally sanctioned for flushing marijuana down a toilet without reporting it had been seized. Yet this failed to slow his rise through the ranks of law enforcement.
The AFP investigation into Standen began in exactly the same month New Zealand authorities had intercepted his friend Anderson's cocaine shipment en route to Australia from South America.
Told of the revelations yesterday, NSW Police Minister David Campbell said he had not been made aware of the interest in Standen's links to Anderson. He said where and when detectives interviewed Standen was a matter for them.
A spokesman for Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione confirmed homicide Strike Force Keldie had been set up to investigate the murder of Trudie Adams who went missing in 1978.
Police sources say the strike force will be driven by cold case specialists and will be seeking to speak to Standen over his friendship with Anderson.
Anderson was among six suspects first identified during the mid-1990s by task force Loquat, which at the time also held hopes of discovering Ms Adams's remains in bushland on Pittwater Peninsula.
The teenager was last seen outside a Sunday night dance at Newport Surf Club in June 1978. Investigators formed the conclusion she was pack raped.
Following her murder nine girls came forward to report also having been raped by two armed men who had abducted them while hitchhiking along Barrenjoey Road over the previous 10 months.
Eight weeks after Ms Adams disappeared, so too did 18-year-old Michelle Pope and her 21-year-old boyfriend Stephen Lapthorne. None of the bodies has ever been found.
ACCUSED corrupt cop Mark Standen is now facing a second investigation - this time into his long friendship with a jailed drug runner suspected of a rape and murder.
Homicide detectives want to quiz Standen - placed behind bars this week for his alleged role in a $120 million global drug conspiracy - over his close relationship with underworld identity John Anderson.
Career criminal Anderson is also behind bars, awaiting sentence over an attempt to smuggle $7 million worth of cocaine into Australia.
Investigators from Manly police stumbled upon the NSW Crime Commission deputy's extraordinary connection to the 68-year-old crook three weeks before he himself was arrested by federal police.
Detectives were following a cold-case lead that Anderson was involved in the rape and murder of a Sydney teenager 30 years ago when their routine enquiry found Standen's son Matthew staying in the home of Anderson's estranged wife Susan.
Now NSW Police want access to Standen in jail to question him over any knowledge he had of Anderson's criminal activities.
Anderson was charged with trying to smuggle 27 kilograms of cocaine into Australia chained to the hulls of cargo ships including the infamous Tampa in 2006. His son Michael, 30, was spotted by police attempting to dive under the Tampa before he too was arrested. Michael Anderson is also awaiting sentencing.
Standen has been a close friend of Anderson for at least 30 years and was a regular visitor to his Central Coast home, The Sun-Herald has learned.
Former neighbours of John and Susan Anderson, by co-incidence, had also known the Standen family in Sydney years before. They told how they often saw Mark Standen at the Andersons' home.
"We saw Mark there a number of times but I didn't recognise him as a top policeman until I saw him on the news this week," said the neighbour, who was too scared to be identified.
Anderson and his wife Sue, who hosted lingerie parties, were members of the local gun club and keen divers. Their passion for diving was shared by Standen's 22-year-old son Matthew, who stayed with them. There is no suggestion Matthew had any knowledge of any criminal activity.
Matthew Standen refused to comment when approached at the Standen family home on the Central Coast, where his mother Lynn was being comforted by friends and relatives last week.
The family has been rocked by revelations that Standen, one of Australia's most senior law enforcers, had been accused of attempting to bring in 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine, used to make the drug ice.
It is alleged the 51-year-old father of four had massive gambling debts and had set up the deal, uncovered by Dutch authorities, while on a luxury trip to Dubai with his mistress, Louise Baker. She works for the Independent Commission Against Corruption. but is not considered a suspect.
Standen has been in trouble in the past. Almost 30 years ago he was departmentally sanctioned for flushing marijuana down a toilet without reporting it had been seized. Yet this failed to slow his rise through the ranks of law enforcement.
