The patsy, the false confession and the winding road to the truth

As they are not the types to head to VCAT for an independent assessment, the dispute was likely to end in violence – although no one could have anticipated a street execution.

On June 20, 2009, the feud between the Chaouks and Haddaras reached another flashpoint in a quiet street in Altona North.

Ali Chaouk had called out Mohammed Haddara. They were to meet one-out with no guns. The thing is, Chaouk fibbed and arrived with a .44 Magnum.

As insurance, Haddara abducted a Chaouk associate, Ahmed Hablas (Ali’s cousin by marriage), and forced him into his car.

The message was clear. If there was no resolution, Hablas would be bashed. Haddara even made threatening calls using his hostage’s phone and pocketed his expensive gold necklace.

Haddara’s insurance policy proved useless, as Chaouk shot his enemy five times, twice in the side and three times in the back, at 7.50pm in Fifth Avenue.

A neighbour ran out to shield the victim until the ambulance arrived, concerned the gunman would return to finish him off.

Haddara’s brother, Fadi, raced to the scene to be told Mohammed couldn’t be saved. Fadi had no doubt who was responsible, as that night he drove his car to the heavily fortified gates of the Chaouk compound in nearby Brooklyn.

Yes, that’s right. We have organised crime groups living in private compounds to deter police and enemies – one of which was attacked with army grenades. Considering these families’ mortality rate they would be better off investing in funeral homes than fortified ones.

The initial head of the investigation, now Superintendent Tim Day, says police expected a likely payback shooting that night. “The Santiago taskforce [into Middle Eastern crime] looked after risk mitigation while we investigated the homicide.”

The homicide squad went to the Haddaras to promise the murder would be fully investigated.

They also went to the Chaouks to make it clear Ali was a suspect and would have to be interviewed, and they wanted to make sure the process was conducted with no risk. (Ali’s brother, Mohammed, was shot dead in April 2005 when police went to arrest him. He pulled a samurai sword on the Special Operations Group, making the classic mistake of taking a knife to a gunfight. Mohammed was wanted in connection with an attempted murder, alleged drug trafficking and a stolen car racket.)

Their father, Machhour Chaouk, was murdered 14 months after the Haddara execution. At the age of 10, when most kids are off to Auskick for quality family time, Ali watched his father shoot another man.

The family referred police to their lawyer and the following day solicitor Alan Swanwick promised to bring in a person of interest.

Then-homicide detective Barry Gray says: “We were expecting Ali, and Swanwick arrived with another man saying, ‘This is Mr Hablas.’ We knew who he was and we considered him a witness.”

Not only did the lawyer take in Hablas (freshly showered and wearing clothes that couldn’t be linked to the crime scene), he advised police to caution him before producing a five-page statement describing how Hablas was abducted, managed to escape, was chased by Haddara and then wrestled the gun from his kidnapper and shot him in self-defence.

If the statement was to be believed, Hablas was a hero not a murderer. The sticking point was police did not believe it. Another sticking point was the victim had been shot five times, which included three in the back and one at close range while on the ground.

“It was not consistent with self-defence,” Gray says.

Helpfully, Swanwick took in Chaouk the following night to be questioned. The solicitor brushed off Day’s concerns that representing both men was a conflict of his clients’ interest.

So, there was a man who police believed was innocent confessing he had killed, and another man who police believed was the killer but was denying involvement.

Here was the dilemma. Should police charge the wrong man? If they charged the right man, would he be able to use Hablas’ confession as the smokescreen to escape a guilty verdict? And Chaouk had two tame relatives who swore he was at home at the time of the killing.

Day says it wasn’t a matter for the police but the courts. “We are the collectors of the evidence and our subjective views are not relevant. It was a matter for a jury to decide.”

Hablas believed (and was assured by Chaouk) his concocted self-defence story would hold and must have been surprised that a year after the shooting he was charged with murder.

After a couple of months in remand, Hablas recanted his confession, saying he had been intimidated by the real shooter. He was understandably surprised this was not raised at his bail application. His family decided it was time to find independent legal representation, and turned to the experienced firm of Stary Norton Halphen.

“They (the Hablases) are a decent family that was dragged into this conspiracy,” Gray says.

Police secretly recorded Chaouk telling family members if multiple people confessed to a crime it could create enough doubt to destroy any police case.

It is part of a pattern several Middle Eastern crime clans follow. Treat the police as enemies, refuse to co-operate, try to intimidate local cops by turning up in numbers to deter them from conducting searches, and threaten witnesses.

‘Do not underestimate the determination of the quiet man. Without his work the murder would have remained unsolved, and we would have had another gangland war.’

Superintendent Tim Day on detective Barry Gray

At Hablas’ trial, Gray says everyone in the court knew an innocent man was in the dock. “We were all on the same page knowing it would be a travesty of justice if he was convicted.”

That included the jury, which in October 2011 took just two hours to acquit.

Gray could have let the case lapse, but he kept investigating even after he left homicide, persuading Hablas to give evidence.

Perhaps when the car Hablas was sitting in at a McDonald’s car park was peppered with 10 shots from a machine gun he realised he had backed the wrong horse.

Police traced but did not find the murder weapon, although they located the buried spent shells.

Ali Chaouk was charged, but the first jury was disbanded on day six of the trial after some jurors expressed concerns for their safety.

Chaouk’s two alibi witnesses were blown out of the water when one admitted to the Office of Special Examiner that while Chaouk had been home on the night of the murder, he took a phone call outside then disappeared before the killing.

Police believe the call was from Haddara organising the meeting.

At the second trial, which lasted 22 days in 2018, the jury returned a guilty verdict.

This surprised Chaouk who, having intimidated someone to falsely confess to murder, persuaded witnesses to lie on his behalf and having shot someone dead in cold blood, responded with profound indignation at his sentencing.

“I don’t accept the verdict, it’s unsafe. I’m appealing the decision. It’s a miscarriage of justice.”

Bell sentenced him to 24 years in prison to serve a minimum of 18. True to his word, Chaouk appealed. Last year that was thrown out.

Day says Barry Gray spent more than a decade pursuing justice for the Haddara family.

“Do not underestimate the determination of the quiet man. Without his work the murder would have remained unsolved, and we would have had another gangland war,” Day says.

Had the false confession succeeded, Day says, police would have been swamped by similar cases involving patsies intimidated to take the fall.

By the time Chaouk is eligible to apply for parole he will be 55 and will have spent 29 of 30 years in prison. His son was six when he was arrested for the murder. The boy will be 24 by the time Chaouk has served his minimum term.

Perhaps Chaouk will spend his time in prison reflecting that he is not much good at this gangster stuff. But don’t hold your breath.