Little Fish Are Sweet

by Matthew Condon

  The article stated that Mann’s arrest ‘spotlighted a loophole in the Vagrants, Gaming and Other Offences Act which allows people to give false names, forfeit bail and remain “incognito”’.

  Mann was also the subject of a royal commission, when allegations of being involved in a corrupt tendering process for some sewerage works in Redcliffe were levelled against him, but he was ultimately cleared.

  Upon Mann’s death in 1973, much was made of his kindness and generosity to the battlers. The then member for Merthyr, Don Lane, a former police officer who would be gaoled for corruption following the Fitzgerald Inquiry in the 1980s, told parliament that Mann was ‘fair dinkum to his mates and often offered money to his constituents who had fallen on hard times. He would fight strenuously if his point of view differed from that of others, but, once the fight was over, “Johnno” was happy to say, “Let’s go and have a beer together”.’

  Lane said the legends of Johnno Mann would ‘be remembered when most of us have been forgotten’.

  Mann was also a mad punter. Terry Lewis told me that Mann was always at the races. ‘I knew of him and then saw him at the races; he was always … well, there were only races on Saturday but he was always there and always surrounded by a group of blokes,’ said Lewis. ‘Probably wharfies or whatever … they didn’t like the coppers then and we didn’t like them but … over a period of time we ended up saying good day to each other and that.

  ‘And that’s when some of them told us about his – well he might have even told us – about the biggest heist he had on the wharf, when he was working there, knocking off a grand piano. Anything you wanted done [it] was known around the ridges, you’d go and see Johnno.’

  I told Lewis I’d read a little snippet in the newspaper archives about a man who was trying to avoid conscription during the Second World War. The article said when police grabbed the man he said, ‘Oh, Johnno Mann will fix it for me.’ And he told the court, ‘Johnno Mann has fixed this for me three times before as I’ve avoided being called up for active duty.’

  I asked Lewis if Mann was ‘the fix-it guy’ and did this service come at a price?

  ‘Oh, of course,’ said Lewis. ‘And I’d say that he would be a bit like Russo [Russ Hinze] in the sense … he’d just ring up and say, look, I want you to do this or do that. And they were two fairly – looking at in retrospect they’d be … similar on opposite sides of politics.’

  Lewis had also heard of various scams at the track. He said: ‘Johnno Mann was a bit of a doer, he was an ex-waterside worker and he would go … he had the spivs if you like … they had runners, as they call it, so somebody would be outside with a telephone and get information from down south. One of them would go out and he’d have to pay to come back in … what were the bets down south? And we used to clash with him a bit but it was a bit hard to clash with the Speaker too long, till eventually we’d end up … we’d talk.’

  I once spent a morning speaking with former Police Union president and long-time police officer Ron Edington, and our discussion invariably turned to Johnno Mann. ‘Bischof … was tied up with the politicians,’ said Edington. ‘The Speaker of the House when I was there, he was the greatest bloody criminal of all time – Johnno Mann. His electorate was Brisbane, that’s Spring Hill right over to Kangaroo Point … where all the working-class [people lived] and particularly Spring Hill, nobody was game to walk through Spring Hill at night. It was one of those places where you’d get assaulted, it was a terrible bloody place.

  ‘Everyone used to use Spring Hill when they were trying to describe violence, you know. I used to work with a bloody old mate of mine and he’d say, “Get that prick over there.” He said, “Bring him in.” He said give [him] the Spring Hill uppercut. I said well, “What’s the Spring Hill uppercut?” He said, “A kick in the fucking balls.” That was the attitude, you know.’

  ‘So how did Bischof and Mann operate?’

  ‘If anything ever happened – there was painters and dockers and wharf labourers mainly, that lived up there. If you pinched any one of them they’d go to Johnno Mann and then old Johnno Mann would ring Bischof,’ Edington recalled.

  ‘Then Bischof would send for you and ask, “You’re investigating this?” Bischof would say, “You’d better just leave it alone, we’ve got something going there.”’

  ‘What else did you see and hear in relation to Mann?’