The AFP investigation into Standen began in exactly the same month New Zealand authorities had intercepted his friend Anderson's cocaine shipment en route to Australia from South America.
Told of the revelations yesterday, NSW Police Minister David Campbell said he had not been made aware of the interest in Standen's links to Anderson. He said where and when detectives interviewed Standen was a matter for them.
A spokesman for Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione confirmed homicide Strike Force Keldie had been set up to investigate the murder of Trudie Adams who went missing in 1978.
Police sources say the strike force will be driven by cold case specialists and will be seeking to speak to Standen over his friendship with Anderson.
Anderson was among six suspects first identified during the mid-1990s by task force Loquat, which at the time also held hopes of discovering Ms Adams's remains in bushland on Pittwater Peninsula.
The teenager was last seen outside a Sunday night dance at Newport Surf Club in June 1978. Investigators formed the conclusion she was pack raped.
Following her murder nine girls came forward to report also having been raped by two armed men who had abducted them while hitchhiking along Barrenjoey Road over the previous 10 months.
Eight weeks after Ms Adams disappeared, so too did 18-year-old Michelle Pope and her 21-year-old boyfriend Stephen Lapthorne. None of the bodies has ever been found.
Shipping crates laden with drugs 'slip past customs'
Source "The Age" Mark Russell June 8, 2008
DRUG lords see Australia as an easy market, confident that with just one in 20 shipping containers being X-rayed by customs their illicit goods will reach their destination: our suburban streets.
This is the stark warning of security experts who say the flood of drugs into Australia will be stemmed only if crime bosses have reason to fear their consignments, worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year, will not make it past our ports.
Security and counter-terrorism expert Neil Fergus, who helped write the Wheeler review into airport security, said that at least one in four shipping containers needed to be screened if authorities were committed to stopping the flow of drugs and other illegal imports.
Advertisement: Story continues below
He said it was worrying that customs only checked between 130,000 and 140,000 of the 2.6 million containers shipped into Australia each year.
"If you are a criminal cabal seeking to bring a large importation of narcotics into Australia, the maritime option is going to offer dramatically better prospects of success," Mr Fergus told The Sunday Age.
"But if there was a one in four chance of losing an expensive shipment, that could be enough to make a criminal cabal think twice about whether or not to send it to Australia."
Professor Clive Williams of the Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism, agreed that more frequent screening was needed but said any significant increase in the number of containers checked could prove a logistical nightmare because of the extra time and costs involved. Delays getting containers off the wharves if they had to be screened first would cause chaos, he said.
Most countries were only screening between 2% and 5% of containers and relied heavily on intelligence to pinpoint where drugs had been hidden in certain shipments.
In 2006-07, there were 140,539 containers X-rayed and 15,062 physically examined at the Australian border. Customs' target for 2008-09 is to X-ray at least 134,000 containers and examine 14,300.
A customs spokesman said the department electronically profiled information received on every sea consignment coming to Australia. "This profiling allows customs to assess the level of risk associated with each consignment. All high-risk cargo is then examined."
He said that while there had been an increase in the amount of drugs seized in the past five years, "customs recognises that criminal syndicates will constantly react to our efforts by attempting new methods of concealment and importation. So there is a need for customs to constantly remain vigilant against these shifts in criminal activity."
Last week's arrest of NSW Crime Commission investigator Mark Standen has brought maritime drug smuggling back into focus. Standen was allegedly involved in an international drug syndicate planning to import 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine to make $120 million worth of the drug ice.
Dutch police discovered the pseudoephedrine was originally to be shipped from the Congo to Australia but was cancelled because of problems with a supplier. It was allegedly decided to send the precursor chemical from Pakistan, where a trial shipment with basmati rice was sent to Australia in a shipping container and arrived in October last year. A second rice container carrying pseudoephedrine was subsequently sent and arrived on April 25 but was intercepted by Federal Police. No trace of the chemical was found. It is rumoured the shipment was stolen en route by a rival gang.
