Jim O’Sullivan, who rose to become Commissioner himself, has told 9News in an exclusive interview how he and 30 other so-called “untouchables” broke open the network of criminals and corrupt officers that led all the way to the top.
And Mr O’Sullivan, hand-picked by Commissioner Tony Fitzgerald to head the Commission’s investigations, warned corruption might never be totally weeded out.
“You would be naive in the extreme to think that a body of 12,000 would be totally free of corruption,” Mr O'Sullivan said.
“There will always be corruption. There will always be people looking for the cheap dollar.
“Corruption is just about eliminated but it never will be.”
Three decades after Mr Fitzgerald handed the findings of his two-year inquiry to then Premier, Mike Ahern, Mr O’Sullivan opened up about the extent of the corruption, how his small band managed to break it open, and of threats and intimidation from those desperate to protect their rackets.
“We knew there was corruption afoot,” he said.
“You couldn’t go to the Commissioner’s office because they were corrupt there.
“You couldn’t go down George Street (to the Government) because you didn’t know who was honest and who wasn’t.”
Mr O'Sullivan and his small team faced brick walls and a cone of silence for their first 12 months, as police effectively turned their backs.
The breakthrough came when they tracked self-confessed bagman, Jack Herbert, to London.
Herbert was brought home, given indemnity, and rolled over.
He broke the code of disgraced Assistant Commissioner Graeme Parker’s secret flow chart, listing who paid what to whom, and when; a corrupt network of crims and cops those involved called 'The Joke'.
“We couldn’t decipher it for 12 months,” Mr O’Sullivan told 9News.
“He deciphered it in less than ten minutes. It was on then, for young and old.”
Commissioner Terry Lewis was found guilty of corruption and given 14 years behind bars.
Mr O’Sullivan talked of death threats and of his tyres being slashed, as the hunter became the hunted.
“It was a bad time. A lot of people had a lot to lose,” he said.
“And a lot of people lost everything.
“They didn’t win. We won. We went in harder than ever then. We survived.”
The Fitzgerald Inquiry at first investigated police corruption. But it spread to politics, and politicians.
The Premier, Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, was charged with lying to the Commission, but found not guilty.
And despite allegations of receiving payments, Jim O’Sullivan never thought Sir Joh was corrupt.
“Naïve in the extreme. But corrupt, no,” he said.
Much changed after the inquiry.
The corruption watchdog, the Criminal Justice Commission was set up, the state’s electoral boundaries, that always favoured Sir Joh’s National Party, were overhauled, politicians were made more accountable, and political structures were reformed.
Jim O’Sullivan, is, rightly so, proud of his work.
“The most horrific inquiry, from my point of view, but the most satisfying.
“We rid the service of a lot of people who weren’t worthy of being in the service.
“It brought the police service into the twenty-first century. Cleansed the department.”
And it was due largely, to the dirty work of Jim O’Sullivan, and his “untouchables”.
Australia is a dangerous place for journalists, whistleblowers (i.e. people exposing corruption or criminal activity by those in position of authority), as well as for the general population otherwise known as the 'public' or more accurately the serfs.
