June 9, 2025 • 41 mins
George Xynas, known as the King of Sunshine, shares his harrowing journey from a troubled youth in Melbourne's gangland to a life of redemption. Xynas recounts his early experiences in a crime-ridden environment, the allure of money and power, and the violent realities of street life.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apodge production, Welcome to Real Crime with Adam shand I'm
Your Host Adam Shand. Sunshine and Melbourne's West produced some
of the most notorious and brutal criminals.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Victoria Police are under pressure after a series of shootings
and a fire bombing in Melbourne's local residents are afraid
they're getting caught in the middle of a gangland war.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Names like Dino Debra, Mark Mehlia, Paul Calipolitis and Andrew
Benji Venyumin have passed into history due to the underbelly
story of Melbourne's gangland War. He had an extensive criminal history,
including convictions for trafficking heroin and assaulting police. In running
my book Big Shots on the Gangland War, I found
(00:50):
myself immersed in Sunshine and the atmosphere that produced these fearless,
dangerous criminals.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
We say they believe the violences drug related, but have
so far made no arrests.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
George Zionas, as a teenager, walked those same brutal streets
and became known as the King of Sunshine, building a
drug empire before he was old enough to vote.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
To the people on the outside, the are notorious characters.
To people like me, their friends and family. My dream
when I was a kid to die fighting. If I
died fighting beside my brothers, that would have been the
best day of my life. You put a knife to
my throat, you put a gun to my head. There's
no rules for me after that. I will never wrong you.
(01:34):
But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
If you just chopped my finger off, I will chop
your hands off and your feet off.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
And to me, that was fair enough.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
He managed to get out and has decided to share
his story. Thanks for joining me.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
George, Thank you, You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
What's led you to decide to share what you did
as a teenager?
Speaker 3 (01:59):
I suppose it'll be my book that I'm writing. I
feel like I need to get it out there, get
the story.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Because it was brutal and traumatic, what you were involved in,
what you saw. What Mark do you think it's left
on you?
Speaker 4 (02:13):
What Mark?
Speaker 3 (02:14):
I can't say it stays with you for a long time,
but it's been almost thirty years now, thirty years, that's
a long time. So for me, I have to think
about a little bit to remember how those times were.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
What was it about sunshine back in those days?
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Sunshine I'll tell you one thing that you can say
about the people of Sunshine that you can't help respect.
There's no victim mentality people. They grow up, they're poor,
their parents are working, their parents aren't home most of
the time. Nothing to eat maybe, but they don't complain
about it. They go out and do what they have
(02:51):
to do. And a lot of kids at that time,
and I think I remember the nineties was a recession
and parents were working two jobs at a time and
they couldn't be home all the time, so the kids
were on the street a lot.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So where did you get to in terms of the
criminal empire that you created in Sunshine? Tell me at
the height of.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
What and't call it a criminal empire. I just grew
up in those streets and I just knew those people
that you mentioned, and we grew up together.
Speaker 4 (03:21):
That's all.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
So what was your business though?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
My business as a kid.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
A lot of the times when you're hanging around Charlie's
in Sunshine, they're a lot of the thieves and the
drug addicts. They come through and they sell you stolen goods.
That's most of the business that you did back then.
I'd go to the shops bring back something that's worth
one hundred dollars, give it to you for twenty or
even ten dollars, and you sell it for twenty thirty.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
How you made some money.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Because Charlie's was a pinball parlor in the main threat
of sunshine there, but it became a lot more than
just stolen goods. You found yourself going from that beginning
into drug dealing. How did that happen?
Speaker 3 (04:00):
It was, like I said, the stolen goods. Whatever little
crimes people did back then, it wasn't too bad. Maybe
people got into selling marijuana heroine. I'm going to leave
a lot of details for the book. I'll tell you that.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
How old were you when this started happening? And listen,
I appreciate you if you're writing a book, but I
think we need to sort of just touch on the
development of your life at that time and how you
found yourself. I mean, you're right at the center of it.
This was a dangerous place that were full of people
who were coming to buy drugs. There was some pretty
notorious characters.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
To the people on the outside, the notorious characters to
people like me, their friends and family, And to tell
the truth, I met a lot of good people a
lot of good people in Sancho.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
With quite a few people who were murdered over the
journey too.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yes, but if you think about it, when all that
stuff was happening, it was, what was it, two thousand
and two thousand and one. I was already out of
Sunshine at that time. See with me, It started when
I was twelve years old, So I was a teenager
through the nineties, and I just used to hang out
at sh at Charlie's. And by the time it got
(05:08):
really bad there I was, I was already out.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
But there was already some pretty bad things happening within
Sunshine at that time, and you saw a lot of
this there was.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
My first one was someone got murdered under the train station.
There used to be an underpass in the train station there,
and the guy got murdered, and the police came into
Charlie's and they took us all out, and they lined us.
Speaker 4 (05:29):
All up and got all our details.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
And I was very young at time, twelve years old,
and I can remember the police putting us up against
the wall and then making us sit down there for
at least an hour or so, taking all our details,
and eventually they let us go. But then I found
out it was because of murder. But at the time
they had a sitting there, I had no idea what
it was for. Then you found out on the news
after there was a murder.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
This began to establish a us and their mentality in
people in Sunshine. There was the police, then there was
you guys.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Before you mentioned the King of Sunshine. Never have I
said those words out of my mouth to anybody. I'll
tell you how it started. The police used to come
past and they used to pick on us a little bit,
so they'll get out of the car and they'll push
us around. At one time, this cop comes out of
the car and he starts pushing me around, and he goes, look,
I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And if you
(06:22):
look in the back seat, there was a young lady there.
They were doing a ride along, and you could see
the surprise look on their face, thinking that's the King
of Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
It's a little boy, you know what I mean. And
that's how it started. It happened twice.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
So the first time he was pushing around, slopping around
a little bit. I didn't say not one word, didn't
say anything. And the second time he said look, look,
I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And I said
to him, mate, this is no way to treat your majesty.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
You know what I mean. You're gonna stop it, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
So that's how it came about because people heard him saying, look,
look I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
And that's how that started.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
But you were also highly connected. You were doing a
lot of business back in those days. You were a
connector between people who wanted to buy drugs and the
sources that you could get them from.
Speaker 4 (07:09):
Yes, yes I was. I was.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
We started moving a lot of marijuana and heroin when
I was about thirteen fourteen years old, very young. I
didn't even know really what it was, and we pretty
much started making a lot of money, a lot real quick.
And as a young kid, when you've got a lot
of money and you're very young, you know you don't
(07:32):
know what to do with it, and there's not much
you can do with it but spend it.
Speaker 4 (07:37):
So you learn how to spend money.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Because you must laugh now when you hear people talking about, oh,
criminals are getting younger and younger. Now, this has always
been the case back in your day. If he was
still at school.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Always, It's always been like that, even before that, even
the eighties, because I used to hang around Tom's. There
was another place around the corner there that was my
Auntie's place, and we started hanging around there when we're
about seven eight years old.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
And you'd see the older kids.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
To us though older kids, but that was they were
young still thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old, but to us
they looked old. But they were selling drugs at the
time too. And this was the eighties, because what sort
of money were talking about.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Here was a thirteen year old boy. Suddenly you've got
fist full of cash. Yeah, I couldn't really tell you
how much money, but it was a lot of money
for a thirteen year old. It was.
Speaker 4 (08:26):
There was a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Because people I've talked to from your background in Sunshine
all those years ago, people like Andrew ven Yum and
Johnny Orcello, those sort of people, they talked about money
and power being the motivator. Is the aphrodisiacs, Yes, that's true.
What role of that playing your life?
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Well, the money and it does come with power to
the point where you can get anything done for a
little bit of money, and that's where the power comes in.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Were you ever afraid.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
I probably was too stupid to be afraid. Kids at
that age are so dumb they don't know anything.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
And you were building up a distribution network. You've made
a life answers with other individuals from the Vietnamese community
out there, that's right. And you were witnessing the struggle
for the corners in Sunshine where people were selling drugs.
Tell us a bit about that.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Well, when it gets to the time when a lot
of drug addicts are coming into one area, the other
drug dealers can see that a lot of money is
coming in, so they want it. And when they come in,
you have to do something about it or walk away.
So we did something about it. What sort of things
would happen, Well, would push them out of the area,
(09:44):
to say so, it would beat them up, and you
know things like that.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
There were some pretty big confrontations. And understand that because
when you talk about money and power, when you have money,
you have the power to get people to do things
for you. And so some of these fights would have
been set up around bringing in heavier individuals, older guys
to come fight for you.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yes, we did have a lot of people see, there
was our group in Sunshine and there was a group
in Suncho On West, and that's the people you're talking about.
And a few times they came and helped us out,
you know, with some fights. And when there was a
lot of numbers on their side, we called in other
people and Sunshine West they had the numbers. There was
(10:27):
a lot of people in sun John.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
West and there were some very heavy guys that were
useful in terms of your business. And you've been beaten up,
you'd been kicked off your corners.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
I have, I have.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
What's that like?