In a separate case, drugs worth more than $11 million were found in Sydney on May 5 inside a shipping container carrying foot spas and massage chairs. A Victorian man, 40, and a Canadian woman, 32, were charged over the discovery of 27 kilograms of cocaine and 27 kilograms of methamphetamine (ice).
The big catches
Customs X-rays about 130,000 of the 2.6 million containers shipped to Australia per year.
Since 2002 (when the first container examination facility opened), customs has seized goods including:
190 kg of heroin
4019 kg of MDMA (ecstasy)
395 kg of crystal methylamphetamine (ice)
691 kg of cocaine
1629 kg of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine.
3200 litres of chemicals used to make amphetamines
About 233 million cigarettes
472 tonnes of tobacco
Over 31,000 bottles of alcohol
A network of 231 cameras covering the national waterfront is monitored 24 hours a day from a Melbourne office.
SOURCE: CUSTOMS
 |
| Shipping containers Photo: James Davies |
DRUG lords see Australia as an easy market, confident that with just one in 20 shipping containers being X-rayed by customs their illicit goods will reach their destination: our suburban streets.
This is the stark warning of security experts who say the flood of drugs into Australia will be stemmed only if crime bosses have reason to fear their consignments, worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year, will not make it past our ports.
Security and counter-terrorism expert Neil Fergus, who helped write the Wheeler review into airport security, said that at least one in four shipping containers needed to be screened if authorities were committed to stopping the flow of drugs and other illegal imports.
Advertisement: Story continues below
He said it was worrying that customs only checked between 130,000 and 140,000 of the 2.6 million containers shipped into Australia each year.
"If you are a criminal cabal seeking to bring a large importation of narcotics into Australia, the maritime option is going to offer dramatically better prospects of success," Mr Fergus told The Sunday Age.
"But if there was a one in four chance of losing an expensive shipment, that could be enough to make a criminal cabal think twice about whether or not to send it to Australia."
Professor Clive Williams of the Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism, agreed that more frequent screening was needed but said any significant increase in the number of containers checked could prove a logistical nightmare because of the extra time and costs involved. Delays getting containers off the wharves if they had to be screened first would cause chaos, he said.
Most countries were only screening between 2% and 5% of containers and relied heavily on intelligence to pinpoint where drugs had been hidden in certain shipments.
In 2006-07, there were 140,539 containers X-rayed and 15,062 physically examined at the Australian border. Customs' target for 2008-09 is to X-ray at least 134,000 containers and examine 14,300.
A customs spokesman said the department electronically profiled information received on every sea consignment coming to Australia. "This profiling allows customs to assess the level of risk associated with each consignment. All high-risk cargo is then examined."
He said that while there had been an increase in the amount of drugs seized in the past five years, "customs recognises that criminal syndicates will constantly react to our efforts by attempting new methods of concealment and importation. So there is a need for customs to constantly remain vigilant against these shifts in criminal activity."
Last week's arrest of NSW Crime Commission investigator Mark Standen has brought maritime drug smuggling back into focus. Standen was allegedly involved in an international drug syndicate planning to import 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine to make $120 million worth of the drug ice.
Dutch police discovered the pseudoephedrine was originally to be shipped from the Congo to Australia but was cancelled because of problems with a supplier. It was allegedly decided to send the precursor chemical from Pakistan, where a trial shipment with basmati rice was sent to Australia in a shipping container and arrived in October last year. A second rice container carrying pseudoephedrine was subsequently sent and arrived on April 25 but was intercepted by Federal Police. No trace of the chemical was found. It is rumoured the shipment was stolen en route by a rival gang.
In a separate case, drugs worth more than $11 million were found in Sydney on May 5 inside a shipping container carrying foot spas and massage chairs. A Victorian man, 40, and a Canadian woman, 32, were charged over the discovery of 27 kilograms of cocaine and 27 kilograms of methamphetamine (ice).
The big catches
Customs X-rays about 130,000 of the 2.6 million containers shipped to Australia per year.