  ‘If you wanted anything you’d have to go down and see Johnno Mann in Parliament House and they’d tell you what to do,’ said Edington. ‘Now when you got there he’d pull the drawer of his desk open and he’d excuse himself and he’d say he’s going to the toilet and then when he goes to the toilet you put the money in the drawer and when he comes back, if he closes the drawer he’s happy, he’s going to help you. But if he doesn’t close it, you know you’re fucked. And that was a well-known thing and an accepted thing.’

  Edington said there were numerous incidents of criminality that were swept under the carpet courtesy of Mann’s connections. ‘It gives you an illustration of the power of Johnno Mann in that era and that’s why crime was so prevalent because all the criminals knew the … well, criminals.

  ‘They might have been on the grog but nothing like these bloody drug addicts, they’ve got no courage the drug addicts, that’s why they take the drugs … but they’re not tough men, they’re not the type of criminal that … the type of criminal in the past was a man … You’d cooperate with them and they’d cooperate with you.’

  To the end, Mann was described as ‘colourful’. His humour saw off his detractors and any serious allegations about corruption. He remained genuinely perplexed at a scandal that erupted around him when his chauffeur-driven limousine was involved in an accident and a racing greyhound was discovered with Mann in the back seat of the vehicle.

  On 6 March 1973, Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen led the motions of condolence on the death of Mann (as well as former members Frank Bulcock and Thomas Foley) in state parliament. One of the most effusive was the member for Merthyr, the former police officer Don ‘Shady’ Lane, who’d been in parliament less than two years at the time of Mann’s passing.

  ‘I came in contact with him, socially and otherwise, on numerous occasions, and in recent years I received much good advice from him,’ Lane told the House. ‘I found him, in total, to be a man’s man, one who could be met in the city, on the racecourse, and in many other places where men mix in sharing common sporting and social interests. I think it is a great tribute to this country and this State that “Johnno” Mann was able to raise himself from humble beginnings to the position of Speaker of this House. He was a friend of the aged and the “little” man, and he was one of my constituents.’

  Almost 20 years later, in a motion of condolence to former ‘Minister for Everything’ Russ Hinze, the member for Southport, Mick Veivers, told the story of Hinze entering parliament in 1966 and being given advice by Mann.

  As Veivers recounted, Hinze met Mann at the door of the Members’ Bar. ‘Russell,’ Mann greeted Hinze, ‘welcome. It’s the best club in Australia, mate. Make sure you stop here as long as you can.’ Mann added: ‘Not all the crooks are on this side of the House, and not all the good ones are on that side. If you believe you’ve got more authority than me in here because you’re in Government, well that’s a mistake.

  ‘If I can help you, boy, I will.’

  At the urging of Lewis I head to Tallai Glades aged care facility at Mudgeeraba to catch a glimpse of Tony Murphy. The receptionist checks her books and tells me Murphy was discharged weeks earlier. Had I tried him at home?

  She telephones Murphy’s house and speaks with his carer, who says I’m welcome to come over and speak with Tony. ‘He’s in a bit of a cranky mood today,’ she tells me.

  I take the short drive to Robina at the back of the Gold Coast. The house is cream brick and the lawn immaculate. The house is opposite a man-made lake
with ducks and lily pads. There are children’s swings across from the house.

  Murphy’s carer, Sonia, answers the door and welcomes me in. It is a typical Gold Coast house, all large floor tiles and cane furniture. Neat and uncluttered. There is a generic Australian bush scene hanging on the wall.

  I see Murphy from the front door; an old man in pyjamas, sitting in a wheeled chair. I approach him, introduce myself and shake his hand. He has a firm grip. His grey hair is sparse. His cheeks are sunken. He wears huge horn-rimmed spectacles.

  I begin asking him about his friendship with Lewis. He says Terry is a good bloke. Who am I writing about? He wants to know. Who is this for?

  When I ask him about Bischof and his corruption, or the prostitute Brifman, he says that’s ‘all water under the bridge’, and that it happened ‘too long ago to remember’.

