Underbelly: The Gangland War
The True Story Behind The Underbelly TV Series

Underbelly - The Gangland War, takes up where Leadbelly left off in 2004. If you like Channel 9's new series, you'll love this book by John Silvester and Andrew Rule.
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Joseph Quadara

Joe Quadara had worked for 30 years in the fruit and vegetable industry and was known as a perfectionist.

Known as a good fighter when he was younger, Quadara had later gone from a millionaire to bankrupt.

Once a generous patron of Frankston and Collingwood Football Clubs, Quadara, 57, was ambushed at 3am on Friday, 28 May 1999, when he arrived for work outside a Malvern Road supermarket.

Two men armed with hand guns shot him repeatedly.

He was the third greengrocer killed since 1992.

Quadara's funeral was attended by notable criminals including Graham Kinniburgh and Jason Moran.

But there was another Joe Quadara.

Giuseppe "Joe" Quadara, a truck-driving father of three, was also directly involved in the fruit and vegetable industry.

Mr. Quadara was angered following published accounts - including one in The Age, later corrected - of his murder at the hands of an assassin in Toorak.

Giuseppe 'Joe' arrived in Melbourne in 1956 from Lipari, Italy.

On Oct 4, 1992, he was named at an inquest on murdered vegetable wholesaler, Mr Alfonso Muratore, where it was alleged - and strongly denied - that he had prior knowledge of the killing.

Muratore was the son-in-law of Liborio Benvenuto, the 'Melbourne Godfather'.

The allegations at the Muratore inquest have "stayed on my record'', he said, but "I go out and earn an honest dollar's work and this is what I cop. It's unfair to me and it's unfair to my family''.

Mr. Quadara, who said he was pressured to work at the market and left after Mr. Muratore's murder, described the Mafia as a "stupid tag''. He said he worked from one in the morning seven days a week and was "an honest bloke trying to earn a bit of bread and butter'' and that ``Mafia people don't work''.

"I don't even know the meaning of the Mafia,'' he said.

"I don't even know the meaning if somebody called me a wog. Who the bloody hell's the Mafia, mate? I've been working all my life. I got tax records and everything.

"I never cheated nobody and all of a sudden ... I'm a dead man. I talk to you straight. If you do nothing wrong you can walk with your head very high.

"I can walk anywhere and nobody's going to say to me `You owe me, you owe me this, or you done this to me' because I never done nothing to nobody. To me, I've got nothing to worry about, but it gets into you. The way I got to put up with all this nonsense when I'm a bloody free man and I never harm anybody. I don't have to look over my shoulder because I've done nothing wrong.

"I go through all this and I never smack anybody, right, because if I did smack somebody at least I would have the satisfaction that I did smack somebody, right? But I haven't even done that.''

The other Quadara's murder sparked 100 phone calls to his home.

One was from a reporter who told his wife, Giuseppina, that he'd been shot dead.

Giuseppe 'Joe' was represented by Mr Andrew Fraser, the high profile lawyer later jailed for cocaine trafficking.

Speaking exclusively to The Age in the office of Fraser, Mr Quadara said:

"My wife is still very upset and keeps on saying "Be careful, be careful', and I say "What the hell have I got to be careful about? I've done nothing wrong to nobody."

The cases have been officially switched from the homicide squad to Purana.

The first phase for the taskforce was to concentrate on the murders ordered by drug dealer Carl Williams. Williams was earlier this year sentenced to 35 years' jail for the murders of Jason Moran, Michael Marshall, Lewis Moran and Mark Mallia.

The second Purana phase was to investigate Tony Mokbel's drug syndicate, uncover his hidden financial network, and find him. On June 5 this year Mokbel was arrested in Greece and charged with two murders and a string of drug offences. He is expected to be extradited by mid-next year.

Detective Superintendent Richard Grant said Purana would take on new targets next year. He said intelligence files were being checked to identify a new crime ring that required long-term investigation.

Meanwhile, homicide investigators have found that a hitman who worked for Williams also worked for Italian gangsters. Andrew "Benji" Veniamin was considered to be Williams' loyal lieutenant, but police now believe he carried out three contract killings for Italian gangsters before Williams recruited him.

They believe his first known victim was Joe Quadara, and he remains the suspect for the murders of Frank Benvenuto and Victor Peirce.

Police suspect Veniamin was the gunman in seven underworld murders. They say he shot dead Dino Dibra, on October 14, 2000, Paul Kallipolitis, whose body was found on October 25, 2002, and was the main suspect in the murder of standover man Nik Radev, who was shot dead on April 15, 2003. Radev had an appointment to see Veniamin on the morning he was murdered, and was also part of the torture team that grabbed and killed Mark Mallia in August 2003.

Police say that both Peirce and Veniamin worked for Benvenuto at different times when the apparently respectable businessman felt the need to intimidate enemies at the wholesale fruit and vegetable market.

Veniamin was shot dead by a Melbourne identity, Mick Gatto, on March 23, 2004 in a Carlton restaurant. Gatto was acquitted of murder on the grounds of self-defence.

Purana detectives working on the Italian murders have arrested a man they allege was the driver when Veniamin ambushed Peirce in Bay Street, Port Melbourne.