Enforcer (21 page)

O
NE OF
the proudest times I had with the Bandidos was once when I was on my own down at a pub in Balmain and there were about forty wharfies there, all making fun of the big bad biker thing. I was standing there solo, surrounded by all these wharfies, thinking, Fuck, I’m gunna be in hospital for six months. Luckily the barmaid knew me. Most of the pubs in Balmain had our clubhouse phone number. She rang the clubhouse and next thing I knew I looked over my shoulder and there was Kid Rotten, Opey, Charlie, Davo, plus Snake and my other brothers. All standing there. It’s hard to explain, but I got this real warm feeling. Here was this bunch of blokes who’d rush down even though they knew they were going to be outnumbered. They were standing behind me, all ready to go, and telling these blokes, ‘You want to take on one Bandido, you take on all Bandidos.’

They were living out the motto I’d made up for the club: cut one Bandido and we all bleed. It made me so proud to be part of this club.

T
HERE WERE
four blokes hanging around the club – Tramp, Sleazy, Maverick and Scotty – and in about April or May 1984 we decided to make them prospects. Maverick was the brother of the chick Snoddy was going out with.

A couple of weeks after they’d been made prospects, Donna and I pulled up at the clubhouse on the Saturday night and Shadow had a real stern look on his face. I could tell he was agitated. He pulled me aside and said the new prospect Scotty had been fucking around with another club, causing trouble.

‘What club?’ I asked.

‘The Lone Wolf.’

‘Have you spoken to anyone?’

‘Yeah, I’ve spoken to a couple of their top blokes.’

‘What’s their version?’

‘Completely different to Scotty’s.’

‘Well get in touch with the blokes you were talking to and take Scotty out there. Just watch how Scotty reacts when he has to front them.’

So Shadow did that and reported back that Scotty had made a complete dick of himself and fucked up something bad. Shadow made an agreement with the Wolves that we’d take care of Scotty ourselves.

A lot of the blokes wanted to stomp the shit out of Scotty. But me and Shadow figured if that happened, he’d probably end up dead, so we came up with another idea. Seeing as he was a fuck-up, we thought we’d brand him with the letter F.

We brought in all the prospects so they could see what happened when you fucked up. I heated up an iron bar till it was red hot. Then I pushed it hard into Scotty’s wrist to make the long straight part of the F. I smelt burning hair and flesh, and I pressed harder still. All of a sudden there was nothing pushing back against the iron. I looked to see what had happened and I was more than a little surprised to see that the metal was that hot it had just burnt through and out the other side of his wrist. I could smell the blood burning and hear it sizzling on the iron.

Scotty had not made a sound. But he looked very pale, like he was going to pass out. He had to sit down. Charlie stuck his head out the window ready to chuck. The rest of the prospects looked like they wanted to run.

Shadow told Scotty to get back up, that it wasn’t finished. I’d pulled the bar out of his wrist and Shadow picked up a hot knife now and made the other two lines, completing an F that didn’t look too messy, considering. Snoddy reckoned it was the most sickening thing he’d ever seen.

We sent Scotty to the hospital with the other prospects and never saw him again. Scotty had lied to the club and he nearly caused a lot of shit between us and a club that we were pretty friendly with. We didn’t want to go to war with anybody. We’d left all that bullshit behind us with Jock.

U
NFORTUNATELY,
J
OCK
hadn’t left us behind. He’d got it into his head that his honour had been impugned when we walked out on the Comancheros, and he was getting ready to avenge it. While we’d been having a good time partying and going on runs like a bike club should, the Comos had been busy recruiting.

I got a call from Leroy, who Snoddy and I had tried so hard to get out of jail. He was out at last, he said. And Jock had paid the bail.

We arranged to meet at the Royal Oak in North Parramatta and a big group of us went along to see him. As soon as we walked in, Leroy told us, ‘You know if I had me choice, I’d be with youse.’

‘Well why aren’t ya?’ I asked.