  At the carer’s prompting, he does remember some cases, and more specifically the full names of offenders and police. When I mention Hallahan he says, ‘Glen Patrick Hallahan’. When I talk about Lewis he recalls, ‘Terence Murray Lewis’.

  He looks at me with his mouth open. He is 83 and unwell. He appears confused and often incredulous. You can just see the tough detective in him, the one they used to call ‘the boss’ or ‘the grey eminence’.

  Sometimes the old Murphy will emerge. He says loudly, ‘What is this for?’ and ‘Why are you asking these questions?’ Then he subsides again.

  Before I leave he says it’s a surprise he saw the sun come up that morning.

  Outside children are playing by the lake. Inside the house, one of the state’s most controversial policemen is dying.

  The Night Porter

  A refrain that sounded time and again as I was researching my story of Queensland corruption was that anyone who dared challenge The Joke and its various iterations was punished or destroyed. This applied to both police and civilians.

  Officers who put their hand up to challenge the corruption were summarily transferred or they and their families received physical threats. This modus operandi stretched across decades and wreaked havoc for honest men and women and their families. The public vivisection of immigrant John Komlosy always stood out as a particularly brutal case study of this abhorrent element of The Joke and the ruthless behaviour of its insiders.

  Komlosy was the night porter at the notorious National Hotel in Brisbane in the early 1960s prior to the calling of an inquiry into the hotel and police who enjoyed the National’s hospitality after hours, including Police Commissioner Frank Bischof.

  Komlosy was one of only two witnesses to step forward and assist the commission. He wanted to expose corrupt police, especially Bischof, and also the callgirl racket that ran out of the National. Within months of making that decision, he so feared for the lives of himself, his wife and children that he fled back to Europe. His dream of a good life in Australia with his family was over.

  I was fascinated by the Komlosy story because it exposed the raw methods of Bischof and his trusted Rat Pack. Komlosy lost his job because he dared act as a witness to police corruption, his reputation was trashed, his confidential immigration records were released to the public and he received death threats. Detective Tony Murphy publicly threatened Komlosy outside the court during the inquiry hearings, telling him to act like the ‘three wise monkeys or else’ and drawing an index finger across his throat.

  Then, out of the blue I received a message on Facebook from Fred Komlosy, John’s son, who was living in north-west Germany. He had read the Lewis books and wanted to get in touch.

  ‘No one was as thoroughly destroyed during the 1963 National Hotel inquiry as the key witness – my father John Komlosy,’ Fred wrote. ‘He saw no other option after being torn to shreds by 82 defence counsel and a crooked judge than to flee the country. As a teenager – 14 years of age – I had to start a new life in a strange country which was not easy.

  ‘Some years later I tried to return to Australia, however to no avail. I did not know that ASIO had our name on black lists at all Australian embassies. Had my father and other witnesses been believed, and appropriate action taken, it could have spared Queensland a further 25 years of steadily worsening police corruption. Perhaps you could mention the name of my father, who at least died a happy man after the Rat Pack was finally brought to justice in the late 1980s.’

  I was stunned. I had written about Fred’s father in Three Crooked Kings and had duly reported the basics of John Komlosy’s appearance as a witness at the inquiry and how his reputation was savaged when he took the stand. I knew the family had felt intimidated enough to leave the country and return to Europe, but it wasn’t until I began communicating with Fred that I finally understood not just the full story, but the depth of generational hurt that one moment in history had produced, altering lives for decades. I also understood that so many characters, ostensibly bit players on the surface, each had formidable back stories of their own, triggered by their fateful intersection with this dark, complex drama.

  The Hungarian-born Komlosy was just 172 centimetres tall and slightly built, with brown eyes and dark hair. He and his family arrived in Melbourne on 22 January 1951, aboard the converted troop ship the Fairsea, especially refitted in 1949 for the repatriation of displaced persons and refugees from Europe to Australia. The ship had no cabins, just huge spaces with triple-decker bunks, the men and women segregated. Komlosy, a former prisoner of war, was looking for a fresh start.

