Every business needs a succession plan. The Comancheros motorcycle club had announced their arrival in New Zealand on Instagram in 2018, wearing gold chains and riding gold-plated Harleys.
The Australian newcomers were a threat to the established gangs and weren’t shy about telling everyone.
But by the following year, the executive leadership team of the Comancheros were all behind bars on money laundering and organised crime offences from a covert police investigation called Operation Nova.
With the club’s president (Pasilika Naufahu,) vice-president (Tyson Daniels,) treasurer (Jarome Fonua) and founding member Vetekina Naufahu remanded in custody, someone had to step up in their absence.
The mantle of leadership was passed over in a phone call from Fonua, inside Mt Eden prison, to another member on the outside.
Fonua: “Um, from now on, Young is in charge … he’s commander now … you’re the sarge”.
The newly promoted sergeant-at-arms replied: “We’ll run the ball for the brothers while they’re inside”.
“Young” was the Seiana Fakaosilea and he was a big deal, literally.
Tipping the scales at around 180kg, he was one of the six founding members of the gang’s New Zealand chapter in the infamous Instagram post.
Just 20 years old, Fakaosilea was now the gang’s acting national commander.
At the time of the prison call, in June 2020, he was already the target of another covert police investigation.
Courtesy of a bug hidden inside an unassuming Toyota Corolla, police recorded Fakaosilea talking in March 2020 about importing “600 keys” from South Africa.
A few hours later, Fakaosilea was overheard talking to a friend in the Mongols gang (who also happened to be under surveillance) and showed him a photo on his phone screen.
“Oh that’s a big one,” the Mongol said.
Fakaosilea replied: “I told you, you didn’t want me back in the game, brother.”
To the police listening to the bugged conversations, the mention of “600 keys” from South Africa was a reference to a planned importation of 600kg of drugs, most probably methamphetamine.
Despite his relative youth, Fakaosilea clearly had the criminal contacts to pull off such large-scale drug smuggling.
In some respects, he was just following in the footsteps of his family.
The previous year, Fakaosilea’s sister and brother, Selaima and Ulakai, had been convicted of being involved in New Zealand’s biggest drug importation of 500kg of meth on to 90 Mile Beach in 2016.
That was a mindblowing discovery for police and, importantly, the first time that the full impact of the influence of the Australian “501s” on the New Zealand criminal world was felt.
A potential lead on the Comancheros making arrangements for 600kg of drugs to be imported into the country could not be ignored, so Detective Sergeant Jason Hunt was put in charge of Operation Cincinnati.
Their first job was to find out who Fakaosilea was talking to about the “600 keys” from South Africa, someone referred to as “Mango”.
In the same conversation which kickstarted the investigation, the mystery caller had talked about his international contact wanting to use “our door” to get the drug shipment into the country.
Fakaosilea cut across “Mango” to say: “We come see you … bye bye”.
The next day, the tracking device in Fakaosilea’s car led police straight to the door of Richard Pelikani in Mangere.
He belonged to two street gangs, Crips Family and Two Eight Brotherhood, which had close ties and interchangeable membership. Police intelligence showed Pelikani also had ongoing associations with a wide range of well-known criminals and was held in high regard.
Fakaosilea took him to see “Mango”. The tracking device in the Toyota Corolla showed they drove across town to East Tamaki, and the car was stopped outside a particular address for 40 minutes.
“Mango” was a man called Jie Huang, more often called Nick, and the police had never heard of him before. Over the coming months, Fakaosilea and Pelikani met with Huang many times.
The police theory was that Huang had a source overseas who could supply large amounts of methamphetamine, while Fakaosilea and Pelikani had the “door” - or a corrupt insider - to get the drugs through border security.
While waiting for the supposed importation of 600kg from South Africa, it became clear that Huang was already supplying Fakaosilea with drugs, which in turn he was distributing through the Comancheros.
To become patched members of the Comancheros, “nominees” - referred to as prospects in other gangs - have to earn the trust of the club and follow orders. In other words, they do the dirty work so the bosses can keep their hands clean.
Fakaosilea’s syndicate included a patched member, whose name is suppressed currently, and “nominees” - or prospects who want to join the gang - Diamond Katoa, Rhakim Mataia and Samuel Halaholo who were moving meth around Auckland as well as MDMA, the party drug more often called Ecstasy.
Another drug dealing associate was Lemeki Namoa, a childhood friend of Fakaosilea, who had left the prestigious Sacred Heart College as head boy with potential careers in law and professional rugby.
Like any business enterprise, the Comancheros were looking to expand into more lucrative markets.
Auckland is the cheapest place to buy methamphetamine in New Zealand, and the price becomes progressively more expensive the further south you travel. So the Comancheros started selling in Christchurch.