Leroy said that Jock had offered to bail him out, but only on the condition that Leroy give him his word that he’d stay loyal to him and do whatever Jock asked. Leroy didn’t know at that stage what had gone down with the club; visiting him in jail no one had wanted to bring him down with talk of the split. So Leroy had given Jock his word.

Sitting there at the pub, we told him we understood his predicament.

‘You all know what I think of you and that I love youse,’ he said. ‘You and Snoddy and Shadow were the ones that got me into the club in the first place. If I’d have known what was happening, I’d have told Jock to stick his bail up his arse. I’d have stuck it out in jail.’

‘Sorry, mate,’ said Snoddy. ‘We were trying to get the money together to bail you out.’

‘Well, it’s done now and I’ve given me word.’

He more or less said he was sorry that he was going up against us. ‘I’m not dumb,’ he said. ‘I know what Jock’s got me out for.’

It was obvious to us too. Leroy was a big, impressive-looking bloke and he was about the only one Jock had who might stand a chance against my brothers or myself. It was a classic Jock manoeuvre.

We put talk of Jock behind us and had a drink. Leroy asked me how Donna was.

‘Still the best-looking chick in the club,’ I said.

‘You’re not wrong,’ Leroy said.

‘You been hitting the iron while you been in the Bay?’ Chop asked. ‘You’re nearly as big as Ceese.’

‘How big are you round the chest?’ Leroy asked me.

‘Fifty-three inches, unexpanded.’

‘What about your arms?’

‘Right arm nineteen and a half inches, left arm nineteen inches.’

‘You’re still a bit bigger than me,’ he said.

‘And they’ll have to stretch you another four inches so we can be eye to eye,’ I said.

We all had a good laugh. Shadow walked back from the bar. ‘Sounds like you blokes are having a good time.’

‘You still got the fastest bike in the club, Shadow?’ Leroy asked.

‘Caesar and Lout think they have, but Lout spends more time pushing that Pan than riding it.’

It was a good night. We chewed the fat and had a laugh. At the end, we all shook hands and Leroy said, ‘I wish you guys all the best with your new club.’ But there was something in his voice. He said it like he was apologising for something that hadn’t happened yet.

I
n June 1984, our member Junior went to a swap meet at the Rebels’ clubhouse with his old lady, Cathy. As it turned out, Jock’s two sidekicks, Foghorn and Snowy, were there with a Como prospect called Pee Wee who, as you’d expect with a name like that, was a pretty big unit.

They started following Junior around and insulting Cathy. Junior was only twenty-two and as strong as an ox, but everyone knew he couldn’t fight to save himself. But everyone also knew that Junior had a bit of ticker and would never run away from a fight no matter how many blokes were lined up against him. The Comos knew that made Junior an easy mark. They kept pushing him and pushing him till he stood his ground and offered them on. It was just about to blow up when a Rebel came down and told them to take their problems elsewhere. So Junior left and, being the man he is, waited for Snowy, Foghorn and this Pee Wee prick down the road.

The Comos stopped and Junior asked them why they were insulting his old lady, he hadn’t done anything to them. With that, Foghorn took a piece of a Harley fork leg he’d just bought and smacked Junior in the face with it, breaking Junior’s jaw. Then Snowy and Pee Wee held him down while Foghorn stabbed him in the face, before they all started putting the boot in.

Junior was a mess. Cathy helped him back to the bike and they got up to Canterbury Hospital. I got a call from Cathy to say that he was going in for surgery and I raced up there as fast as I could.

The quacks said it would be a couple of days before Junior was able to talk, so I just went up there every day and sat by him until he came out of it. When he eventually could talk, his jaw was wired so he was hard to understand, but he told me enough. And it didn’t surprise me. It was always Foghorn’s go to be a tough man when the odds were in his favour.

‘Whaddya wanna do about this?’ I asked. ‘Do you want the club to take care of it? Or do you want me to do it?’

‘What would you do if this had happened to you?’ he asked.

‘Well, if it was to do with the club and the club had been insulted, I’d let the club know. But if me old lady had been insulted, I’d take care of it meself. Whether I got ’em one at a time or two on one or whether I’d use the baseball bat or an iron bar, I dunno, but I’d get the blokes meself.’

