Annual Report - COMPLETE - Australian Crime Commission

As at 1 June 2004, operations previously conducted under the South East Asian
Organised Crime (SEAOC) Determination were incorporated into the ECN
Determination.
ECN operations have demonstrated the resilience of criminal groups. In Operation
Senatus, for example, despite the disruption caused by the arrest of key players in
Australia and India, the network has continued its criminal activities.
Networks identified in ECN operations prevail as fluid ‘entrepreneurial’ type networks
involving a core group or key individuals. Intelligence has found that these groups
often combine expertise and resources to commit crimes, most usually drug
trafficking, and maintain a range of strategic relationships to facilitate their illicit
activities. Associations and involvement in specific types of business activities are
commonplace. The networks are involved in a range of criminal activities which are
ancillary to their primary criminal involvement in the lucrative domestic and international
drug market. While nationality and background appears not to limit membership to
specific networks, ECN operations have shown that key individuals within groups do
share common ethnic backgrounds. The Determination has also benefited from the
profiling of criminal networks through the production of the ACC’s National Criminal
Intelligence Assessment on Serious and Organised Crime Groups.
ECN operations conducted by the ACC have resulted in numerous charges relating to
various criminal activity including narcotic and firearms offences. The people charged
have played significant roles within their respective criminal groups, creating disruption
and reducing the threats they pose.
A substantial amount of assets including houses, properties, factories, cars, trucks,
truck trailers and cash in bank accounts were restrained under Commonwealth and
state legislation as a result of ECN operations.
Table 4.4: Output 1.3 – ECN use proceeds of crime restrained
Measure Total
Assets restrained $7,180,000
Exercise of the ACC’s coercive powers under the ECN Determination has confirmed
that the dominant criminal activities in Australia are the importation, distribution
and/or manufacture of illicit drugs, as well as associated offences including money
laundering and defrauding the Commonwealth through tax evasion. Coercive powers
have resulted in the arrest and charging of significant criminal members involved in
such activities as drugs (Operation Ballynoe and Boothia) and firearms trafficking
(Operation Senatus), and has led to the dismantling and deterrence of organised
criminal groups that would have otherwise continued to commit serious crimes.
ACC ANNUAL REPORT 2003–04 I 59
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OUTPUT 1.3: INVESTIGATIONS INTO FEDERALLY RELEVANT CRIMINAL ACTIVITY