On the 11th of March 2020, the police intercepted another conversation inside the silver Toyota Corolla, this time between Fakaosilea and someone called Luke Mathers. Fakaosilea asked if Mathers wanted some methamphetamine.
Fakaosilea: “Ah it’s f***en full-on bro. Do you want it or not?”
Mathers: “Yeah.”
Fakaosilea: “Sweet I’ll send it down. Back in the game, cuz.”
The police knew all about Mathers. He was a 501 deportee from Australia who had become the president of the Christchurch chapter of the Rebels motorcycle gang.
Fakaosilea switched the conversation to 300kg of drugs that were intercepted in Australia.
Mathers joked that the shipment was probably tainted with coronavirus. “That’s the whole thing bro,” said Fakaosilea, “this is the f***en big headache, bro.”
As the Covid-19 pandemic moved across the globe in the early part of 2020, New Zealand progressively shut its borders to tourists, as well as shipping and air freight, from countries deemed to be high risk.
This was to slow the spread of the highly infectious virus, but also made it very difficult to smuggle drugs into the country. Within two weeks of Fakaosilea’s complaint to Mathers, it became nearly impossible.
New Zealand went into a complete lockdown on March 25, 2020, when no one was allowed to leave their homes, except to buy groceries, in a bid to “eliminate” the virus.
“Stay home to save lives” was the government motto, and while it worked, the elimination strategy brought the economy to a grinding halt - as well as the market for drugs.
Not only was it impossible for drugs to be imported into the country, with everyone supposed to be staying at home, the limited amount of meth already inside the border was hard to sell without being caught.
The law of supply and demand meant the price skyrocketed during the 2020 lockdown. An ounce of meth which might have cost $5000 on average, or as low as $2500, was now $10,000.
The coronavirus wasn’t just a headache for Fakaosilea and other crooks. The lockdown meant Operation Cincinnati also ground to a halt, unable to conduct surveillance or any other investigative techniques, for fear of being caught.
Nearly two months later, on May 13, 2020, the strict lockdowns ended and everybody was able to get back to work. Including the Comancheros.
Before the Covid lockdown, the Fakaosilea’s nominees would drive to Hamilton and book flights to Christchurch under assumed names, then return as soon as possible after taking the drugs to a safe house.
After the Covid lockdown, with domestic air travel still restricted, the Comancheros decided to drive all the way to Christchurch.
At about 2pm on August 4, 2020, Rhakim Mataia and his partner rented a Toyota Rav4 at Auckland airport and drove home to the North Shore.
Mataia then picked up Diamond Katoa and together they visited a senior patched member, higher in the pecking order, at his home in Westmere.
He handed them a package, and the pair picked up Mataia’s partner before driving through the night to Wellington - a distance of 643km along State Highway 1- and made it in time to board the Interislander ferry leaving at 9am to Picton.
Also crossing the Cook Strait that morning was the Operation Cincinnati team.
Once the Comanchero crew had parked their car in the bowels of the ferry, then headed upstairs to the public lobby, the police executed a covert search warrant and broke into the Toyota Rav4 rental.
In the boot of the vehicle was a grey duffle bag. Inside was a black bra, a black Tommy Hilfiger jumper and a red New World carry bag. Inside the New World bag, was a grey towel wrapped around two clear plastic Sistema containers.
The containers were photographed and opened so a sample could be taken from the white crystal powder inside. This is a step referred to by police as “proving product”, so in any eventual prosecution, the defendants cannot claim it was another substance.
Everything was put back into the Rav4 just as the police found it before they returned to the public area of the lobby to continue their surveillance on the Diamond Katoa and Rhakim Mataia.
After disembarking the Interislander at Picton, the Comancheros - blissfully ignorant of the police surveillance - kept driving south until they reached Christchurch.
At 5.05pm Mataia contacted Luke Mathers by using the encrypted Wickr app on his phone.
Mathers asked if it was the “same bloke” as last time, and once confirmed, told the Comancheros to meet him on Thackers Quay in the central suburb of Woolston.
The address was familiar to the police: it was the Rebels’ gang pad.
Mataia and Katoa parked outside at 6pm and were warmly embraced by Mathers and Jarrad Singer, another patched member of the Rebels.
Mataia retrieved the New World bag from the Toyota RAV4, then all four men went inside the Rebels headquarters, which was protected by a heavy sliding gate.
Nine minutes later, the Comancheros duo were seen leaving the address. As soon as they were in the rental, Katoa sent an encrypted message on Wickr to tell Fakaosilea that Mathers would pay for the methamphetamine later that night.
At 6.11pm, Fakaosilea called them back - just as the police stopped the RAV4 and arrested Katoa and Mataia.
Almost simultaneously, the police Armed Offenders Squad raided the Rebels’ pad on Thackers Quay.
