An outlaw motorbike gang police say puts “profits ahead of public safety” has been targeted by Australian and New Zealand authorities in a bid to undermine its criminal control.<\/p>\n
The Lone Wolf Outlaw Motorcycle Gang has been assessed as posing a “very high threat” in organised crime in Australia.<\/p>\n
Police say this is driven by its alleged involvement in illicit drug importation and trafficking, money laundering and violence.<\/p>\n
A national day of action by a specialised task force on Thursday ended in 20 arrests and 69 charges laid.<\/p>\n
Across Australia and New Zealand, Taskforce Morpheus conducted 18 search warrants, 10 firearms compliance checks and seized cocaine, MDMA, illicit tobacco and vapes.<\/p>\n
The task force brings together all Australian state and territory police and Commonwealth law enforcement agencies.<\/p>\n
Queensland detective superintendent Troy Pukallus said Lone Wolf used violence, intimidation and organised offending for financial gain.<\/p>\n
“They have no regard for the impact their actions have on the safety and wellbeing of the community,” he said.<\/p>\n
Detective superintendent Pukallus said police were sending a clear message that no matter how well-connected criminal gangs believe they are, authorities are committed to identifying, disrupting and dismantling organised crime networks.<\/p>\n
Australian border force commander Graeme Campbell said the illicit tobacco trade was a significant source of revenue for organised crime groups.<\/p>\n
“With proven links between OMCG’s (Outlaw Motorcycle Gang’s) and illicit tobacco retail premises across Australia, profits are used to fund other serious criminal activity,” he said.<\/p>\n
Campbell said authorities would continue to target groups that “exploit legitimate businesses”, including tobacco shops, to “conceal and facilitate organised criminal activity”.<\/p>\n
NSW police force raptor squad commander, detective acting superintendent Brad Abdy said outlaw motorcycle gangs should expect to be targeted “wherever they operate”.<\/p>\n
“By combining intelligence and resources across jurisdictions, we’re making it increasingly difficult for organised crime groups to profit from their criminal activity,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An outlaw motorbike gang police say puts “profits ahead of public safety” has been targeted by Australian and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":625290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[111,43,139,69],"class_list":["post-625289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=625289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/625290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=625289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=625289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=625289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}