Brandon Cole pleaded guilty in 2024 and was sentenced to 22 years’ imprisonment. His father – also a business partner, who was initially thought by investigators to have a larger role in the import but was later found to have been “wilfully blind” – was sentenced in May to home detention.
The remaining three defendants appeared for sentencing last week in the High Court at Auckland. Each of the men also claimed wilful blindness rather than an active role in the plot.
Wesley Wykeham Whaits appears in the High Court at Auckland for sentencing after admitting his role in a 451kg meth import that was spearheaded by long-time family friend Brandon Cole, a Hells Angels member. Photo / Annaleise Shortland
“You said you trusted Mr [Brandon] Cole and did not want to believe he would put your business and family in jeopardy,” Justice Greg Blanchard told Whaits, whose business premises were used as a brief waypoint for the illicit shipment before it was shipped to a North Shore warehouse leased by the ringleader’s father.
But wilful blindness does not excuse such behaviour, the judge said.
“You turning a blind eye … allowed for significant social harm,” he explained.
Secret room, $2.4m cash
Police launched Operation Sampson following a tip from the Australian Border Force in August 2021 that a 556kg shipment of methamphetamine was discovered hidden inside a large “rotary separator” airfreighted to Australia from the Philippines.
A search of New Zealand import records showed a nearly identical shipment had already arrived.
Hells Angels member Brandon St John Cole has pleaded guilty to multiple charges involving drug trafficking and money laundering. He was arrested after a year-long investigation dubbed Operation Samson.
Although the investigation was too late to catch anyone red-handed, the circumstantial evidence investigators uncovered was strong.
They confiscated $2.4m in cash that had been stuffed into a West Auckland storage unit and discovered a false wall at the Silverdale warehouse that both Coles had claimed was for their tyre business. Behind the false wall were about 20 plastic bags testing positive for meth residue, each marked with a number.
Police knew from the seized Australian import that the drugs had been shipped in individually numbered bags containing 1kg of meth each. The highest number among the remaining Silverdale bags was 451, hence the 451kg figure that Brandon Cole later acknowledged as part of his guilty plea.
Forensic accounting also uncovered that the younger Cole had paid nearly $32,000 cash for a 2020 model Harley-Davidson Softail Low Rider motorbike in September 2021, and paid $50,000 in rolled-up bills for an SUV with plates he changed to read OGBOSS.
More than $2.4 million in cash, firearms and drugs were seized as part of Operation Samson.
It was during that forensic investigation that the Fritz family, including 52-year-old Maureen Fritz, came under the spotlight. Charges against Maureen Fritz were later dropped.
Businessmen duped
The Fritzes and the Coles knew each other through their legitimate businesses, which shared office space in Penrose, court documents state.
The Fritzes operated Security Force New Zealand, which provided security guard services to private businesses, while the Coles operated two vehicle-related businesses: Zoo Performances Ltd and Rogue Customs.
Over the course of 13 months in 2021 and 2022, the Fritzes and their company deposited more than $810,000 into bank accounts associated with the Coles and their companies.
Defence lawyer Philip Hamlin, representing the elder Fritz, emphasised that the father and son had not made any profit off the money laundering scheme.
Many of their security company employees preferred to be paid in cash, and they turned to Brandon Cole for help when they had trouble accessing cash over the Covid-19 pandemic, he said.
Auckland resident Michael Fritz, aided by his business partner son, helped to launder more than $800,000 for Hells Angels gang member Brandon Cole.
The money they put into the Cole family accounts, without any efforts to disguise the payments, was in their minds the legitimate repayment for cash loans the fellow businessman and friend had fronted them, the defence suggested.
“They knew he was a Hells Angel but had no idea he was involved in any drug dealing,” Hamlin said, acknowledging that the duo was reckless because “they didn’t query where it came from”.
The irony, Hamlin argued, is that the Fritzes thought Brandon Cole was doing them a favour when in actuality the “hard-working family” was being manipulated to significantly benefit the gang member.
“They’re otherwise honest and reliable people who got caught up in this drug web,” he said.
The pair faced up to seven years’ imprisonment for one count each of money laundering. The judge ordered a starting point of three-and-a-half years for both men, noting that the scheme was reasonably sophisticated and lengthy.
Marciano Fritz has been sentenced alongside his father for helping to launder more than $800,000 for a record-setting methamphetamine importation plot spearheaded by Hells Angels gang member Brandon Cole.
They both received 35% in reductions for their guilty pleas and prior good character. Marciano Fritz received an additional 10% reduction for youth, having been between the ages of 20 and 21 at the time of offending.
The combined reductions for the younger Fritz were enough to reduce the sentence below two years, the point at which a judge can consider a non-custodial alternative. Justice Blanchard ordered him to instead serve 12 months’ home detention.
Michael Fritz’s discounts, however, were not enough to qualify. He was sentenced to two years and three months’ imprisonment.
Family friend ‘shocked’
Whaits also qualified, just barely, for home detention.
He had faced up to 10 years’ imprisonment for permitting his premises to be used for drug trafficking.
Court documents state he allowed Brandon Cole to use the Customs code for his business, Steel Fabrication Solutions, to ship the rotary separator into New Zealand. The Te Atatū South business was also listed as the delivery address.
Justice Greg Blanchard, at the joint sentencing hearing in the High Court at Auckland for Marciano Fritz, Michael Fritz and Wesley Whaits. Photo / Annaleise Shortland
Whaits was the last person to be convicted for the scheme. He pleaded guilty earlier this year, partway through his High Court trial. The agreed facts note he was “unaware of the specific details of Mr B. Cole’s intentions, including the quantity of controlled drugs or the size of the operation”.
When a forklift was needed to place the shipment at his business, Whaits was “shocked”, court documents state.
“He realised for the first time the extent of what he had involved himself in,” the agreed summary of facts continues.
Although the younger Cole had argued at his own sentencing two years ago that there was no proof he had used the Hells Angels to distribute the drugs, the final agreed summary of facts for the case made it clear that authorities consider it an inescapable inference that the gang was involved.
Whaits’ agreed facts also go well beyond the elder Cole’s claim that he was “wilfully blind”.
“Mr B. Cole used his connections within the HAMC [Hells Angels Motorcycle Club] and their supply networks to assist with distributing the entirety of the methamphetamine within the community,” the document states.
“The sale of the methamphetamine generated a significant amount of cash for Mr M. Cole and Mr B. Cole, and they acquired multiple cash assets including high-value vehicles with the proceeds in the months following their offending.”
Auckland resident Michael Mcgreggor Cole has been sentenced to home detention for his “wilful blindness” as his Hells Angels member son, Brandon Cole, imported a record haul of methamphetamine into New Zealand.
Defence lawyer Emma Priest noted that Whaits, like the Fritzes, did not receive a profit from his involvement.
He was an extended family friend of the Coles who knew the younger Cole from before he joined the motorcycle gang.
Home detention, she said, would allow her client to continue running his business and supporting his nine employees.
Crown prosecutor Conrad Purdon did not disagree that home detention was a possibility for Whaits. But he suggested the defendant’s offending was slightly more serious than that of Brandon Cole’s father.
He allowed his forklift to be used to offload the drugs even after his “shock” at seeing the size of the shipment, Purdon said.
The judge ordered a three-year starting point but allowed 35% in discounts for his guilty plea, previous good character and remorse that included a $5000 donation to the Salvation Army. The resulting 23-month sentence was converted to 12 months’ home detention.
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.
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