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Lone Wolf sergeant at arms to contest drive-by shooting

POLICE have alleged in court that a sergeant at arms of the Lone Wolf bikie gang supplied a police informant more than a kilogram of amphetamines and various other amounts of heroin and cocaine with a combined value of almost $100,000.

Joshua Paul Battah was not required to appear via video link at Wyong Local Court on Tuesday where his solicitor said he would be contesting two of 16 charges before they go to committal in the District Court.

The 36-year-old has been remanded in custody since his arrest at Budgewoi just hours after a drive-by shooting at Toowoon Bay on August 27, 2014.

Some of the cash seized after a raid on Mr Battah’s St Clair home. Photo courtesy of NSW Police.

Police had Mr Battah under surveillance since learning of his promotion as one of three national sergeant at arms of the outlaw bikie gang when the then president was overseas.

Police facts — tendered in a bundle of documents so large Magistrate Peter Feather said he would need a “front end loader for that file” — allege Mr Battah supplied a police informant more than a kilogram of amphetamines and various other amounts of heroin and cocaine between May 8 and August 7 with a combined value of almost $100,000.

But it was a recent clash between the Lone Wolf and Rebels gangs in which three men suffered stab wounds at Tweed Heads that had police worried about a looming “war” between the rival gangs at the time.

Large amounts of drugs seized from his house. Photo courtesy of NSW Police.

Police facts revealed detectives visited Mr Battah in the afternoon before the alleged drive-by shooting to see if he could use his influence as a senior member to cool the “escalating violence” but he “disregarded it”.

Police allege Mr Battah ordered their informant to meet him in Sydney to collect a cache of firearms but the informant went to detectives instead.

A series of intercepted “phone calls and messages” allegedly showed Mr Battah becoming increasingly irate at the informant for not showing up before his house was peppered with bullets.

The following day officers from the State Crime Command’s Gang Squad searched Mr Battah’s St Clair home in Sydney’s west seizing more than $120,000 in cash allegedly hidden in a wall, drugs, ammunition and a Glock pistol stashed in a concealed draw in the master bedroom.

More drugs allegedly seized during the raid. Photo courtesy of NSW Police.

He was later charged with a string of offences including 11 counts of supplying and possessing prohibited drugs, as well as possessing a weapon and ammunition without a permit.

But his solicitor sought an adjournment on Tuesday for a hearing in October to contest a charge of directing a criminal group and another of firing a firearm into a dwelling.

At a previous appearance his defence said the evidence regarding the drive-by shooting was “purely circumstantial”.

However police facts maintain Mr Battah was an alleged ringleader in the outlaw gang.

“Police intelligence and interception of the accused’s phone confirms conclusively that the accused is the National Sergeant at arms of the Lone Wolf Motorcycle gang,” they read.

Mr Battah has not entered any pleas and the two charges were set down for a hearing on October 24.

A Lone Wolf club house sign.


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