Speaker 4 (10:40):
It's not a good feeling, but you get used to it.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
To tell the truth, you know, after you've been beaten
up a few times, it's not that bad, you know
what I mean. I remember my friend James. I used
to tell him, you know, you have to fight. He
never fought this guy. Every time there was a fight,
he would run away. I said to him, look doesn't
matter if you get beaten up, the pain goes away.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
It's not that bad.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
I remember one time he got caught chroming in his
room and his dad beating him up really bad. And
we'll have a nightclub that night. And he came out
and his face it was rearranged. He looked like a
different person. And he goes to me, George, I know
now what you mean. It's not that bad. And I'm
looking at him, like, are you you're kidding? That was
(11:24):
so bad. I've never had a beating that bad. He
goes to me, George, I know now, I'm not scared
of getting.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
A beating, because the reality in Sunshine in those years
was that if you got beaten up, if you got
kicked off your corner, if you didn't back up, you
were weak and you were finished.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
With one hundred percent must one hundred percent. I would
actually challenge anybody to find one person that I have
wronged who hasn't wronged me.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
You're a different person back then, I can tell. I
can see your heart's changed completely. And I've seen this
before a person.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
If I said more than ten words a day, I
spoke too much. I would hardly say a word for
about ten about twenty years of my life, I wouldn't
say a word.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Why was that?
Speaker 4 (12:07):
I don't know. I couldn't tell you. Was I angry?
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
But you were dealing with the trauma and stress of
what you were involved in and the uncertainty of with
the turmoil that must have been in your life because
you're a kid. You're thirteen and fourteen now yeah, yeah, But.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
To tell you the truth, my dream when I was
a kid to die fighting. If I died fighting beside
my brothers, that would have been the best day of
my life.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I'm not even joking. That was my dream.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
And actually I had a couple of times it could
have happened. So one time we ad a party in Albion.
At the party were making too much noise, too much
of a racket. So the person whose party it was,
he said, look, we got to go for a walk
because we're making too much noise.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
They're going to call the cops on us.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
So we go for a walker, went across the train
tracks there at Albion and there was another party. Someone
else was having a party, and there was this lady
at the front and one of my friends it goes,
can we come to the party, and she goes no, no, no,
go away, go away, trust me, go away, And my
friend kept in saysing no, we're going to want to
come into the party, and she goes no, don't, don't.
And about five or six bikers. They looked like bikers,
(13:17):
you know, came out with machetes, and I wanted to
run away too, But everybody ran away except my brother Peter.
The first person who made the trouble. They were chopping
in with the machetes and my brother Peter jumped on
him and he started coppying the machetes to the head
(13:38):
and I wanted to run away, but I saw that happening,
so I ran towards it.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
And let me tell you the feeling that I had.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Let's just say, you go home one day and you
find your house is full of money, full of gold,
full of diamonds. How would you feel excited, A bit
of fear. That's how I felt. And if it happened,
it happened. But it didn't happen. I ended up jumping
(14:06):
on one of the guys and he started swinging me around.
And at the time, I was probably about fourteen years old.
And as he's swinging me around, I'm hitting the other guys.
So I'm knocking out three or four people at a
time while he's swinging me around. Believe it or not,
they called the cops on us.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
These people.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
The police ended up coming to the house where we
at this party, pushes around a bit, hit a couple
of people with their torches and ended up arresting me
because they said I was the one who caused all
the trouble. And I believe that was the first time
I spent overnight till my parents came in the morning.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Because that was a feature of the guys in Sunshine
and Sunshine West that they had done very little jail,
They'd done very little time in police custody. They came
to notice in the Gangland War as fully formed criminals,
and most of the hierarchy and town had ever heard
of them. So what was happening with the police out
(15:04):
in Sunshine back in those days? Were they a part
of the corruption or were they just not good at
their jobs?
Speaker 3 (15:09):
No, no, I wouldn't say they were part of the corruption.
There was a few people, I'm sure part of the corruption,
but not that I know of. But we were underage.
We're very young. So if you think about it, let's
just say one of us gets caught shoplifting. You know
what you got back then a five year good behavior bond,
and a five year good behavior bond means nothing. You
(15:31):
know what you get the next time the next day
you get caught shoplifted again. The next day it's another
five year good behavior bond. The one before didn't matter.
And also concurrently, so exactly so what was the first
one for? And then you found out, well, nothing's happening.
You can get away with anything underage. I shouldn't be
saying that's true.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
It's happening again today. I'm we're seeing young criminals here
in the streets of Melbourne who are getting bail on bail,
on bail, they're going to youth Justice, they're not going
to jail. And they're thinking, well, this is a lark,
but this is not new you're saying it was back then.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
It was.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
It was because by the time people like Andrew Venyuman
got uptown, he'd already been involved in violence, assaults, murders
even I mean, he'd been involved, for instance, in the
murder of Dino Dibrah in two thousand, he'd probably been
involved in the murder of Paul Calipalitis in two thousand
and two, and nothing had happened. And so when he
(16:28):
comes uptown with carl Williams, he was a different breed
and the guys in Carlton could not believe how willing,
how much dash the guys in Sunshine had, there were
complete revelation. Can you understand that?
Speaker 3 (16:42):
I understand that, bully. Why, I know exactly the type.
If sunhohe West came through your area and maybe they
hang out their little bit no chroming or something, you
could do nothing or you'll be able to do his
smile and let them do whatever they want to do.
Sunhohn West, you didn't mess with back then.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
It was that simple.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
And they all died.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
No, there's a lot of them still around still. Yeah,
what's happened to them? Productive members of society, believe it
or not. A lot of the people, Yeah, smart people,
smart guys. They weren't stupid even back then. They were
just street kids.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
I suppose, well, yeah, because I mean you were a
good student, yeah, but you couldn't see any future in
staying in school. You were making too much money down
at Charlie's and on your corners selling drugs. So, and
you had ambitions you wanted to be You're interested in
ancient Greek history, and you wanted to write and a lot
sort of stuff. But you saw your future on the
streets at that time.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Yeah, I actually wanted to be a soldier back when
I was a teenager, you know, Navy seal something like that.
But yeah, that wasn't going to happen. I loved football,
AFL football when I was a young kid, that was
my thing. So through my young probably to say from
six years old to about twelve years old, AFL was
(18:03):
everything to me.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
Oh I was sports. It doesn't matter what sport it was.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
I had to play sports that day, you know what
I mean my primary school times and if you talk
to anyone through my primary school, it doesn't matter what
sport it was.
Speaker 4 (18:15):
I was good at it, every sport and I had
to play sport. You know.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
We used to have like an Olympic day that was
the best day of the year for me. We used
to go to it was called Albefeldi Park and it
was like an Olympics high jump, long jump, hundred meters,
really everything you can think of. And that to me
was like if you were junkie and you had as
(18:41):
unlimited drugs.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
That's how it felt.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
So that's how it felt to me, you know what
I mean, A natural high, natural high for sports. I
was crazy about sports. But I suppose you get over it.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
Well, other things came up and this opportunity and then
you could see, I mean, you're also quite a commercially
oriented young man, and you could see at a ridiculously
young age that you could apply the demand. And obviously
heroin was booming in Melbourne across Australia ACTA at that
time as well. You could see an opportunity that took
you right away from that righteous path of sports and study.
(19:17):
Wanted to be a soldier, and boy, what a dark
place you ended up.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Yeah, but even during those times, I knew this isn't
the path. I knew I got to get out. I
knew I had to think of something, I had to
do something else. I knew this, But until I was
about eighteen nineteen, I was still involved.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
It is difficult to get out. And I know from
the Sunshine Crew that I knew that where there was
a little bit of doubt about you, there was no doubt.
And one thing they really looked down upon was people
who were snitches on pain of death, and that's really
that caused several of the murders. So how difficult was
(19:59):
it to get out knowing that your associates would be saying, hey,
George's out but is he going to snitch on us now?
Speaker 3 (20:05):
No, they knew me, They knew me, they knew the
type of person I was, and they knew they would
not happen. One time we had a fight at a
footscrape McDonald's and the police ended up coming during the
fight and they arrested me and about to put me
in the back of the police divvy van and I
started running, and as I was running, a few of
(20:29):
the Sunshine boys stole the things in the police car.
Believe it or not, I ran so they could they still.
I believe it was a mobile phone and a few
other things. But the sergeant then at the time, he
wanted his mobile phone back, so he used to come
to my house, take me to the police station and
slap me around a bit until I gave him the name.
(20:52):
And I wouldn't do it. So for three months, whenever
they found me, they took me to the police station,
slapped me around a bit, and let me go. The
last time it happened, I said, guys, this is going
to happen forever. I don't know who took the mobile phone.
Of course I knew who took it, but I said
to him, I don't know who took it. You're not
going to get a name from me. It's that simple,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Because what would have happened to you had you given
that name.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Well, I couldn't tell you. I couldn't tell you the person.
