Christopher Flannery became a hitman after spending time in prison. Photo/News Corp Australia
Christopher Flannery became a hitman after spending time in prison. Photo/News Corp Australia
Known as Mr Rent-a-Kill, he is suspected of killing 14 people as a hitman in Sydney and Melbourne before mysteriously disappearing.
What happened to Christopher Flannery has become one of Australia's most enduring crime mysteries.
Tomorrow marks 32 years since his disappearance and police are still no closer to the truth about what happened to Mr Rent-a-Kill.
The theories from Sydney and Melbourne underworld figures about what happened to Flannery after he vanished on May 9, 1985 range from being killed with a meat cleaver before his body was mulched and scattered to being hidden in a concrete foundation somewhere in Sydney.
More than 30 years on, the story of Flannery's rise from bouncer to infmamous hitman across Australia's two biggest cities is one that continues to captivate.
In the 1970s, Flannery was jailed on an outstanding warrant in Victoria over a suspected rape.
When he was released from prison he became a bouncer at a St Kilda club in Melbourne's southeast, but soon became a contract killer willing to murder for the right price.
It has been reported he killed as many as 14 people, including Victorian barrister and businessman Roger Wilson in 1980.
Mr Wilson's body was never found, but police alleged Flannery, along with John Henry Williams and Mark Alfred Clarkson, rammed Wilson off the road while he was driving and abducted him. It was alleged Flannery shot Wilson.
The trio were arrested and charged with the murder but all three were later acquitted.
When Flannery left the court a free man, police arrested him straight away over the murder of Sydney brothel owner Raymond 'Lizard' Locksley.
Locksley was murdered on May 11, 1979 in Menai, in Sydney's south.
During Flannery's trial in 1982, the jury couldn't reach a verdict so the case was adjourned for two year.
Peter Grabosky in the book Crime in the Digital Age, wrote that when the trial was due to start in January 1984, GP Geoffrey Edelsten gave Flannery a medical certificate deeming him too unwell for stand trial so he could avoid a particular judge.
In 1990, Edelsten was jailed for a year for perverting the course of justice and also hiring Flannery to assault a former patient. Flannery was later acquitted of the murder of Locksley.
Christopher Flannery was part of Sydney's seedy underworld. Photo/News Corp Australia
His move to Sydney's underbelly
Flannery, who was married with children, moved to Sydney from Melbourne and became a body guard in 1984.
He would become a major part of the gang wars gripping Sydney at the time and was embroiled in the attempted murder of undercover cop Michael Drury.
Darren Goodsir, in his book, Line of Fire: The inside story of the controversial shooting of undercover policeman Michael Drury, wrote Drury had charged Flannery's friend Alan Williams after an undercover drug raid.
Flannery tried to bribe Drury - through crooked cop Roger Rogerson - to drop the charges but the officer refused.
Williams then allegedly gave Flannery and Rogerson $50,000 each to kill Drury. Drury was shot twice through his kitchen window but survived.
Drury was in a coma for almost two weeks, and when he woke, he had a strong suspicion as to who tried to kill him.
Four years after Mr Rent-a-Kill disappeared, Rogerson - who in 2016 was found guilty of the murder of Sydney student Jamie Gao - was charged in relation to the attempted murder of Drury for conspiring with Mr Rent-a-Kill and Williams. Rogerson was later acquitted.
Williams confessed to police about organising the attempted murder.
About six months after Drury was shot in Januray 1985, just months before Flannery disappeared, there was an attack on Flannery's home in Turrella in Sydney's south. Shots were fired at his home as Flannery and his wife walked towards the house.
According to the Line of Fire, Rogerson was seen near Flannery's house in the days after the attack. He was interviewed by police, and released and has never been charged in relation to Flannery's disappearance.
Roger Rogerson during the trial for the murder of Jamie Gao. Picture: Stephen Cooper. Photo/News Corp Australia
Mr Rent-a-Kill's last job
In the month before Flannery disappeared he was sent on one last job to kill underworld figure Tony 'Spaghetti' Eustace.
Sixteen days later Flannery disappeared on his way to a meeting with his boss George Freeman. After his car wouldn't start, Flannery's boss told him to take a taxi instead.
That was the last known contact of Mr Rent-a-Kill.
A coroner investigating the death found in 1997 that he was likely the victim of murder and believed Rogerson had information about it.
The crooked cop told current affairs program, Sunday, that Flannery was "a complete pest" and didn't do what he was told.