‘You wouldn’t involve the club?’

‘No, I might get one of me brothers to help me if I thought I couldn’t handle it, but I think I’d take care of it meself.’

‘Well that’s what I want to do then. It’s personal. I’ll fix it up myself.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘The rest of the club are firing up so I’d better get over to the clubhouse.’

When I got back to Louisa Road, every member was there, ready to rip heads off. I briefed Snoddy on what Junior told me. Then he pulled all the blokes together in the pool room and told them that Junior was going to handle it himself; that it was a personal issue, not a club issue. A lot of the blokes still wanted to go out and bash Comos.

‘I know how youse feel,’ I said. ‘I feel like going out and punching those cunts’ heads in meself, but we’ve got to respect the man’s wishes or he’s going to think that we don’t respect him.’

Everyone agreed with this. A lot of the fellas headed over to the hospital to visit Junior. It wasn’t a good night at the clubhouse.

The next day, the Comancheros’ Strike Force sergeant-at-arms, Sheepskin, called me and, given what had happened to Junior, it wasn’t a real friendly call at the start. Even though I personally liked Sheepskin I wasn’t in the mood for exchanging pleasantries. But Sheepskin soon explained that he was ringing to see how Junior was and to ask me for Junior’s side of the story. So I told him.

‘I thought it would be something like that,’ Sheepskin said. ‘I heard Snowy and Foghorn’s version and, knowing Junior, I figured that what they said was a bunch of shit.’

‘What did Foghorn and Snowy reckon happened?’ I asked.

Sheepskin said they’d claimed that Junior was running down the Comancheros and making fun of Jock, and he’d put it on them. ‘That’s why I was suspicious,’ he said. ‘I knew Junior wouldn’t start any fight.’

He asked me to give him a couple of days and he’d get back to me. ‘You’ve got me word that I’ll try and find out what’s going on.’ He paused, then asked me, ‘Ya know, is this gunna be an all-out blue and everything?’

‘You’ll find out one way or another.’

He rang back two days later and told me that he’d grabbed the nom, Pee Wee, and taken him out behind the clubhouse. Sheepskin told him, ‘Now don’t fuckin’ lie to me or I’ll smack your head in.’ After about fifteen minutes Pee Wee told him his version, which was nearly identical to Junior’s.

‘Youse are lucky this time,’ I told Sheepskin. ‘Junior wants to front those three cocksuckers himself. It’s not gunna be an all-in. But you can tell Foghorn and Snowy and that other prick of a prospect of yours that the next time I see them they’re gunna feel me boot in their faces. And if it happens again I won’t be holding me brothers back.’

‘I sorta figured that was going to be your response, but there’s not much I can do about it. Foghorn’s in Jock’s ear non-stop. This is heading for trouble.’

‘I don’t know why you won’t just leave the prick. You know I’ve always trusted ya. You’ve always kept yer word. But being in charge of the Strike Force seems to be changing ya, Sheepskin. You’re not the same man ya were when I first came round the club.’

I told him it was up to him to keep it cool on his side and I’d try to do the same with my brothers.

‘Well I can only try me best,’ he said.

‘Well your best better be pretty good.’

N
OT LONG
after Junior’s bashing, a few of the blokes decided to ride up to the Bull & Bush Hotel, thirty kilometres away in Baulkham Hills, after a club meeting one night. About eight or nine of them rocked up to the pub only to discover about ten Comos – or Condoms as we’d started calling them, because you had to be a dick to be one – already there. In the crowd, Big Tony recognised the prospect Pee Wee, who at about six three was easy to spot across the room. Even though we’d agreed we were going to let Junior square up himself, I suppose Big Tony just couldn’t resist. He went over and picked up Pee Wee and threw him straight through a plate-glass window.

Snoddy was there too and he started laying in along with Bushy and my brother Shadow. Snoddy tried scalping some bloke and got hold of a little peanut they called Nugget. A Como called Dog also copped a beating. Our guys were outnumbered but the Comos just faded away.