Nothing good, nothing good, of course. But the person who
actually took it wasn't even a friend of mine. He
was my good friend's cousin, you know. But I knew that,
and I could have easily just given the name. Easy,
they will stop harassing me. And in this time I
couldn't do anything, and I stayed over friend's houses. But
(21:35):
in this three months they only got me about five
six times because I stayed at friend's houses. But I
could have easily just given the name. How many people
would have done it, you know what I mean? Easy.
I didn't even care for the guy, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
But also the reality was that police knew that you
were a tall poppy, a young tall poppy. But they
could also let people know that you were a snitch, yes,
and destroying you.
Speaker 4 (22:03):
Yeah, that's what they do.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
The times when you're in the police station and they
got you for some crime, the person in the other room,
they'll tell them that person in the other room is talking.
Speaker 4 (22:15):
He's told us everything.
Speaker 3 (22:16):
You might as well just tell us he's told us,
and a lot of people fall for it, you know
what I mean. Plus, when you're young, you don't know
any better, but I knew better, you know what I mean.
And when you don't say anything, you walk. It's that simple.
When a police officer says to you, make it easy
on yourself, he means make it easy on himself, you
know what I mean. That's what he means. If they're
(22:38):
there talking to you and they're trying to get something,
they've got nothing. So if you keep your mouth shut,
you'll walk. It's that simple.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Yes, you're right, George. There's not much they can do
unless people are giving evidence against you. And you were
quite a big operation by this time, but you were
flying below the radar. All of a sudden that changes
because some of your workers decide to give you up.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
What happened, Yeah, so a few workers bus, they've got raiders,
five of them, and they also got a few clients
at the same time, three, so it was eight people altogether,
and seven of those eight gave witness statements and they
picked me up on the back.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Of that and what did they say?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
We know everything, we know what you're running, we know
what you're doing, we know it all.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
And you've been doing this now for three or four
years at this point, at that point, about five years,
five years. You were sixteen at.
Speaker 4 (23:32):
This time, yeah, sixteen, about seventeen.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
Ye staggering, isn't it that you were that young and
you've been doing it for five years and the police
hadn't managed to nail you. But so what did your
so called faithful workers say about you?
Speaker 4 (23:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
The faithful workers are you know a lot of them.
They were all talked tough before this happened. If you
talk to them, oh, don't worry about the belize, don't
the police. And the one who never talks, he's quiet,
he doesn't act tough, nothing. He's the one that didn't
say anything. It's amazing.
Speaker 4 (24:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
The four that talked tough all talked, but the one
who never talks didn't talk at that point.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And so they come to you. Where were you when
they when the police descended?
Speaker 4 (24:12):
Believe I was in Sunshine.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Just another business day the day for me.
Speaker 4 (24:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
They came and arrested me from there and took me
to Sunshine Police, which was the old police station at
that time, and they took turns slipping around a bit,
beating me up a bit to get something out of me.
And they did it one at a time, so only
one police officer was in the room. And when my
barrister came, when I was talking to him, he said,
(24:38):
I think I had a mark, but it wasn't from
police hitting me or anything. And he said, did they
did the police beat you up? And I said yeah,
like this was normal because that happened all the time.
It's no big deal. If you're in the boxing ring,
you get hit a few times, you can't complain And
I said yeah. He goes, oh, which ones? And the
names were on the paper in front of him, and
I tapped the paper, said this, and he ended up
(25:01):
rolling with that and ended up taking those officers to court.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
And what happened about that without me telling him to
do that.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
So the day we went to court and I saw
those three there, I said, what are they doing here?
He said, you're going to testify against them? I said
I'm not doing that. He said, yeah, but they beat
you up. We're going to try and get your charges
dropped and all this stuff. I said, yeah, I'm not
going to testify against them, and I left it at that,
(25:30):
and they left.
Speaker 4 (25:32):
They heard obviously I wasn't going to go forward with it.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
And we got a charge of community service two hundred
and fifty hours and we're happy with it.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
And what were you charged with?
Speaker 4 (25:42):
Heroin trafficking? Organized crime?
Speaker 3 (25:44):
It was like something about running an organized crime syndicate
and things like that, just crazy charges, but they ended
up it was like ten charges or more. But then
they just went down to a few of them which
was just drug trafficking and things like that.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
So it's gone from like pretty serious down to fairly mind.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I will tell me twenty years. You're going to get
twenty they're telling me. I didn't believe that straight up.
First of all, I'm sixteen, seventeen years old. I knew
that wasn't gonna happen. I ended up just getting two
hundred and fifty hours of community serving, which was good
for me actually at the time. Come work into the work.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
What did you have to do?
Speaker 4 (26:20):
At science works?
Speaker 3 (26:21):
There was this guy who collects the dead bodies who
jumped from the West Gate Bridge and he collects them
and the people.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
That had jumped off the bridge and committed suicide. Okay.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
He says that people around that area they get like
eight bodies a week. And I couldn't believe it because
you don't hear about on the news.
Speaker 4 (26:37):
Nothing.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
And he opened up the drainage hatch and he said,
this is where we're going to get the bodies from.
I've never taken up, but I saw them do it
one time. But removing bodies from where was this Science Works?
This is just near the West Gate Bridge. There they
were storing the bodies that people had committed suicide. No, no,
they washed up in their drainage system. And there was
this big hatch at the back of Science Works and
(27:01):
you go down a ladder. It's like a sewage system,
and that's sometimes the bodies get caught up there.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And what was your job in relation to that?
Speaker 4 (27:08):
I was supposed to help him pull them out?
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Goodness me.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Yeah, but we're also also doing landscaping around the front
of the place and back of the place. And he said,
if there's a dead body, you've got to come and
help me. It's a bit of gardening, bit of body retrieval. Yeah,
two and fifty hours. I mean it's remarkable because I
mean most ordinary people would say, ah, you should have
given evidence against the police. But I know in Sunshine
at that time, you didn't give evidence against anybody, be
(27:34):
it your friends or the police, because you always had
to go back to Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
Exactly, and you have to live with yourself. It's that simple.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
But giving evidence against the police wouldn't bother me that much.
I just couldn't do it. I just didn't feel it
was right. They beat me up a bit so wide,
you know what I mean, that's how it's meant to be.
But what I hated the worst about this cop that
I took the court. Three months later, he arrested a
friend of mine right in front of me, and as
he's got him in handcuffs taking him to the car,
he says, he yells out to me, thanks for your help, George.
(28:03):
Are you just trying to get me killed?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Yeah? That was a common tactic, wasn't it, to say
that you've been.
Speaker 3 (28:07):
Helped, because obviously something's gone wrong with his career, he
can't get promoted, or something's happened because there was a
someone's complaint against him, So he's held a grudge, this guy.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
And in those years, you had a lot to lose
you had built up this empire. You work all the
King of Sunshine, however reluctantly you were His Majesty, if
you like. So to see that wrenched away from you
and your reputation destroyed was a powerful incentive to stay staunch.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
Yes, but I knew I had to get out one day,
sooner or later. I knew I had to get out.
So I knew it was going to end. I just
didn't know how it was going to end.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Well. For a lot of those guys out there, or
a number of them, it ended up in the mortuary.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
It did.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
It did, And you had that experience when I went
out there the first time, I saw how many houses
in that area had roller shutters. They're like little fortresses.
People feared retribution for various things, and I number one
crook there told me that you could fear the police,
but you had more to fear from your mates.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
Yeah. Yeah, I suppose.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
You had a couple of instances where people tried to
take your life.
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Yes, robberies. There was a lot of standover men at
those times. We were little kids were easy targets, you
know what I mean. Your pockets are full of money,
easy targets, So standover men in the nineties was a
normal thing and most of the things would do that
people would look at that it's very bad. Was beating
(29:38):
up a standover men, you know what I mean? And
people would say, sometimes we'll go a bit too far.
And that's why people thought you were so bad, because
you're beating up all these people. But they actually tried
to rob you. So to me, the rules are gone
to me, I can do whatever I want after that.
You tried to rob me. You put a blood field
to ringe to my eye, you put a knife to
(29:59):
my throat, you put a gun to my head.
Speaker 4 (30:01):
There's no rules for me after that. You're lucky if
I let you live. To tell you the truth. That's
how angry I get. I used to get back then
I can.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
See how painful this is. The memories are difficult because
it was Yeah, it does come back, and I'm sure
one moment does come back. When you were at home
there and there's a drive by on your house.
Speaker 4 (30:20):
That's right. Yeah, what happened to your story? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Funny.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
Yeah, I actually heard something in the front yard and
I went to look out the window, and I thought
it was my brother pushing me down.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
But it wasn't. No one was there.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
My brother was laying down sleeping, and I was about
to look exactly where that bullet was, exactly right between
the eyes, but something pushed me down. Believe it or not,
it's so weird.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
So the shot passed through the front of your house
and over your head where you'd just been.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
Just been, and I was about to look. I was
about to move the curtain and look in that exact
spot that bullet went, but I felt a hand on
my back push me. I really don't care people believe
that or not, but that's that's what I felt like,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
You had a guardian angel. Maybe maybe that could also
be interpreted as a sign that it was time to
get out. Did you get out?
