Janet CollinsWho Shot McGurk?
September 13th 2009 21:46
Who needs TV these days when you can get some of the best crime drama from reading the newspapers? The recent slaying of Michael McGurk in Sydney’s north has had journalists working overtime and it has probably reclaimed Sydney as the high profile crime capital of Australia.
Sydney was once noted for its crime and corruption. Attempts to clean up its image saw politicians and judges incarcerated long ago but the reputation of seedy dealings is coming home to roost.
Quite some time ago, a friend of mine, originally from the U.K., commented on the stories that captured headlines when she traveled back to the U.K. Over there, she said, the headlines are all about sex and scandal. Here they are about crime and corruption.
That changed, of course, in Sydney at least, when the perception at least that everything had been cleaned up from the police force to the colourful businessmen and the politicians who accommodated them right down to the judiciary were outed.
The honour for the underworld category went to Melbourne and this spurned a few well received mini-series called Underbelly that highlighted the crime and corruption in our sister city.
McGurk’s slaying has once again put Sydney in the spotlight for high level crime. The story behind the story has kept journalists busy for not only two days but for a few weeks and it would be very surprising if there is not yet a script underway for this story.
For those outside of Sydney or even Australia, Michael McGurk was gunned down with one bullet to the head after returning home with takeway food with his nine-year old son.
At first, the reports came out about the family man who doted on his kids but may have had a few dodgy business deals. As Richard Ackland pointed out in Friday’s “Sydney Morning Herald” by day three, McGurk had a much shadier background that was first reported. The ongoing expose into McGurk, as Ackland also writes about is possible because there are no legal proceedings, yet.
The story as it has evolved has more colour and intrigue than any scriptwriter could hope for. It is almost like a rags to riches story but the riches were gained by very, very dubious means. Only three days after the slaying, reports about his background included a Scottish born orphan who became a boxer and came to Australia in his early 20s.
In fact, what has come out of the whole story is that Michael McGurk is not even his real name. In the early ninetees, a Michael Rushford, who had overstayed a visa, left for New Zealand and Fiji, to come back to Australia as Michael McGurk.
In his early days in Australia, he had been a house painter before progressing to selling lighting before becoming a standover man. In all this, McGurk managed to weave his way into pretty good connections, some millionaires, one at least billionaire.
There is more. There is the report about the Russian heavyweights turning up to an office of a valuer demanding to see the owner and saying they didn’t leave business cards. The worker in the office was subsequently bashed and his boss had his house firebombed.
Fire bombing houses also seems to have been McGurk’s specialty. He had been charged with firebombing Adam Tilley’s house in Wolselely Road, Point Piper – one of the most prestigious addresses in the world - not long before but these charges, to the disappointment of the police involved, had been dropped by the Director of Public Prosecutions.
McGurk’s connections were extremely high profile. Top property developers were amongst them. By all accounts, most good associations ended up bad ones and these associations he made, given his small beginnings, can only be testament to a possible charm or persuasion or just that of a brilliant con-man.
The suggestion of a letter he had that threatened his life has even come to the surface and his attempts to protect his life by going to State Parliament to get some protection. And the revelations keep coming.
There is even some suggestion that a political figure is involved in the whole thing. The only thing that it missing out of this whole scenario is a “colourful racing identity”. Maybe, just maybe, that is too 80s!
Sourced: www.smh.com.au; www.dailytelegraph.com.au; www.abc.net.au.
Image credit: www.abc.net.au
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