  He secured a job as a signalman with Victorian Railways. There, he spent time working in the remote town of Lubeck, in the state’s west, a featureless and remote fly speck compared with Germany’s splendid and historic northern city of Lubeck, on the River Trave.

  Back in those days, a younger Komlosy had to scamper up the signals with a lamp and physically shift the weighted levers. Dissatisfied with being away from his family for long stretches as part of his railway work, and the family having to shift houses four times, he worked briefly as a hotel porter in Melbourne. It would be his next decision, however, that would haunt his life and that of his family.

  A restless Komlosy decided to seek better prospects in Queensland, and the family settled in Brisbane. He began work, this time as a conductor with the Brisbane City Council Tramways Department, on 10 May 1955. At the time, Sub-Inspector Frank Bischof was the leading detective in charge of the Brisbane CIB, and was mentoring two of his three ‘trusted boys’, the young officers Terry Lewis and Tony Murphy. (Glen Hallahan – completing the fabled Rat Pack - would not arrive on the scene for a few more years.)

  Komlosy would find it difficult to secure meaningful, long-term employment. He went from tram conductor to mailman to a trainee night officer with Queensland Railways. During this time he applied for naturalisation but constantly fell afoul of the Commonwealth Department of Immigration in Brisbane for not updating his Alien Registration Certificate, to the point that he was threatened with prosecution under the Aliens Act 1947–1952.

  Government agencies were also gathering dirt on the ‘insolent’ Komlosy. The Commonwealth Migration Officer, T.M. Nulty, concluded that he had ‘received confidential information to the effect that he [Komlosy] is at least strongly suspected of communistic activities’. His so-called insolence, it seems, had brought him to the attention of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO). A Komlosy file was begun.

  In 1960, drawing on his experience in Melbourne, he got a job as the night porter for the National Hotel down at Petrie Bight, towards Fortitude Valley. The old hotel had recently been taken over by entrepreneurs Max, Rolly and Jack Roberts. The National was Max’s baby, while Rolly ran the Criterion up in George Street. The Roberts boys had instantly turned around the fortunes of the hotel, and it became a hub of live shows, steak dinners and cocktails. It quickly attracted a risqué reputation, and for good reason.

  After Bischof, Police Commissioner since 1958, had padlocked the city’s half a
dozen sanctioned brothels following a scandal involving Lewis and Hallahan in 1959, Brisbane prostitutes had begun to ply their trade in the city’s major hotels. They took a particular liking to the National Hotel, with its bawdy atmosphere, after-hours drinking and eclectic clientele – from overseas visitors to country cockies to police.

  Courtesy of a strong friendship between Bischof and the Roberts boys, it in effect became a ‘police’ hotel – frequented by them constantly and used for official and non-official police functions. Its best customers were Frank Bischof, Tony Murphy and Norm Bauer.

  From the first evening Komlosy began work as the night porter at the National in May 1960, with his wife and now three children living a quiet life in suburban Runcorn, he became aware of the hotel’s decadent reputation.

  He was ‘shocked’ at the amount of illegal drinking and what he perceived as rampant prostitution. There were orgies going on in some of the rooms. Police were picking up alcohol after hours and driving off. Women were engaging in what he thought was sexual congress in the public bars. And Commissioner Bischof was drinking late and enjoying the largesse of the Roberts’.

  In just six months at the National Komlosy not only became acquainted with a host of local prostitutes, including Shirley Brifman, who used to trade their wares out of the National, but kept a list of them and their contact numbers in the back of a notebook in the event a client wanted a girl.

  Komlosy lasted until December, before he was unemployed again. In fact, he had been dismissed by Max Roberts after police, driving past the National late one night, had witnessed Komlosy putting two crates of beer into the boot of a taxi. One of the arresting officers was young Licensing Branch gun, Jack Herbert.

  Komlosy appealed to police, and later personally to Commissioner Frank Bischof, that he had been instructed by Max Roberts to put the beer in the taxi and have it sent over to a party in a neighbouring suburb that Roberts was attending that night.