Speaker 4 (31:23):
Yes? I did. I did get out. Was not at
that time?
Speaker 1 (31:26):
It took a bit longer.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
Yeah, well you can't do that and get away with it. Yeah,
something has to happen, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
So what happened?
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Well, I didn't murder it. I've never murdered anybody, you
know what I mean. Even if you have, no one's
going to say, yeah you have. But I used to
get pretty angry if somebody because I'll tell you this,
I will never wrong you. Never will I ever wrong anybody.
But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
(31:56):
I looked at it like this, If you just say
chop my finger off, I will chop your hands off
and your feet off. And to me, that was fair enough,
and I would think with most people would be fair
enough because I will never wrong you leave me alone,
you know it, won't even know I exist?
Speaker 4 (32:13):
Is that simple?
Speaker 1 (32:15):
Because that was the law of the streets in Sunshine.
I heard stories, for instance, about if there were debtsode
or things had been done to people's family and so forth,
and you could find people who could do these things
for you. For the amount of money that you would pay,
you could get these jobs done. And Andrew Venuman was
very experienced at this, shooting people in the buttocks, bashing people,
(32:36):
and more or less acting like a little local police
force if you like.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Yes, I suppose I've never actually hired him to do
a job like that, but I'm sure people have.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yeah. But like I said, he and people like Debrah
were regarded as just next level. They had dashed that
people did not see, and when they came down, when
they began to knock off the cart and crew. The
cart and Crew were rich crooks, they were comfortable, they
were knitted into the fabric of Melbourne. But these renegades,
(33:06):
these guys from the streets of Sunshine, who did not
give a shit and they were prepared to do what
others were. And that's why Carl Williams made his relationship
with Dino Dibborh and then with their new venumin because
that experience you had anothers on the streets of Sunshine
was next level.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
They were.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
They were, But to tell the truth, there was a
lot of people like them, but you just don't hear
about them. The actual worst people, the biggest criminals. You'll
never hear about him.
Speaker 4 (33:35):
Never.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
No one will ever hear about him. It's that simple.
And did you hear that Carl Williams just to hang
out in Sunshine? Remember that link I sent you? Yes,
Carl Williams. See people believe anything they hear. Yeah, it's amazing.
So apparently he grew up in Sunshine, hang out at
Charlie's through the nineties and I've never met the man.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
No.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
I was there every day through the nineties and I've
never met the man. But people believe he was from Sunshine.
People will believe stories.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
I mean, he grew up in broad Meadows and a
very different situation to Sunshine completely. And he was not
a tough guy. He did not run with street gangs.
He was a businessman who needed people like Andrew Venyuman
and Debra to do his dirty work for him. Even Underbelly,
which portrayed him shooting Mark Moran, that's absolute rubbish.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Oh yeah, you've met Carl Yeah, and new.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Car back in the day. Of course, you know, during
that period when he was still with Benji and running
hot on the streets. And I spoke to him the
Saturday before he was murdered. And even then it was
his mate that murdered him, Matthew Johnson in jail there.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
I was a friend of his.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
He was a friend of his. He was He said
to me, there's issues about the media knowing that the
state was going to pay for my father's tax bill
if I would cooperate and things like that, and that
was going to come out, and that was the reason
he was murdered. But he was killed again by his friend.
But he was never a tough gun. He was never
in Sunshine. So let's put that on the record right now.
Speaker 4 (35:00):
Yeah, he I can say that for sure.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, yeah, you would have known him if he was
out there, he'd been a arrival to you or.
Speaker 4 (35:06):
A friend or a friend if you grew up there.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yeah, and if he were smart, you'd be his friend.
By the sounds, it was the whole area was going
to fall to death and mayhem. It looked that way,
and you could see the future. Yeah, how did you
go about changing your life? Changing your heart? You know?
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Two thousand and one, you know, there was a big
drought in Melbourne and a lot of people stopped then.
I believe it lasted for over a year, two years,
so most people stopped using. Most people it was like
the lockdown, how the lockdown was, and people just stopped
using heroin drought exactly, And that's how it was. Then
(35:46):
there was a heroin drought and people just stopped using
and stopped dealing.
Speaker 1 (35:51):
Ruined your business.
Speaker 4 (35:53):
Not that I cared, I didn't care. I think it
happened for a reason.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Is what was going to happen to you? George?
Speaker 3 (36:02):
I couldn't tell you, And at that time I couldn't
care less. That's how stupid kids are. Yeah, I couldn't
care less.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
How do you end up putting a new value on
your life and seeing a future because that's what you did.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Good people, good people around you. If you always have
good people around you, you'll do well. It's that simple.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But you gave up money and power, position opportunities. You
could have been one of those big swinging crooks.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
They used to say that would I will be a
lot of the Vietnamese, a lot of people in the area.
They're going to say this guy, he's going to run
Melbourne one day. And I used to think in my head, no,
I'm not. I can't wait to get out of this shit,
you know. But like I said, yeah, good people, and
I think it all happened for a reason. So I
feel like I got to write this book and I
want to start my charity. I want to stop kids
(36:55):
from going down this.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Road because there are a lot of children now. Children.
It's hard to believe you can get people who are
doing these aggravated burglaries, seriously violent assaults and so forth.
There's still children. But you've been in that place. How
do you think Melbourne and Australia should address the issue
of youth crime.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
Stop pointing the finger that's for sure. That's for the
first thing, society points the finger in the direction of children.
Imagine this, the eels of society. We point our finger
at twelve year olds. Doesn't make sense. How do we
get beyond that? Well, first of all, we can't blame them.
We can't blame children for the eels of society. It's
(37:36):
that simple.
Speaker 1 (37:37):
Because you were merely supplying a demand for.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
Drugs exactly exactly so where we were at the time,
they would come to you and they would ask you
for certain things, and you think, why you're here, you
might as well supply that demand.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
And that's how it started.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
What would have made a difference in your life at
that stage, if.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Anything, sports Stay playing sports and stay at school. That
would make a difference. Stay off the street. And you know,
I've got some really good friends that I grew up
with from the street. And because I was about to say,
don't hang out with these certain type of people from
the street, but the best people I've ever met were
(38:18):
from the street. You know what I mean, Maybe one
day you'll meet them and you'll see these people, unbelievable people.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
You know, it's like that old Bob dylanline. He said,
if you're going to be an outlaw, you have to
be honest.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
At least I used to think, at least be honorable.
If you're going to do it, do it honorably. You
know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (38:35):
How's your life now?
Speaker 3 (38:37):
I've got no money, I'm a nobody and I've never
been happier.
Speaker 4 (38:43):
That's simple. What does the future hold anything? Anything? I want?
Speaker 1 (38:50):
Not money and power anymore.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
I can care less for money, so money's gone. I
can care less if I make money.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
Because this is a problem for not just criminals, but
everyone in society. Everyone's interested in money and power and materialism.
But you've got to a different level in your life
where you can be grateful.
Speaker 4 (39:11):
Doesn't everybody get there?
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Not everyone, afraid, not everyone, A lot of people, don't
you know. But I think in your life you've got
the love of a very loyal woman who's helped you
to get beyond what you used to be. That's right, yeah,
and that was a big help. I think you better
thank you while you're here. Don't you think you'd have
to name her? But what difference did your partner make
(39:34):
in your life?
Speaker 3 (39:35):
She knows words from your mouth means nothing, words that
mean anything, So.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
What advice would you give parents who've got young children
who are headed down the road.
Speaker 4 (39:46):
Don't judge.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Don't think that your kid is the worst kid out there,
because I always considered the worst kid to tell the truth. Parents, teachers, police,
social workers, religious figures. They would say I was the
worst kid at school. The teacher would say, keep it up,
and you end up in George's gang.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
You know what I mean? You think maybe I am.
Speaker 3 (40:10):
You know, people keep saying that, You keep thinking that,
you know, so don't judge, don't be too hard because
people can change, you know what I mean. A teenager
going through crime or whatever they're going through, they can
get out of it. Believe me, a lot worse people
than me have got out of it, and they're really
good people.
Speaker 4 (40:31):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Well, you're giving yourself another chance, and I'm fascinated to
see where you go with telling your own story and
carving in your future. Thank you so much for sharing
your story. I think you're a brave man full of
courage to do that, and I look forward to hearing
more about it soon.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
That was George Zionist. They used to call him the
King of Sunshine, but now He's the king of his
own life, king of his own future. And I think
this is a really important message to family out there.
Don't give up on your kids. Keep working hard. They
can have a future and you've just got to have
a bit of faith in it. This has been real
crime with Adam Shann. Thank you for listening. If you'd
like to get in touch with me with stories and ideas,
(41:12):
please email me at Adam shandwriter at gmail dot com.
If you've got some information that you need to share
with the police, do it at crime Stoppers one at
one hundred, triple three, triple zero. Thanks for listening.
