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A security professional hired to protect a CFMEU-targeted worksite found a tracking device attached to his car and believes his dog was poisoned by baited meat dropped from a drone in a campaign of intimidation by the union, a commission of inquiry heard on Tuesday.
Concentric Concepts managing director Grant Killen was providing security services to construction firm BMD at the Centenary Bridge worksite when, he told the Commission of Inquiry into the CFMEU and Misconduct in the Construction Industry, he became the target of a sustained campaign of harassment.
After attending the site on May 17, 2024, Killen said he sensed he was being followed during his drive back to his company headquarters near the Port of Brisbane.
Upon arrival, Killen said he immediately placed his car on a hoist, lifted it, and found a tracking device attached beneath the chassis.
“Once I found the device, I immediately put the vehicle on the ground as quick as I could. Then I left the facility,” he said.
“Then I gave the admin staff at the office a call and directed them to pack up and close up for the day and go home.”
Killen said he sped away from the site to put distance between the device and his staff.
“I left the device on the vehicle mainly because I knew the device had a particular anti-removal device on there, an anti-tilt switch,” he said.
“As soon as it gets removed, the people who put it on there, who have the software for that, would immediately be notified.”
Suspecting he was being followed by someone in a Toyota RAV4, Killen said he engaged in some “aggressive driving”, including deliberately running a red light to check if he was being followed.
“I was followed through that red light,” he said.
“Further down the road, we did an aggressive U-turn [to] see if it would keep up, and it did follow.”
Killen eventually lost his tail, he said, and removed the device by the side of a road.
But he said the intimidation did not stop there, instead spreading to his family home.
There were drive-bys in his cul-de-sac, and Killen said he managed a brief look at one of the drivers, who he identified as former police detective Mick Featherstone, whom the inquiry heard the CFMEU had engaged to collect intelligence on BMD personnel.
Separately, Killen said he noticed several drones overhead.
Then, the family dog got sick.
“One of the questions the vet asked me, after a point where the vet had to operate on the dog and remove its stomach contents, was ‘Do you feed your dog cubed meat?’,” Killen said.
“We don’t, and I thought that was a strange question. But as I reflected shortly after and recalled, I formed the opinion that there was a possibility that the dog had been baited at some stage.”
When counsel assisting the inquiry, Eddy Gisonda, KC, put it to Killen that he suspected one of the drones may have dropped baited meat on his property, he responded “yeah, correct”.
Killen said the campaign was enough to make him walk away from the BMD contract.
“With the tracking device on our vehicle, with everything that was occurring, I needed to step back and just concentrate on the safety of me and my family and our business,” he said.
Commissioner Stuart Wood asked Killen, a military veteran with service in Iraq, whether he had experienced anything of that level while deployed.
“An assailant or an offender always has the upper hand about how they plan to do an overt act or assault someone or conduct an attack,” he said.
“They choose the time, they choose the place, they choose the method.
“All we can do is simply react the best that we can and try and mitigate it by having that planning in place.
“So to put that in context, that’s what we tried our best to do in this particular situation.”
Earlier, Queensland Council of Unions general secretary Jacqueline King said relations between the state trades and labour council and the CFMEU had greatly improved since the latter went into administration.
“We have developed, I think, a fairly good working relationship, completely unlike what it was, and on the basis that we work with the Queensland branch to try to assist them on their path to getting out of administration,” she said.
But King said there was still some way to go before the CFMEU could be reaffiliated with the Queensland Council of Unions.
“It is going to take time because, while the people who are in the union now are not the same people who were doing the activities and the conduct that was occurring pre-the High Court decision, relationships still take time to mend, and trust takes time to rebuild,” she said.
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