Since 2002 (when the first container examination facility opened), customs has seized goods including:
190 kg of heroin
4019 kg of MDMA (ecstasy)
395 kg of crystal methylamphetamine (ice)
691 kg of cocaine
1629 kg of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine.
3200 litres of chemicals used to make amphetamines
About 233 million cigarettes
472 tonnes of tobacco
Over 31,000 bottles of alcohol
A network of 231 cameras covering the national waterfront is monitored 24 hours a day from a Melbourne office.
SOURCE: CUSTOMS
Kiwi link to investigation into top aussie crime fighter
Accused corrupt cop Mark Standen is now facing a second
investigation - this time into his long friendship with a jailed drug
runner suspected of a rape and murder.
Homicide detectives want to quiz Standen - placed behind bars this week for his alleged role in a $120 million global drug conspiracy - over his close relationship with underworld identity John Anderson.
Career criminal Anderson is also behind bars, awaiting sentence over an attempt to smuggle $A7 million worth of cocaine into Australia.
Investigators from Manly police stumbled upon the NSW Crime Commission deputy's extraordinary connection to the 68-year-old crook three weeks before he himself was arrested by federal police.
Detectives were following a cold-case lead that Anderson was involved in the rape and murder of a Sydney teenager 30 years ago when their routine enquiry found Standen's son Matthew staying in the home of Anderson's estranged wife Susan.
Now NSW Police want access to Standen in jail to question him over any knowledge he had of Anderson's criminal activities.
Anderson was charged with trying to smuggle 27 kilograms of cocaine into Australia chained to the hulls of cargo ships including the infamous Tampa in 2006. His son Michael, 30, was spotted by police attempting to dive under the Tampa before he too was arrested. Michael Anderson is also awaiting sentencing.
Standen has been a close friend of Anderson for at least 30 years and was a regular visitor to his Central Coast home, The Sun-Herald has learned.
Former neighbours of John and Susan Anderson, by co-incidence, had also known the Standen family in Sydney years before. They told how they often saw Mark Standen at the Andersons' home.
"We saw Mark there a number of times but I didn't recognise him as a top policeman until I saw him on the news this week," said the neighbour, who was too scared to be identified.
Anderson and his wife Sue, who hosted lingerie parties, were members of the local gun club and keen divers. Their passion for diving was shared by Standen's 22-year-old son Matthew, who stayed with them. There is no suggestion Matthew had any knowledge of any criminal activity.
Matthew Standen refused to comment when approached at the Standen family home on the Central Coast, where his mother Lynn was being comforted by friends and relatives last week.
The family has been rocked by revelations that Standen, one of Australia's most senior law enforcers, had been accused of attempting to bring in 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine, used to make the drug ice.
It is alleged the 51-year-old father of four had massive gambling debts and had set up the deal, uncovered by Dutch authorities, while on a luxury trip to Dubai with his mistress, Louise Baker. She works for the Independent Commission Against Corruption. but is not considered a suspect.
Standen has been in trouble in the past. Almost 30 years ago he was departmentally sanctioned for flushing marijuana down a toilet without reporting it had been seized. Yet this failed to slow his rise through the ranks of law enforcement.
The AFP investigation into Standen began in exactly the same month New Zealand authorities had intercepted his friend Anderson's cocaine shipment en route to Australia from South America.
Told of the revelations yesterday, NSW Police Minister David Campbell said he had not been made aware of the interest in Standen's links to Anderson. He said where and when detectives interviewed Standen was a matter for them.
A spokesman for Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione confirmed homicide Strike Force Keldie had been set up to investigate the murder of Trudie Adams who went missing in 1978.
Police sources say the strike force will be driven by cold case specialists and will be seeking to speak to Standen over his friendship with Anderson.
Anderson was among six suspects first identified during the mid-1990s by task force Loquat, which at the time also held hopes of discovering Ms Adams's remains in bushland on Pittwater Peninsula.
The teenager was last seen outside a Sunday night dance at Newport Surf Club in June 1978.
Investigators formed the conclusion she was pack raped.