Apodge production, Welcome to Real Crime with Adam shand I'm
Your Host Adam Shand. Sunshine and Melbourne's West produced some
of the most notorious and brutal criminals.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Victoria Police are under pressure after a series of shootings
and a fire bombing in Melbourne's local residents are afraid
they're getting caught in the middle of a gangland war.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Names like Dino Debra, Mark Mehlia, Paul Calipolitis and Andrew
Benji Venyumin have passed into history due to the underbelly
story of Melbourne's gangland War. He had an extensive criminal history,
including convictions for trafficking heroin and assaulting police. In running
my book Big Shots on the Gangland War, I found
(00:50):
myself immersed in Sunshine and the atmosphere that produced these fearless,
dangerous criminals.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
We say they believe the violences drug related, but have
so far made no arrests.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
George Zionas, as a teenager, walked those same brutal streets
and became known as the King of Sunshine, building a
drug empire before he was old enough to vote.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
To the people on the outside, the are notorious characters.
To people like me, their friends and family. My dream
when I was a kid to die fighting. If I
died fighting beside my brothers, that would have been the
best day of my life. You put a knife to
my throat, you put a gun to my head. There's
no rules for me after that. I will never wrong you.
(01:34):
But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
If you just chopped my finger off, I will chop
your hands off and your feet off.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
And to me, that was fair enough.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
He managed to get out and has decided to share
his story. Thanks for joining me.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
George, Thank you, You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
What's led you to decide to share what you did
as a teenager?
Speaker 3 (01:59):
I suppose it'll be my book that I'm writing. I
feel like I need to get it out there, get
the story.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Because it was brutal and traumatic, what you were involved in,
what you saw. What Mark do you think it's left
on you?
Speaker 4 (02:13):
What Mark?
Speaker 3 (02:14):
I can't say it stays with you for a long time,
but it's been almost thirty years now, thirty years, that's
a long time. So for me, I have to think
about a little bit to remember how those times were.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
What was it about sunshine back in those days?
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Sunshine I'll tell you one thing that you can say
about the people of Sunshine that you can't help respect.
There's no victim mentality people. They grow up, they're poor,
their parents are working, their parents aren't home most of
the time. Nothing to eat maybe, but they don't complain
about it. They go out and do what they have
(02:51):
to do. And a lot of kids at that time,
and I think I remember the nineties was a recession
and parents were working two jobs at a time and
they couldn't be home all the time, so the kids
were on the street a lot.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
So where did you get to in terms of the
criminal empire that you created in Sunshine? Tell me at
the height of.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
What and't call it a criminal empire. I just grew
up in those streets and I just knew those people
that you mentioned, and we grew up together.
Speaker 4 (03:21):
That's all.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
So what was your business though?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
My business as a kid.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
A lot of the times when you're hanging around Charlie's
in Sunshine, they're a lot of the thieves and the
drug addicts. They come through and they sell you stolen goods.
That's most of the business that you did back then.
I'd go to the shops bring back something that's worth
one hundred dollars, give it to you for twenty or
even ten dollars, and you sell it for twenty thirty.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
How you made some money.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Because Charlie's was a pinball parlor in the main threat
of sunshine there, but it became a lot more than
just stolen goods. You found yourself going from that beginning
into drug dealing. How did that happen?
Speaker 3 (04:00):
It was, like I said, the stolen goods. Whatever little
crimes people did back then, it wasn't too bad. Maybe
people got into selling marijuana heroine. I'm going to leave
a lot of details for the book. I'll tell you that.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
How old were you when this started happening? And listen,
I appreciate you if you're writing a book, but I
think we need to sort of just touch on the
development of your life at that time and how you
found yourself. I mean, you're right at the center of it.
This was a dangerous place that were full of people
who were coming to buy drugs. There was some pretty
notorious characters.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
To the people on the outside, the notorious characters to
people like me, their friends and family, And to tell
the truth, I met a lot of good people a
lot of good people in Sancho.
Speaker 1 (04:43):
With quite a few people who were murdered over the
journey too.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yes, but if you think about it, when all that
stuff was happening, it was, what was it, two thousand
and two thousand and one. I was already out of
Sunshine at that time. See with me, It started when
I was twelve years old, So I was a teenager
through the nineties, and I just used to hang out
at sh at Charlie's. And by the time it got
(05:08):
really bad there I was, I was already out.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
But there was already some pretty bad things happening within
Sunshine at that time, and you saw a lot of
this there was.
Speaker 3 (05:16):
My first one was someone got murdered under the train station.
There used to be an underpass in the train station there,
and the guy got murdered, and the police came into
Charlie's and they took us all out, and they lined us.
Speaker 4 (05:29):
All up and got all our details.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
And I was very young at time, twelve years old,
and I can remember the police putting us up against
the wall and then making us sit down there for
at least an hour or so, taking all our details,
and eventually they let us go. But then I found
out it was because of murder. But at the time
they had a sitting there, I had no idea what
it was for. Then you found out on the news
after there was a murder.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
This began to establish a us and their mentality in
people in Sunshine. There was the police, then there was
you guys.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
Before you mentioned the King of Sunshine. Never have I
said those words out of my mouth to anybody. I'll
tell you how it started. The police used to come
past and they used to pick on us a little bit,
so they'll get out of the car and they'll push
us around. At one time, this cop comes out of
the car and he starts pushing me around, and he goes, look,
I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And if you
(06:22):
look in the back seat, there was a young lady there.
They were doing a ride along, and you could see
the surprise look on their face, thinking that's the King
of Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
It's a little boy, you know what I mean. And
that's how it started. It happened twice.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
So the first time he was pushing around, slopping around
a little bit. I didn't say not one word, didn't
say anything. And the second time he said look, look,
I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine. And I said
to him, mate, this is no way to treat your majesty.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
You know what I mean. You're gonna stop it, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
So that's how it came about because people heard him saying, look,
look I'm pushing around the King of Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
And that's how that started.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
But you were also highly connected. You were doing a
lot of business back in those days. You were a
connector between people who wanted to buy drugs and the
sources that you could get them from.
Speaker 4 (07:09):
Yes, yes I was. I was.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
We started moving a lot of marijuana and heroin when
I was about thirteen fourteen years old, very young. I
didn't even know really what it was, and we pretty
much started making a lot of money, a lot real quick.
And as a young kid, when you've got a lot
of money and you're very young, you know you don't
(07:32):
know what to do with it, and there's not much
you can do with it but spend it.
Speaker 4 (07:37):
So you learn how to spend money.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Because you must laugh now when you hear people talking about, oh,
criminals are getting younger and younger. Now, this has always
been the case back in your day. If he was
still at school.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Always, It's always been like that, even before that, even
the eighties, because I used to hang around Tom's. There
was another place around the corner there that was my
Auntie's place, and we started hanging around there when we're
about seven eight years old.
Speaker 4 (08:01):
And you'd see the older kids.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
To us though older kids, but that was they were
young still thirteen, fourteen, fifteen years old, but to us
they looked old. But they were selling drugs at the
time too. And this was the eighties, because what sort
of money were talking about.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Here was a thirteen year old boy. Suddenly you've got
fist full of cash. Yeah, I couldn't really tell you
how much money, but it was a lot of money
for a thirteen year old. It was.
Speaker 4 (08:26):
There was a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Because people I've talked to from your background in Sunshine
all those years ago, people like Andrew ven Yum and
Johnny Orcello, those sort of people, they talked about money
and power being the motivator. Is the aphrodisiacs, Yes, that's true.
What role of that playing your life?
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Well, the money and it does come with power to
the point where you can get anything done for a
little bit of money, and that's where the power comes in.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Were you ever afraid.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
I probably was too stupid to be afraid. Kids at
that age are so dumb they don't know anything.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
And you were building up a distribution network. You've made
a life answers with other individuals from the Vietnamese community
out there, that's right. And you were witnessing the struggle
for the corners in Sunshine where people were selling drugs.
Tell us a bit about that.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Well, when it gets to the time when a lot
of drug addicts are coming into one area, the other
drug dealers can see that a lot of money is
coming in, so they want it. And when they come in,
you have to do something about it or walk away.
So we did something about it. What sort of things
would happen, Well, would push them out of the area,
(09:44):
to say so, it would beat them up, and you
know things like that.
Speaker 1 (09:50):
There were some pretty big confrontations. And understand that because
when you talk about money and power, when you have money,
you have the power to get people to do things
for you. And so some of these fights would have
been set up around bringing in heavier individuals, older guys
to come fight for you.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yes, we did have a lot of people see, there
was our group in Sunshine and there was a group
in Suncho On West, and that's the people you're talking about.
And a few times they came and helped us out,
you know, with some fights. And when there was a
lot of numbers on their side, we called in other
people and Sunshine West they had the numbers. There was
(10:27):
a lot of people in sun John.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
West and there were some very heavy guys that were
useful in terms of your business. And you've been beaten up,
you'd been kicked off your corners.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
I have, I have.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
What's that like?
