|
"Tizzone
was a flashy, arrogant, talkative man, not my style at all, and I was dead set
against drugs anyway.
"Lillian
and I have children and grandchildren to think of and I have given them enough
to worry about already, without helping flood Melbourne with poison.
"That's
why it is just not on that I would kill a man like Donald Mackay for any amount
of money."
Bazley
said he told Tizzone he was not interested in the offer and warned Joseph not to
trust him.
Some
time later, however, at the gun-dealer's urging, he met Tizzone at his luxurious
Balwyn home.
"George
was talking incredible sums of money, millions," he said. "I wouldn't
have to deal with Tizzone, he said, that would be his responsibility.
"My
job would simply be to see that nobody else interfered. Tizzone greeted us as
old friends, sat us down in his lounge room and insisted on giving us big drinks
of whisky in cut crystal glasses.
"Then
he started talking non-stop, dropping names and huge sums of money all over the
place. It was incredible.
"He
told us practically the whole Griffith operation from start to finish, naming
names! "If ever there was a chance of me joining in, that ended it then and
there.
"If ever there was a man capable of talking himself, and anyone close to
him, to death, it was Tizzone.
"I'm
not the loner I'm said to be in the newspapers. I'm very close to my family and
I have some good friends I trust.
"But
the less people who know what you are doing, particularly when you are doing
something wrong, the better.
"Tizzone
was a boaster and a blabber-mouth. He was practically tailor-made for the police
and I wanted nothing to do with him.
"I
told George Joseph he was crazy; that Tizzone would put his family, and 'The
Family', before anyone else, that you couldn't trust people who talked a
language you couldn't understand in front of you."
Bazley
said he had never liked or trusted people who told him secrets he didn't need to
know.
Tizzone
had been desperate to find someone to blame for the disasters which eventually
befell the Griffith Mafia after Mackay's disappearance.
Tizzone
became a police informer in 1982, after being arrested in a car carrying
marijuana.
After
his arrest he released a veritable torrent of confessions.
"I
was in Pentridge serving nine and 6 (nine years with a minimum period of 6
years) for a bank robbery which went wrong," Bazley said.
"I
was going all right - if you can't do the time, don't commit the crime - and had
a fairly comfortable berth upstairs in E division.
"As
a matter of fact, I was in charge of the kiosk here (in Pentridge's contact
visit area, where we were talking).
"In
June, 1983, I was called into the governor's office to be served warrants by a
couple of detectives and immediately transferred to Jika.
"The
governor actually apologised and said the move didn't have anything to do with
him, that I had been behaving myself all right.
"I
wasn't in danger and I wasn't a danger to anyone else. There was no suggestion
that I would try to escape.
"But
I didn't get out of Jika until October last year, 40 months later." Bazley
shook his head in disgust when I asked him about identification, ballistic and
other evidence which led to the murder charges against him and his ultimate
convictions.
"As
far as identification is concerned, I'll plead guilty if (NSW) Superintendent
Joe Parrington says he thinks I murdered Donald Mackay," he said.
Parrington
was charged departmentally over his handling of the inquiry.
"Parrington
was in charge in Griffith. "And, unlike most of the other police in the
area, there is no way that he was 'bent' (corrupt)," Bazely told Tom Prior.
And
the evidence of George Joseph that he had sold Bazley the .22 calibre,
French-made Unique pistol used in the Greensborough robbery and to kill Donald
Mackay and the Wilsons?
"I
was an armed robber," Bazley said scornfully. "A professional. I doubt
I can remember all the times I have carried a gun over the years.
"Picking
up a new pistol was as easy as walking down the street.
"And
I am supposed to have used the same one for more than two years, the one used in
one of the hottest murders in recent Australian history!
"It
would be farcical if it wasn't so serious for me.
"Even
the greenest rookie policemen would know that the professional criminal uses
'clean' guns.
"They
get rid of the 'dirty' one as soon as they have used it, in case they are caught
the next time and it implicates them in previous crimes.
"Whoever
killed Donald Mackay would have got rid of the gun immediately. Like the body,
it will never be found.
"I
wish it would be." If then, as Bazley claims, he was set up, why him?
"I was available," he said. "I was a criminal, a wanted man on
the run; I stayed out of public places and stuck to my family and few friends.
"I
wouldn't have any independent alibis, Tizzone didn't like me, and vice-versa,
and George Joseph was desperate to stay out of Jika.
"Also
possibly George and Tizzone, maybe even other members of 'the Family', were
afraid of me.
I
have done some desperate things in my time.
"But
I didn't murder those three people. I'll stake my soul on that." Who did
then? "Detective-Sergeant Fred Krahe of the Sydney police killed Donald
Mackay," Bazley said, without hesitation.
