AN alleged member of a key Melbourne drug syndicate was an "extreme" flight risk with associates in the Philippines and links to the Gladiators outlaw motorcycle gang in New South Wales, a bail hearing has been told.
Scott James Frankland, 28, is accused of being a member of the drug gang and fleeing to the Philippines three days after police raided a clandestine lab in the affluent Melbourne suburb of Canterbury.
Melbourne Magistrates Court was told Mr Frankland, known within the drug gang as “GQ”, was second in charge to the syndicate’s boss and was sent more than $58,000 via Western Union money transfers while in the Philippines.
Sen-Det Warren Day, of the Victoria Police clandestine laboratory squad, told Mr Frankland’s bail application hearing that police ran an operation between July 2011 and February 2012 after discovering the “sophisticated” amphetamines lab in a house in Rochester Rd, Canterbury.
Sen-Det Day said several men were identified as being involved in the large-scale syndicate.
The partial remains of one of those alleged members, a man named Yengo Faugere, were found at a drug lab in St Leonards, on the Bellarine Peninsula.
Sen-Det Day alleged that Mr Frankland assisted in the collection of equipment and in the drug manufacturing process at labs in Canterbury and Reservoir.
The court was told Mr Frankland helped recruit a gang member whom he taught to use fake identification and rent properties as well as collecting precursor chemicals.
Detectives raided the Canterbury lab on July 8, 2011.
“The whole two-bedroom unit was being used entirely for the manufacturing of amphetamine-type substances,” Sen-Det Day told the hearing.
“There was no fridge, no beds and no furniture.”
Investigators found glassware, filters, chemicals used to produce amphetamines, liquid amphetamine known as “freebase” and a pill press, the court was told.
“Firearms including a loaded Norinco 7.62 calibre semi-automatic centre-fire rifle, a .22 calibre rifle and a large quantity of bullets …were located in the roof next to the manhole,” Sen-Det Day said.
The court was told Mr Frankland’s fingerprints were found on documents and his photo on a fake driver’s licence under the name George Davis.
“A photocopy of a fraudulent Victorian driver’s licence and Australian passports were also located within the crime scene which depict the image of Yengo Faugere,” Sen-Det Day said.
“Those documents match those provided to the real estate agency to lease the property.”
The court was told that three days after the police raid in Canterbury, Mr Frankland took off to the Phillipines and returned to Australia in April last year unaware detectives wanted to arrest him.
The gang was linked to labs in Canterbury, Kew, Reservoir and the “largest and most sophisticated” in St Leonards, the court heard.
In opposing bail, Sen-Det Day said Mr Frankland was a flight risk due to his overseas and interstate connections.
Defence barrister Colin Mandy cited a delay before any trial, the strength of the Crown case and Mr Frankland’s health concerns as exceptional circumstances for bail.
Magistrate Donna Bakos refused bail.
Mr Frankland, who is facing charges including trafficking a large commercial quantity of a drug of dependence and firearms offences, will re-appear in court at a later date.
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