Speaker 4 (10:40):
It's not a good feeling, but you get used to it.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
To tell the truth, you know, after you've been beaten
up a few times, it's not that bad, you know
what I mean. I remember my friend James. I used
to tell him, you know, you have to fight. He
never fought this guy. Every time there was a fight,
he would run away. I said to him, look doesn't
matter if you get beaten up, the pain goes away.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
It's not that bad.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
I remember one time he got caught chroming in his
room and his dad beating him up really bad. And
we'll have a nightclub that night. And he came out
and his face it was rearranged. He looked like a
different person. And he goes to me, George, I know
now what you mean. It's not that bad. And I'm
looking at him, like, are you you're kidding? That was
(11:24):
so bad. I've never had a beating that bad. He
goes to me, George, I know now, I'm not scared
of getting.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
A beating, because the reality in Sunshine in those years
was that if you got beaten up, if you got
kicked off your corner, if you didn't back up, you
were weak and you were finished.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
With one hundred percent must one hundred percent. I would
actually challenge anybody to find one person that I have
wronged who hasn't wronged me.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
You're a different person back then, I can tell. I
can see your heart's changed completely. And I've seen this
before a person.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
If I said more than ten words a day, I
spoke too much. I would hardly say a word for
about ten about twenty years of my life, I wouldn't
say a word.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Why was that?
Speaker 4 (12:07):
I don't know. I couldn't tell you. Was I angry?
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
But you were dealing with the trauma and stress of
what you were involved in and the uncertainty of with
the turmoil that must have been in your life because
you're a kid. You're thirteen and fourteen now yeah, yeah, But.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
To tell you the truth, my dream when I was
a kid to die fighting. If I died fighting beside
my brothers, that would have been the best day of
my life.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I'm not even joking. That was my dream.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
And actually I had a couple of times it could
have happened. So one time we ad a party in Albion.
At the party were making too much noise, too much
of a racket. So the person whose party it was,
he said, look, we got to go for a walk
because we're making too much noise.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
They're going to call the cops on us.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
So we go for a walker, went across the train
tracks there at Albion and there was another party. Someone
else was having a party, and there was this lady
at the front and one of my friends it goes,
can we come to the party, and she goes no, no, no,
go away, go away, trust me, go away, And my
friend kept in saysing no, we're going to want to
come into the party, and she goes no, don't, don't.
And about five or six bikers. They looked like bikers,
(13:17):
you know, came out with machetes, and I wanted to
run away too, But everybody ran away except my brother Peter.
The first person who made the trouble. They were chopping
in with the machetes and my brother Peter jumped on
him and he started coppying the machetes to the head
(13:38):
and I wanted to run away, but I saw that happening,
so I ran towards it.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
And let me tell you the feeling that I had.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Let's just say, you go home one day and you
find your house is full of money, full of gold,
full of diamonds. How would you feel excited, A bit
of fear. That's how I felt. And if it happened,
it happened. But it didn't happen. I ended up jumping
(14:06):
on one of the guys and he started swinging me around.
And at the time, I was probably about fourteen years old.
And as he's swinging me around, I'm hitting the other guys.
So I'm knocking out three or four people at a
time while he's swinging me around. Believe it or not,
they called the cops on us.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
These people.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
The police ended up coming to the house where we
at this party, pushes around a bit, hit a couple
of people with their torches and ended up arresting me
because they said I was the one who caused all
the trouble. And I believe that was the first time
I spent overnight till my parents came in the morning.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
Because that was a feature of the guys in Sunshine
and Sunshine West that they had done very little jail,
They'd done very little time in police custody. They came
to notice in the Gangland War as fully formed criminals,
and most of the hierarchy and town had ever heard
of them. So what was happening with the police out
(15:04):
in Sunshine back in those days? Were they a part
of the corruption or were they just not good at
their jobs?
Speaker 3 (15:09):
No, no, I wouldn't say they were part of the corruption.
There was a few people, I'm sure part of the corruption,
but not that I know of. But we were underage.
We're very young. So if you think about it, let's
just say one of us gets caught shoplifting. You know
what you got back then a five year good behavior bond,
and a five year good behavior bond means nothing. You
(15:31):
know what you get the next time the next day
you get caught shoplifted again. The next day it's another
five year good behavior bond. The one before didn't matter.
And also concurrently, so exactly so what was the first
one for? And then you found out, well, nothing's happening.
You can get away with anything underage. I shouldn't be
saying that's true.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
It's happening again today. I'm we're seeing young criminals here
in the streets of Melbourne who are getting bail on bail,
on bail, they're going to youth Justice, they're not going
to jail. And they're thinking, well, this is a lark,
but this is not new you're saying it was back then.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
It was.
Speaker 1 (16:06):
It was because by the time people like Andrew Venyuman
got uptown, he'd already been involved in violence, assaults, murders
even I mean, he'd been involved, for instance, in the
murder of Dino Dibrah in two thousand, he'd probably been
involved in the murder of Paul Calipalitis in two thousand
and two, and nothing had happened. And so when he
(16:28):
comes uptown with carl Williams, he was a different breed
and the guys in Carlton could not believe how willing,
how much dash the guys in Sunshine had, there were
complete revelation. Can you understand that?
Speaker 3 (16:42):
I understand that, bully. Why, I know exactly the type.
If sunhohe West came through your area and maybe they
hang out their little bit no chroming or something, you
could do nothing or you'll be able to do his
smile and let them do whatever they want to do.
Sunhohn West, you didn't mess with back then.
Speaker 4 (17:03):
It was that simple.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
And they all died.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
No, there's a lot of them still around still. Yeah,
what's happened to them? Productive members of society, believe it
or not. A lot of the people, Yeah, smart people,
smart guys. They weren't stupid even back then. They were
just street kids.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
I suppose, well, yeah, because I mean you were a
good student, yeah, but you couldn't see any future in
staying in school. You were making too much money down
at Charlie's and on your corners selling drugs. So, and
you had ambitions you wanted to be You're interested in
ancient Greek history, and you wanted to write and a lot
sort of stuff. But you saw your future on the
streets at that time.
Speaker 3 (17:42):
Yeah, I actually wanted to be a soldier back when
I was a teenager, you know, Navy seal something like that.
But yeah, that wasn't going to happen. I loved football,
AFL football when I was a young kid, that was
my thing. So through my young probably to say from
six years old to about twelve years old, AFL was
(18:03):
everything to me.
Speaker 4 (18:04):
Oh I was sports. It doesn't matter what sport it was.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
I had to play sports that day, you know what
I mean my primary school times and if you talk
to anyone through my primary school, it doesn't matter what
sport it was.
Speaker 4 (18:15):
I was good at it, every sport and I had
to play sport. You know.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
We used to have like an Olympic day that was
the best day of the year for me. We used
to go to it was called Albefeldi Park and it
was like an Olympics high jump, long jump, hundred meters,
really everything you can think of. And that to me
was like if you were junkie and you had as
(18:41):
unlimited drugs.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
That's how it felt.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
So that's how it felt to me, you know what
I mean, A natural high, natural high for sports. I
was crazy about sports. But I suppose you get over it.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
Well, other things came up and this opportunity and then
you could see, I mean, you're also quite a commercially
oriented young man, and you could see at a ridiculously
young age that you could apply the demand. And obviously
heroin was booming in Melbourne across Australia ACTA at that
time as well. You could see an opportunity that took
you right away from that righteous path of sports and study.
(19:17):
Wanted to be a soldier, and boy, what a dark
place you ended up.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Yeah, but even during those times, I knew this isn't
the path. I knew I got to get out. I
knew I had to think of something, I had to
do something else. I knew this, But until I was
about eighteen nineteen, I was still involved.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
It is difficult to get out. And I know from
the Sunshine Crew that I knew that where there was
a little bit of doubt about you, there was no doubt.
And one thing they really looked down upon was people
who were snitches on pain of death, and that's really
that caused several of the murders. So how difficult was
(19:59):
it to get out knowing that your associates would be saying, hey,
George's out but is he going to snitch on us now?
Speaker 3 (20:05):
No, they knew me, They knew me, they knew the
type of person I was, and they knew they would
not happen. One time we had a fight at a
footscrape McDonald's and the police ended up coming during the
fight and they arrested me and about to put me
in the back of the police divvy van and I
started running, and as I was running, a few of
(20:29):
the Sunshine boys stole the things in the police car.
Believe it or not, I ran so they could they still.
I believe it was a mobile phone and a few
other things. But the sergeant then at the time, he
wanted his mobile phone back, so he used to come
to my house, take me to the police station and
slap me around a bit until I gave him the name.
(20:52):
And I wouldn't do it. So for three months, whenever
they found me, they took me to the police station,
slapped me around a bit, and let me go. The
last time it happened, I said, guys, this is going
to happen forever. I don't know who took the mobile phone.
Of course I knew who took it, but I said
to him, I don't know who took it. You're not
going to get a name from me. It's that simple,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Because what would have happened to you had you given
that name.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Well, I couldn't tell you. I couldn't tell you the person.
Nothing good, nothing good, of course. But the person who
actually took it wasn't even a friend of mine. He
was my good friend's cousin, you know. But I knew that,
and I could have easily just given the name. Easy,
they will stop harassing me. And in this time I
couldn't do anything, and I stayed over friend's houses. But
(21:35):
in this three months they only got me about five
six times because I stayed at friend's houses. But I
could have easily just given the name. How many people
would have done it, you know what I mean? Easy.