"Next
to Ray Kelly, Krahe was the most dangerous policeman in NSW - and that's saying
something.
"He
was in Griffith the night Donald Mackay disappeared and he was the one who first
started the rumours about Mackay running off with a woman.
"He
was tied up with the Griffith drug people, and others, and he was well known to
be available for killings if you could afford the price.
"Allison
Dine, Terence Clark's girlfriend, gave evidence on oath that he was prepared to
pay $250,000 to have Douglas and Isabel Wilson killed.
"Who
do you think 'the Family' would have employed, Krahe or me? "Who do you
think would have been safer from arrest by the NSW police and resulting
embarrassment to his employers?
"Why
do you think Superintendent Parrington was so confident I wasn't involved?
"Why
do you think that there was such a high-level police and political cover-up of
what had happened in Griffith? "The dogs have been barking for years that a
NSW policeman killed Donald Mackay.
"That
policeman was Fred Krahe."
And
the Wilsons? "I don't know," Bazley said.
"But
Robert Trimbole made a couple of visits to Melbourne in connection with them and
he had some heavy company.
"And
they knew the area in Rye where the bodies were found at least as well as I
do." Both Krahe and Trimbole are dead and cannot deny any further charges
against them, I said.
"I
know it," Jim Bazley said shortly.
"At
this stage, I don't suppose there is any point in saying that I wish they
weren't . . ."
In
October, 1984, Tizzone, then 50, pleaded guilty to charges of conspiring to
murder Donald Mackay and Douglas and Isabel Wilson.
Sentenced
to a total of eight years' jail, he was released in February 1986, presented
with a tax bill for more than $900,000 and forbidden to leave the country.
Joseph
pleaded guilty to charges of conspiring to murder Mackay and the Wilsons and for
his part in "setting up" the Greensborough security van robbery.
Sentenced
to seven years, he was released in June 1986.
Both
Tizzone and Joseph, who were said to be in extreme danger from the Griffith
Mafia, were given police protection and offered new identities.
Officially
at least, Tizzone has not been seen in Victoria since then, but Joseph is said
to be in business in a Melbourne suburb.
On February 2,
2001 the Herald Sun reported that Bazley was free after being secretly released early from a central
Victorian jail.
Bazley,
75, was hustled from Loddon Prison in darkness after serving 15 years.
The
Herald Sun found the convicted contract killer at his Brunswick home
where he was living with wife, Lillian, as part of his parole conditions.
He
and his wife were returning home carrying bags of shopping when approached.
A
silver-haired Bazley, looking fit and tanned from his time in the low-security
jail in Castlemaine, walked briskly down Brunswick Rd.
The
Herald Sun asked several questions of the released prisoner, including: ``Do you
still proclaim your innocence?'' and "Do you know where Mr MacKay's body
is?''
Shielding
his face with his free hand, the one-time hitman refused to say a word.
He
remained silent when asked how it felt to be a free man and how he intended to
spend the rest of his life.
For
at least the next five years, Bazley would have to report weekly to an
inner-north community corrections centre -- one of several supervision centres
for people serving sentences in the community.
Victim
groups were angry Bazley was set free days early in
what was claimed was an attempt to shield the parolee from the media.
A
police source said Bazley could have been kept days longer at the jail, near
Castlemaine.
"He
should have been looking at a release on about the fourth or fifth (of February)
but he's been let out earlier than expected, I believe because of his age and
his profile,'' the source said.
He
said Bazley's good prison record might also have been a factor.
But Corrections
Commissioner Penny Armytage said Bazley had been released earlier than the
parole board date after applying for "emergency management days''.
She
said he was granted two days owing to his age and a family member's poor health.
"It
might be a difficult concept for the community to accept . . . but there are
provisions within the legislation and this prisoner was eligible,'' Ms Armytage
said.
Crime
Victims Support Association president Noel McNamara said Bazley did not deserve
protection from questioning, regardless of his age or state of health.
"He
should be prepared to deal with that (the media). He should be released at the
same time the others are,'' Mr McNamara said.
"He's
a cold-blooded killer who sneaked up behind people and murdered them.''
But
former Pentridge Prison chaplain Father Peter Norden, who has known Bazley for
two decades, said he was entitled to be free.
He
said the gunman had been in jail since 1980, had behaved behind bars and should
not be judged by "armchair experts''.
"I
haven't heard of any prison officer or staff or inmate speak a bad word about
him,'' Father Norden said.
A
former fellow prisoner said the ageing hitman would not find it easy to adapt to
life on the outside.
The
source said much had changed since the days Bazley was a feared player in the
Painters and Dockers union.
"I
don't think he'll be signing on at the docks for a full-time wage.
"He'll
just be sitting around enjoying his freedom and finding out about the cost of
living.
"He
might be wishing he was back in there with three meals a day.''
|
