collection day. One claimed he lost more than $1 million from the non-payer.
Bookies soon learned it was best to write off the debts from the dealer with the long pockets and even longer memory.
In 1998, racing officials launched an investigation into the ownership of nine horses linked to Tony and Carmel Mokbel. The following year, the Victoria Racing Club banned them from racing horses.
But racing experts say Mokbel continued to own horses although they were officially under the names of friends and associates. He used the same strategy in âlegitimateâ business, hiding his interests under the names of friends and family.
During the 2001 police investigation into Mokbel, police found the prolific drug dealer had strong links to seven jockeys and trainers. Phone taps picked up his regular conversations with three leading jockeys, but racing authorities were powerless to act, as the phone taps could not be released for a non-criminal investigation.
While under surveillance in the Flemington young membersâ enclosure on Derby Day 2000, Mokbel was seen to be unusually popular. Some of his âfriendsâ that day were household names â television identities and members of the âA Listâ crowd endlessly photographed for the covers of glamour magazines and newspaper social columns. Police said he brazenly handed out small âgiftsâ of cocaine to the partying punters.
Years later, he was still a regular at the races even though he was on $1 million bail for serious drug charges.
In 2004, despite having his assets frozen, Mokbel told friends he had won nearly $400,000 on the Melbourne Cup. He was also seen punting heavily at the Oaks two days later, backing three winners in a row, including the appropriately named Hollow Bullet.
The public display so angered senior police they moved with racing clubs to ban him from the Melbourne casino and Victorian racetracks.
He was also banned from entering licensed premises in the South Yarra and Prahran areas, meaning he could not walk into some nightspots he owned.
SO HOW did Tony Mokbel graduate from dishwasher to unknown amphetamine dealer and then to the Hollywood crime cliché of the millionaire, Ferrari-driving drug baron with the blonde girlfriend and the celebrity lifestyle?
It began modestly. In the early days, he was more bumbling crook than master criminal. In 1992, Mokbel was convicted of attempting to pervert the course of justice, after a clumsy bid two years earlier to bribe a County Court judge was undone in a police sting. He was trying to shop for a âbent judgeâ who would give an associate a suspended sentence for drug trafficking. Typically, he wanted to pay the bribe in a mixture of cash and drugs.
Why he would imagine a judge would be interested in drugs is anybodyâs guess, although it was rumoured that he had provided some court staff with drugs in the hope they would be useful contacts some day. It was his version of networking.
Mokbel and two others were arrested as he handed over $2000 as the first payment of $53,000 that was supposed to have gone to the supposedly corrupt judge. Part of the âagreedâ payment was to be made in cocaine.
In 1998, he was convicted over amphetamine manufacturing but beat the charge on appeal. His lawyers successfully argued he should not have been charged with amphetamine trafficking when the drug he was handling was pseudoephedrine â a drug that could be used to make amphetamines.
People who had known him in prison remembered Mokbel as âcunning and a fast learnerâ. The main lesson he learned was to ensure he insulated himself from hands-on drug dealing and use only middlemen he could trust.
Even in prison he craved the good life, bribing catering staff for extra food and a steady supply of alcohol. He also had access to smuggled mobile phones to maintain hands-on control of his business interests.
Police say he was one of the first of the major
Bookies soon learned it was best to write off the debts from the dealer with the long pockets and even longer memory.
In 1998, racing officials launched an investigation into the ownership of nine horses linked to Tony and Carmel Mokbel. The following year, the Victoria Racing Club banned them from racing horses.
But racing experts say Mokbel continued to own horses although they were officially under the names of friends and associates. He used the same strategy in âlegitimateâ business, hiding his interests under the names of friends and family.
During the 2001 police investigation into Mokbel, police found the prolific drug dealer had strong links to seven jockeys and trainers. Phone taps picked up his regular conversations with three leading jockeys, but racing authorities were powerless to act, as the phone taps could not be released for a non-criminal investigation.
While under surveillance in the Flemington young membersâ enclosure on Derby Day 2000, Mokbel was seen to be unusually popular. Some of his âfriendsâ that day were household names â television identities and members of the âA Listâ crowd endlessly photographed for the covers of glamour magazines and newspaper social columns. Police said he brazenly handed out small âgiftsâ of cocaine to the partying punters.
Years later, he was still a regular at the races even though he was on $1 million bail for serious drug charges.
In 2004, despite having his assets frozen, Mokbel told friends he had won nearly $400,000 on the Melbourne Cup. He was also seen punting heavily at the Oaks two days later, backing three winners in a row, including the appropriately named Hollow Bullet.
The public display so angered senior police they moved with racing clubs to ban him from the Melbourne casino and Victorian racetracks.
He was also banned from entering licensed premises in the South Yarra and Prahran areas, meaning he could not walk into some nightspots he owned.
SO HOW did Tony Mokbel graduate from dishwasher to unknown amphetamine dealer and then to the Hollywood crime cliché of the millionaire, Ferrari-driving drug baron with the blonde girlfriend and the celebrity lifestyle?
It began modestly. In the early days, he was more bumbling crook than master criminal. In 1992, Mokbel was convicted of attempting to pervert the course of justice, after a clumsy bid two years earlier to bribe a County Court judge was undone in a police sting. He was trying to shop for a âbent judgeâ who would give an associate a suspended sentence for drug trafficking. Typically, he wanted to pay the bribe in a mixture of cash and drugs.
Why he would imagine a judge would be interested in drugs is anybodyâs guess, although it was rumoured that he had provided some court staff with drugs in the hope they would be useful contacts some day. It was his version of networking.
Mokbel and two others were arrested as he handed over $2000 as the first payment of $53,000 that was supposed to have gone to the supposedly corrupt judge. Part of the âagreedâ payment was to be made in cocaine.
In 1998, he was convicted over amphetamine manufacturing but beat the charge on appeal. His lawyers successfully argued he should not have been charged with amphetamine trafficking when the drug he was handling was pseudoephedrine â a drug that could be used to make amphetamines.
People who had known him in prison remembered Mokbel as âcunning and a fast learnerâ. The main lesson he learned was to ensure he insulated himself from hands-on drug dealing and use only middlemen he could trust.
Even in prison he craved the good life, bribing catering staff for extra food and a steady supply of alcohol. He also had access to smuggled mobile phones to maintain hands-on control of his business interests.
Police say he was one of the first of the major
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