Security camera footage shows Mathers walking outside, through the gate then stopping suddenly, turning around and sprinting back to the building. He only just made it through the closing gap before the gate clanked shut. Eighteen minutes later, Mathers and Singer came out with their hands up.
Police executing the search warrant found two loaded pump action shotguns hidden under a mattress, some smashed cellphones, as well as the red New World bag and the two plastic Sistema containers left on the kitchen bench.
Earlier that day, when the police did the covert search on the Interislander, the containers had been full of meth.
Now, they were empty - and wet. Mathers and Singer had spent the 18 minutes before their surrender trying to destroy evidence, snapping their phones and tipping the methamphetamine down the sink.
Their efforts were in vain given the proof already collected by the police but, just in case, Operation Cincinnati arranged for a sample of wastewater to be collected from the Christchurch treatment plant.
Testing by ESR scientists established a massive spike in methamphetamine levels which was consistent with the raw drugs being dumped into the wastewater system, as compared to average baseline readings from human consumption.
While all this was going down, back in Auckland, Fakaosilea moved quickly to warn his business partners that the police were on to them.
He drove to Richard Pelikani’s home in Mangere at 7pm, then Jie “Mango” Huang’s home in East Tamaki about an hour later, presumably to inform them about the arrests of Diamond Katoa and Rhakim Mataia, as well as the raid on the Rebels pad.
The trio might have expected the police to kick down the door any minute.
But the police waited. A decision was made to keep Operation Cincinnati running, for the time being, with the rationale of waiting for the supposed 600kg import to arrive and catch them all red-handed.
So the police kept watching, and waiting. A few weeks later, Katoa and Mataia were released on electronically monitored bail and were overheard talking about their arrests to Taniela Mafileo, another Comanchero nominee, courtesy of another listening device planted in a different vehicle.
Katoa: “Whose phones were tapped?”
Mafileo: “The one he’s on now.”
Katoa: [Laughs]
Mataia: “I’m dumb, but I’m not that dumb … everyone um there’s … big investigation apparently it’s still going on … they’re trying to tie everything together … just to let you know.”
A few weeks turned into a few months, but the 600kg shipment never came. The National Organised Crime Group decided to wrap up Operation Cincinnati and terminated the investigation on December 2, 2020.
Seiana Fakaosilea was one of 12 individuals arrested that day. When police searched his Dairy Flat home, they found all the tools of a surveillance-conscious criminal: an encrypted Ciphr phone, multiple security cameras able to be viewed on widescreen televisions in his lounge and bedroom, as well as a “bug” detector to scan for listening devices.
Asked how he knew Luke Mathers in Christchurch, Fakaosilea told police: “I’m friends with him on Instagram” as the Rebels president knew his brother back in Australia.
Other than the odd comment like that, Fakaosilea declined to give a formal statement to the police, as it is customary among gang members to follow the criminal code of silence.
Eighteen months later, he uttered one word: guilty.
On the eve of the trial scheduled in the High Court at Auckland in July 2022, Fakaosilea was among 10 of the Operation Cincinnati defendants who admitted a raft of serious drug offences before the jury was even sworn in.
Standing in the dock, the acting national commander of the Comancheros was barely recognisable and not because of the masks everyone was wearing for Covid protection.
Fakaosilea was half the man he used to be; he lost about 80kg while waiting for trial.
While he admitted several charges of possession of methamphetamine for supply, Fakaosilea resolutely maintained his innocence of the charges of plotting to import the 600kg of meth from South Africa, as well as the other, unquantified drug shipment from Fiji.
“While the Crown and police have some things right,” his defence lawyer Jasper Rhodes told the jury, “they have an enormous amount wrong.”
One person on the jury agreed. Otherwise, it was a clean sweep for Crown prosecutor Robin McCoubrey, with majority verdicts of 11-1 finding Fakaosilea, Richard Pelikani and Jie Huang guilty of two counts of conspiracy to import Class-A drugs.
At a hearing in the High Court at Auckland on Thursday, Justice Neil Campbell gave Fakaosilea and his “business partner” Pelikani prison sentences of 13 years and two months and four years and eight months, respectively for their drug offending.
“You organised the buying and selling of methamphetamine on a commercial scale. You directed various subordinates in the drug syndicate … In that sense, it is accurate to say that you were the head of the syndicate,” Justice Campbell told Fakaosilea.
“There is an irresistible inference from the duration, frequency and quantities involved that you expected to profit substantially from the drug enterprise.”
With Fakaosilea’s downfall, all but one of the six foundation members of the New Zealand Comancheros have been convicted of drugs or money laundering offences since their infamous Instagram post.
Despite the setbacks, no one in law enforcement is naive enough to believe the gang is not already back in business.