I didn't even care for the guy, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
But also the reality was that police knew that you
were a tall poppy, a young tall poppy. But they
could also let people know that you were a snitch, yes,
and destroying you.
Speaker 4 (22:03):
Yeah, that's what they do.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
The times when you're in the police station and they
got you for some crime, the person in the other room,
they'll tell them that person in the other room is talking.
Speaker 4 (22:15):
He's told us everything.
Speaker 3 (22:16):
You might as well just tell us he's told us,
and a lot of people fall for it, you know
what I mean. Plus, when you're young, you don't know
any better, but I knew better, you know what I mean.
And when you don't say anything, you walk. It's that simple.
When a police officer says to you, make it easy
on yourself, he means make it easy on himself, you
know what I mean. That's what he means. If they're
(22:38):
there talking to you and they're trying to get something,
they've got nothing. So if you keep your mouth shut,
you'll walk. It's that simple.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Yes, you're right, George. There's not much they can do
unless people are giving evidence against you. And you were
quite a big operation by this time, but you were
flying below the radar. All of a sudden that changes
because some of your workers decide to give you up.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
What happened, Yeah, so a few workers bus, they've got raiders,
five of them, and they also got a few clients
at the same time, three, so it was eight people altogether,
and seven of those eight gave witness statements and they
picked me up on the back.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
Of that and what did they say?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
We know everything, we know what you're running, we know
what you're doing, we know it all.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
And you've been doing this now for three or four
years at this point, at that point, about five years,
five years. You were sixteen at.
Speaker 4 (23:32):
This time, yeah, sixteen, about seventeen.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
Ye staggering, isn't it that you were that young and
you've been doing it for five years and the police
hadn't managed to nail you. But so what did your
so called faithful workers say about you?
Speaker 4 (23:45):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (23:45):
The faithful workers are you know a lot of them.
They were all talked tough before this happened. If you
talk to them, oh, don't worry about the belize, don't
the police. And the one who never talks, he's quiet,
he doesn't act tough, nothing. He's the one that didn't
say anything. It's amazing.
Speaker 4 (24:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
The four that talked tough all talked, but the one
who never talks didn't talk at that point.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And so they come to you. Where were you when
they when the police descended?
Speaker 4 (24:12):
Believe I was in Sunshine.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Just another business day the day for me.
Speaker 4 (24:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
They came and arrested me from there and took me
to Sunshine Police, which was the old police station at
that time, and they took turns slipping around a bit,
beating me up a bit to get something out of me.
And they did it one at a time, so only
one police officer was in the room. And when my
barrister came, when I was talking to him, he said,
(24:38):
I think I had a mark, but it wasn't from
police hitting me or anything. And he said, did they
did the police beat you up? And I said yeah,
like this was normal because that happened all the time.
It's no big deal. If you're in the boxing ring,
you get hit a few times, you can't complain And
I said yeah. He goes, oh, which ones? And the
names were on the paper in front of him, and
I tapped the paper, said this, and he ended up
(25:01):
rolling with that and ended up taking those officers to court.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
And what happened about that without me telling him to
do that.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
So the day we went to court and I saw
those three there, I said, what are they doing here?
He said, you're going to testify against them? I said
I'm not doing that. He said, yeah, but they beat
you up. We're going to try and get your charges
dropped and all this stuff. I said, yeah, I'm not
going to testify against them, and I left it at that,
(25:30):
and they left.
Speaker 4 (25:32):
They heard obviously I wasn't going to go forward with it.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
And we got a charge of community service two hundred
and fifty hours and we're happy with it.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
And what were you charged with?
Speaker 4 (25:42):
Heroin trafficking? Organized crime?
Speaker 3 (25:44):
It was like something about running an organized crime syndicate
and things like that, just crazy charges, but they ended
up it was like ten charges or more. But then
they just went down to a few of them which
was just drug trafficking and things like that.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
So it's gone from like pretty serious down to fairly mind.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
I will tell me twenty years. You're going to get
twenty they're telling me. I didn't believe that straight up.
First of all, I'm sixteen, seventeen years old. I knew
that wasn't gonna happen. I ended up just getting two
hundred and fifty hours of community serving, which was good
for me actually at the time. Come work into the work.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
What did you have to do?
Speaker 4 (26:20):
At science works?
Speaker 3 (26:21):
There was this guy who collects the dead bodies who
jumped from the West Gate Bridge and he collects them
and the people.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
That had jumped off the bridge and committed suicide. Okay.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
He says that people around that area they get like
eight bodies a week. And I couldn't believe it because
you don't hear about on the news.
Speaker 4 (26:37):
Nothing.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
And he opened up the drainage hatch and he said,
this is where we're going to get the bodies from.
I've never taken up, but I saw them do it
one time. But removing bodies from where was this Science Works?
This is just near the West Gate Bridge. There they
were storing the bodies that people had committed suicide. No, no,
they washed up in their drainage system. And there was
this big hatch at the back of Science Works and
(27:01):
you go down a ladder. It's like a sewage system,
and that's sometimes the bodies get caught up there.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
And what was your job in relation to that?
Speaker 4 (27:08):
I was supposed to help him pull them out?
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Goodness me.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Yeah, but we're also also doing landscaping around the front
of the place and back of the place. And he said,
if there's a dead body, you've got to come and
help me. It's a bit of gardening, bit of body retrieval. Yeah,
two and fifty hours. I mean it's remarkable because I
mean most ordinary people would say, ah, you should have
given evidence against the police. But I know in Sunshine
at that time, you didn't give evidence against anybody, be
(27:34):
it your friends or the police, because you always had
to go back to Sunshine.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
Exactly, and you have to live with yourself. It's that simple.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
But giving evidence against the police wouldn't bother me that much.
I just couldn't do it. I just didn't feel it
was right. They beat me up a bit so wide,
you know what I mean, that's how it's meant to be.
But what I hated the worst about this cop that
I took the court. Three months later, he arrested a
friend of mine right in front of me, and as
he's got him in handcuffs taking him to the car,
he says, he yells out to me, thanks for your help, George.
(28:03):
Are you just trying to get me killed?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Yeah? That was a common tactic, wasn't it, to say
that you've been.
Speaker 3 (28:07):
Helped, because obviously something's gone wrong with his career, he
can't get promoted, or something's happened because there was a
someone's complaint against him, So he's held a grudge, this guy.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
And in those years, you had a lot to lose
you had built up this empire. You work all the
King of Sunshine, however reluctantly you were His Majesty, if
you like. So to see that wrenched away from you
and your reputation destroyed was a powerful incentive to stay staunch.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
Yes, but I knew I had to get out one day,
sooner or later. I knew I had to get out.
So I knew it was going to end. I just
didn't know how it was going to end.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
Well. For a lot of those guys out there, or
a number of them, it ended up in the mortuary.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
It did.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
It did, And you had that experience when I went
out there the first time, I saw how many houses
in that area had roller shutters. They're like little fortresses.
People feared retribution for various things, and I number one
crook there told me that you could fear the police,
but you had more to fear from your mates.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
Yeah. Yeah, I suppose.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
You had a couple of instances where people tried to
take your life.
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Yes, robberies. There was a lot of standover men at
those times. We were little kids were easy targets, you
know what I mean. Your pockets are full of money,
easy targets, So standover men in the nineties was a
normal thing and most of the things would do that
people would look at that it's very bad. Was beating
(29:38):
up a standover men, you know what I mean? And
people would say, sometimes we'll go a bit too far.
And that's why people thought you were so bad, because
you're beating up all these people. But they actually tried
to rob you. So to me, the rules are gone
to me, I can do whatever I want after that.
You tried to rob me. You put a blood field
to ringe to my eye, you put a knife to
(29:59):
my throat, you put a gun to my head.
Speaker 4 (30:01):
There's no rules for me after that. You're lucky if
I let you live. To tell you the truth. That's
how angry I get. I used to get back then
I can.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
See how painful this is. The memories are difficult because
it was Yeah, it does come back, and I'm sure
one moment does come back. When you were at home
there and there's a drive by on your house.
Speaker 4 (30:20):
That's right. Yeah, what happened to your story? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Funny.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
Yeah, I actually heard something in the front yard and
I went to look out the window, and I thought
it was my brother pushing me down.
Speaker 4 (30:35):
But it wasn't. No one was there.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
My brother was laying down sleeping, and I was about
to look exactly where that bullet was, exactly right between
the eyes, but something pushed me down. Believe it or not,
it's so weird.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
So the shot passed through the front of your house
and over your head where you'd just been.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
Just been, and I was about to look. I was
about to move the curtain and look in that exact
spot that bullet went, but I felt a hand on
my back push me. I really don't care people believe
that or not, but that's that's what I felt like,
you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
You had a guardian angel. Maybe maybe that could also
be interpreted as a sign that it was time to
get out. Did you get out?
Speaker 4 (31:23):
Yes? I did. I did get out. Was not at
that time?
