Pubdate: Wed, 01 Sep 1999
Source: Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
Contact:  http://www.smh.com.au/
Author: Darren Goodsir

TWO POLICE SEEN AT DRUG PARTIES BEFORE KILLING RONI LEVI

The Police Integrity Commission has received information that the
officers who killed French photographer Roni Levi on Bondi Beach were
at parties where drugs were taken just hours before they fired their
revolvers.

More than two years after the slaying, the PIC has ordered fresh
public hearings into the affair.

The inquiry, to start in November, will focus on whether Constable
Rodney Podesta and Senior Constable Anthony Dilorenzo "were affected
by drugs and/or alcohol at the time they were involved in the fatal
shooting", according to a forthcoming public notice. It will also
explore "allegations of corruption or misconduct" by police in the
subsequent coronial investigation.

According to sources, the PIC inquiry will explore fresh evidence,
including witness statements, that both officers were at a number of
early-morning parties where drugs and alcohol were consumed before
they signed on for work at 6am on June 28, 1997.

The re-opening of the case follows the lodging of a detailed
submission by the Newcastle Legal Centre, which helped Mr Levi's wife,
Ms Melinda Dundas, uncover alleged flaws in the police
investigation.

The submission tracks the contention of lawyers at the centre that
Dilorenzo, Podesta and other eastern suburbs officers were associating
with dealers and users at the time of the shooting. The officers each
fired two bullets at Levi in swift succession. Evidence disclosed at
Levi's coronial inquest showed he was experiencing a mental
disturbance on the morning of June 28, 1997, and raced through the
streets of Bondi and on to the beach brandishing a knife.

Eventually, six officers surrounded Levi on the sand, pleading with
him to drop the knife.

After a tense encounter lasting up to 30 minutes, and witnessed by
scores of people, Podesta and Dilorenzo blasted their revolvers about
7.30am. It was later shown that Podesta fired first.

One of the shots hit Levi between his anus and scrotum. Paramedics
rushed on to the beach and carted Levi to a waiting ambulance, but he
died soon after arriving at St Vincent's Hospital. Podesta resigned
from the force after the shooting.

He has since been charged with one count of supplying cocaine
following his admissions at a PIC hearing last February that he took
cocaine and once tried to trick a former girlfriend by diluting a
cocaine deal he sold to her.

The other police supported Podesta and Dilorenzo's statements that
they acted in self-defence, as Levi suddenly lunged at them with a
knife and they had no further room to retreat.

The coroner, Mr Derrick Hand, found deficiencies in the way the police
inquiry into the shooting was handled - mainly that the other officers
on the beach were not separated before giving statements and that
Podesta and Dilorenzo were not questioned in a similar way. But Mr
Hand found no evidence of a cover-up.

After satisfying himself that the inquest testimony disclosed prima
facie evidence of an offence, he referred the case to the Director of
Public Prosecutions, Mr Nicholas Cowdery, QC, for a legal analysis.

Mr Cowdery cleared the officers of criminal liability.

However, the coroner requested compulsory drug and alcohol testing of
officers involved in future shootings and pursuits - in response to
revelations that neither Podesta nor Dilorenzo had been asked to
provide a urine sample.

The Herald has learnt that police failed to conduct a face-to-face
interview with a contact of a government solicitor who passed on
information about a party attended by the officers on the eve of the
shooting.

Instead, they simply phoned the woman, who denied knowing anything
about the party.

Podesta is at present out of the country. Dilorenzo is fighting his
sacking from the police in the Industrial Relations Commission.

The Police Commissioner, Mr Peter Ryan, ordered the dismissal -
concluding he had lost confidence in Dilorenzo for his failure to
explain why he was at the house of a target of an Internal Affairs
raid.

One of the men who was arrested with Dilorenzo in that raid committed
suicide in March.

A number of associates and friends of the Bondi officers have since
been charged with drugs offences.

Dilorenzo has consistently denied either using or supplying
drugs.

The Herald contacted Mr John Dilorenzo, who has acted as a spokesman
for his brother Anthony. However, he did return not the call.
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