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Queensland’s inquiry into the CFMEU and construction sector has been shown police footage of a senior staff member from infrastructure giant BMD involved in a traffic stop with an alleged bikie gang official.
The inquiry has also been shown CCTV stills of the same once-suggested Comanchero secretary, William Samra, meeting with Gary Samuel – the Melbourne-based head of BMD security contractor Host – at a Brisbane cafe last year.
That pair and another figure can be seen reading a printed copy of The Age and its reporting about two of the Melbourne bikie-linked figures since accused by the inquiry of threatening a CFMEU activist on Brisbane bridge project.
Counsel assisting the inquiry, Eddy Gisonda KC has spent this week’s hearings laying out a suspected plot which saw Melbourne figures travelling to Brisbane in a standover effort, before an attempted cover-up by BMD figures.
BMD human resources and industrial relations manager Steve Thomas returned to the witness stand on Thursday, after following colleague Robert Pickard in denying knowledge or saying he could not recall elements of the alleged plot.
After briefly returning to these topics, Gisonda then played police body-worn footage for the inquiry of Thomas with Samra at a traffic stop in August last year, in which the pair say they had been meeting for work, including security.
The inquiry was later shown news reporting describing Samra as an “alleged Comanchero bikie” and secretary of the outlaw motorcycle gang, links Thomas said he was not aware of at that time.
Thomas said while he was introduced to Samra by Samra’s father in May or April of that year, the pair had actually been meeting for a “social catch-up” when stopped by police and the senior Samra had previously linked him to a separate security firm.
He disputed Samra’s comments in the video that the pair had known each other for some time, saying they had mutual friends who played rugby and went to school at Gregory Terrace together – which he had told police at the time.
Thomas said he had been nervous during the traffic stop, but denied this was because he had been caught in the car with someone he knew to be allegedly connected to the Comancheros.
“Not at all. It was simply the way I was handled [by police],” Thomas told the inquiry, also denying knowledge of any connection between the junior Samra and Samuel – but met his father while he had been working for Samuel.
The inquiry was shown evidence the senior Samra was paid by Host for work on the Albanese and Queensland government-funded $350 million Centenary Bridge upgrade project, which Thomas described as involving logistics and rosters.
Gisonda said there was no suggestion of wrongdoing by Thomas in relation to the traffic stop.
CCTV footage was then shown of the junior Samra meeting with Samuel and Matthew John Lucas at a coffee shop in Heathwood on Brisbane’s west in August last year, with a copy of The Age from May on the table.
Samuel can be seen pointing to reporting by the masthead about intelligence the Victorian Infrastructure Delivery Authority had about firms linked to the underworld being involved in that state’s Big Build infrastructure pipeline.
The article names Bemir Saracevic and Krstomir Bjelogrlic – two of the Comanchero-linked figures accused of travelling from Melbourne for the 2024 standover of CFMEU crane operator Cody Raymond who the inquiry head Samuel suspected of leaking information to the union.
Australian Workers Union-aligned BMD hired Samuel and his company Host earlier that year to counter the CFMEU’s campaign against the contractor on the bridge project.
Thomas denied knowledge of any connection between Samuel and the junior Samra or having ever spoken to Samuel about him.
The inquiry continues.
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Matt Dennien is a reporter at Brisbane Times covering state politics, parliament and the public sector. He has previously worked for newspapers in Tasmania and Brisbane community radio station 4ZZZ. Contact him securely on Signal @mattdennien.15Connect via email.From our partners
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