Speaker 1 (31:26):
It took a bit longer.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
Yeah, well you can't do that and get away with it. Yeah,
something has to happen, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
So what happened?
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Well, I didn't murder it. I've never murdered anybody, you
know what I mean. Even if you have, no one's
going to say, yeah you have. But I used to
get pretty angry if somebody because I'll tell you this,
I will never wrong you. Never will I ever wrong anybody.
But if you wrong me, then I'm going to do something.
(31:56):
I looked at it like this, If you just say
chop my finger off, I will chop your hands off
and your feet off. And to me, that was fair enough,
and I would think with most people would be fair
enough because I will never wrong you leave me alone,
you know it, won't even know I exist?
Speaker 4 (32:13):
Is that simple?
Speaker 1 (32:15):
Because that was the law of the streets in Sunshine.
I heard stories, for instance, about if there were debtsode
or things had been done to people's family and so forth,
and you could find people who could do these things
for you. For the amount of money that you would pay,
you could get these jobs done. And Andrew Venuman was
very experienced at this, shooting people in the buttocks, bashing people,
(32:36):
and more or less acting like a little local police
force if you like.
Speaker 3 (32:39):
Yes, I suppose I've never actually hired him to do
a job like that, but I'm sure people have.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yeah. But like I said, he and people like Debrah
were regarded as just next level. They had dashed that
people did not see, and when they came down, when
they began to knock off the cart and crew. The
cart and Crew were rich crooks, they were comfortable, they
were knitted into the fabric of Melbourne. But these renegades,
(33:06):
these guys from the streets of Sunshine, who did not
give a shit and they were prepared to do what
others were. And that's why Carl Williams made his relationship
with Dino Dibborh and then with their new venumin because
that experience you had anothers on the streets of Sunshine
was next level.
Speaker 4 (33:25):
They were.
Speaker 3 (33:25):
They were, But to tell the truth, there was a
lot of people like them, but you just don't hear
about them. The actual worst people, the biggest criminals. You'll
never hear about him.
Speaker 4 (33:35):
Never.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
No one will ever hear about him. It's that simple.
And did you hear that Carl Williams just to hang
out in Sunshine? Remember that link I sent you? Yes,
Carl Williams. See people believe anything they hear. Yeah, it's amazing.
So apparently he grew up in Sunshine, hang out at
Charlie's through the nineties and I've never met the man.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
No.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
I was there every day through the nineties and I've
never met the man. But people believe he was from Sunshine.
People will believe stories.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
I mean, he grew up in broad Meadows and a
very different situation to Sunshine completely. And he was not
a tough guy. He did not run with street gangs.
He was a businessman who needed people like Andrew Venyuman
and Debra to do his dirty work for him. Even Underbelly,
which portrayed him shooting Mark Moran, that's absolute rubbish.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Oh yeah, you've met Carl Yeah, and new.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Car back in the day. Of course, you know, during
that period when he was still with Benji and running
hot on the streets. And I spoke to him the
Saturday before he was murdered. And even then it was
his mate that murdered him, Matthew Johnson in jail there.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
I was a friend of his.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
He was a friend of his. He was He said
to me, there's issues about the media knowing that the
state was going to pay for my father's tax bill
if I would cooperate and things like that, and that
was going to come out, and that was the reason
he was murdered. But he was killed again by his friend.
But he was never a tough gun. He was never
in Sunshine. So let's put that on the record right now.
Speaker 4 (35:00):
Yeah, he I can say that for sure.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, yeah, you would have known him if he was
out there, he'd been a arrival to you or.
Speaker 4 (35:06):
A friend or a friend if you grew up there.
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yeah, and if he were smart, you'd be his friend.
By the sounds, it was the whole area was going
to fall to death and mayhem. It looked that way,
and you could see the future. Yeah, how did you
go about changing your life? Changing your heart? You know?
Speaker 3 (35:24):
Two thousand and one, you know, there was a big
drought in Melbourne and a lot of people stopped then.
I believe it lasted for over a year, two years,
so most people stopped using. Most people it was like
the lockdown, how the lockdown was, and people just stopped
using heroin drought exactly, And that's how it was. Then
(35:46):
there was a heroin drought and people just stopped using
and stopped dealing.
Speaker 1 (35:51):
Ruined your business.
Speaker 4 (35:53):
Not that I cared, I didn't care. I think it
happened for a reason.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Is what was going to happen to you? George?
Speaker 3 (36:02):
I couldn't tell you, And at that time I couldn't
care less. That's how stupid kids are. Yeah, I couldn't
care less.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
How do you end up putting a new value on
your life and seeing a future because that's what you did.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Good people, good people around you. If you always have
good people around you, you'll do well. It's that simple.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
But you gave up money and power, position opportunities. You
could have been one of those big swinging crooks.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
They used to say that would I will be a
lot of the Vietnamese, a lot of people in the area.
They're going to say this guy, he's going to run
Melbourne one day. And I used to think in my head, no,
I'm not. I can't wait to get out of this shit,
you know. But like I said, yeah, good people, and
I think it all happened for a reason. So I
feel like I got to write this book and I
want to start my charity. I want to stop kids
(36:55):
from going down this.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Road because there are a lot of children now. Children.
It's hard to believe you can get people who are
doing these aggravated burglaries, seriously violent assaults and so forth.
There's still children. But you've been in that place. How
do you think Melbourne and Australia should address the issue
of youth crime.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
Stop pointing the finger that's for sure. That's for the
first thing, society points the finger in the direction of children.
Imagine this, the eels of society. We point our finger
at twelve year olds. Doesn't make sense. How do we
get beyond that? Well, first of all, we can't blame them.
We can't blame children for the eels of society. It's
(37:36):
that simple.
Speaker 1 (37:37):
Because you were merely supplying a demand for.
Speaker 3 (37:40):
Drugs exactly exactly so where we were at the time,
they would come to you and they would ask you
for certain things, and you think, why you're here, you
might as well supply that demand.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
And that's how it started.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
What would have made a difference in your life at
that stage, if.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Anything, sports Stay playing sports and stay at school. That
would make a difference. Stay off the street. And you know,
I've got some really good friends that I grew up
with from the street. And because I was about to say,
don't hang out with these certain type of people from
the street, but the best people I've ever met were
(38:18):
from the street. You know what I mean, Maybe one
day you'll meet them and you'll see these people, unbelievable people.
Speaker 1 (38:25):
You know, it's like that old Bob dylanline. He said,
if you're going to be an outlaw, you have to
be honest.
Speaker 3 (38:29):
At least I used to think, at least be honorable.
If you're going to do it, do it honorably. You
know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (38:35):
How's your life now?
Speaker 3 (38:37):
I've got no money, I'm a nobody and I've never
been happier.
Speaker 4 (38:43):
That's simple. What does the future hold anything? Anything? I want?
Speaker 1 (38:50):
Not money and power anymore.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
I can care less for money, so money's gone. I
can care less if I make money.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
Because this is a problem for not just criminals, but
everyone in society. Everyone's interested in money and power and materialism.
But you've got to a different level in your life
where you can be grateful.
Speaker 4 (39:11):
Doesn't everybody get there?
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Not everyone, afraid, not everyone, A lot of people, don't
you know. But I think in your life you've got
the love of a very loyal woman who's helped you
to get beyond what you used to be. That's right, yeah,
and that was a big help. I think you better
thank you while you're here. Don't you think you'd have
to name her? But what difference did your partner make
(39:34):
in your life?
Speaker 3 (39:35):
She knows words from your mouth means nothing, words that
mean anything, So.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
What advice would you give parents who've got young children
who are headed down the road.
Speaker 4 (39:46):
Don't judge.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Don't think that your kid is the worst kid out there,
because I always considered the worst kid to tell the truth. Parents, teachers, police,
social workers, religious figures. They would say I was the
worst kid at school. The teacher would say, keep it up,
and you end up in George's gang.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
You know what I mean? You think maybe I am.
Speaker 3 (40:10):
You know, people keep saying that, You keep thinking that,
you know, so don't judge, don't be too hard because
people can change, you know what I mean. A teenager
going through crime or whatever they're going through, they can
get out of it. Believe me, a lot worse people
than me have got out of it, and they're really
good people.
Speaker 4 (40:31):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Well, you're giving yourself another chance, and I'm fascinated to
see where you go with telling your own story and
carving in your future. Thank you so much for sharing
your story. I think you're a brave man full of
courage to do that, and I look forward to hearing
more about it soon.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
That was George Zionist. They used to call him the
King of Sunshine, but now He's the king of his
own life, king of his own future. And I think
this is a really important message to family out there.
Don't give up on your kids. Keep working hard. They
can have a future and you've just got to have
a bit of faith in it. This has been real
crime with Adam Shann. Thank you for listening. If you'd
like to get in touch with me with stories and ideas,
(41:12):
please email me at Adam shandwriter at gmail dot com.
If you've got some information that you need to share
with the police, do it at crime Stoppers one at
one hundred, triple three, triple zero. Thanks for listening.
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