Following her murder nine girls came forward to report also having been raped by two armed men who had abducted them while hitchhiking along Barrenjoey Road over the previous 10 months.
Eight weeks after Ms Adams disappeared, so too did 18-year-old Michelle Pope and her 21-year-old boyfriend Stephen Lapthorne. None of the bodies has ever been found.
- Sun-Herald
Homicide detectives want to quiz Standen - placed behind bars this week for his alleged role in a $120 million global drug conspiracy - over his close relationship with underworld identity John Anderson.
Career criminal Anderson is also behind bars, awaiting sentence over an attempt to smuggle $A7 million worth of cocaine into Australia.
Investigators from Manly police stumbled upon the NSW Crime Commission deputy's extraordinary connection to the 68-year-old crook three weeks before he himself was arrested by federal police.
Detectives were following a cold-case lead that Anderson was involved in the rape and murder of a Sydney teenager 30 years ago when their routine enquiry found Standen's son Matthew staying in the home of Anderson's estranged wife Susan.
Now NSW Police want access to Standen in jail to question him over any knowledge he had of Anderson's criminal activities.
Anderson was charged with trying to smuggle 27 kilograms of cocaine into Australia chained to the hulls of cargo ships including the infamous Tampa in 2006. His son Michael, 30, was spotted by police attempting to dive under the Tampa before he too was arrested. Michael Anderson is also awaiting sentencing.
Standen has been a close friend of Anderson for at least 30 years and was a regular visitor to his Central Coast home, The Sun-Herald has learned.
Former neighbours of John and Susan Anderson, by co-incidence, had also known the Standen family in Sydney years before. They told how they often saw Mark Standen at the Andersons' home.
"We saw Mark there a number of times but I didn't recognise him as a top policeman until I saw him on the news this week," said the neighbour, who was too scared to be identified.
Anderson and his wife Sue, who hosted lingerie parties, were members of the local gun club and keen divers. Their passion for diving was shared by Standen's 22-year-old son Matthew, who stayed with them. There is no suggestion Matthew had any knowledge of any criminal activity.
Matthew Standen refused to comment when approached at the Standen family home on the Central Coast, where his mother Lynn was being comforted by friends and relatives last week.
The family has been rocked by revelations that Standen, one of Australia's most senior law enforcers, had been accused of attempting to bring in 600 kilograms of pseudoephedrine, used to make the drug ice.
It is alleged the 51-year-old father of four had massive gambling debts and had set up the deal, uncovered by Dutch authorities, while on a luxury trip to Dubai with his mistress, Louise Baker. She works for the Independent Commission Against Corruption. but is not considered a suspect.
Standen has been in trouble in the past. Almost 30 years ago he was departmentally sanctioned for flushing marijuana down a toilet without reporting it had been seized. Yet this failed to slow his rise through the ranks of law enforcement.
The AFP investigation into Standen began in exactly the same month New Zealand authorities had intercepted his friend Anderson's cocaine shipment en route to Australia from South America.
Told of the revelations yesterday, NSW Police Minister David Campbell said he had not been made aware of the interest in Standen's links to Anderson. He said where and when detectives interviewed Standen was a matter for them.
A spokesman for Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione confirmed homicide Strike Force Keldie had been set up to investigate the murder of Trudie Adams who went missing in 1978.
Police sources say the strike force will be driven by cold case specialists and will be seeking to speak to Standen over his friendship with Anderson.
Anderson was among six suspects first identified during the mid-1990s by task force Loquat, which at the time also held hopes of discovering Ms Adams's remains in bushland on Pittwater Peninsula.
The teenager was last seen outside a Sunday night dance at Newport Surf Club in June 1978.
Investigators formed the conclusion she was pack raped.
Following her murder nine girls came forward to report also having been raped by two armed men who had abducted them while hitchhiking along Barrenjoey Road over the previous 10 months.
Eight weeks after Ms Adams disappeared, so too did 18-year-old Michelle Pope and her 21-year-old boyfriend Stephen Lapthorne. None of the bodies has ever been found.
- Sun-Herald
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