John Dib,66,is the epitome of an Australian migrant success story,amassing his family’s estimated $643 million fortune over decades of striving,having transformed a sole Caltex outlet in Sydney’s Punchbowl into Australia’s largest independent chain of petrol stations.
If you have refuelled in Sydney,Melbourne or Canberra,you’ve likely helped build a fortune that has seen Dib rub shoulders with politicians and sponsor an NRL team.
John Dib,founder of the Metro Petroleum chain.Supplied
His son,George Dib,40,has also grown vast wealth selling what the business world calls fast-moving consumer goods. But where John’s cash cow is petrol,police suspect part of George’s business is drugs.
The Australian Federal Police outlined their suspicions in a letter to Colombian authorities saying:“George Dib is the[suspected] leader of an international criminal group involved in large-scale imports of cocaine,MDMA and other illicit substances.”
There is no suggestion that John or any other member of the Dib family has any involvement or have in any way assisted in his son’s suspected criminality.
George Dib has never been convicted of a crime and was acquitted a decade ago when charged with possession of a trafficable quantity of drugs in the ACT.
But this masthead has confirmed that investigators from federal agencies have pored over George Dib’s possible interactions with his Australian family’s booming business empire as they try to hold the 40-year-old to account from his haven in Lebanon.
‘George Dib jnr is a much-loved son of my brother,John,and nephew of myself.’
George Dib snr
Having gathered intelligence that makes George Dib one of Australia’s most significant organised crime targets for enforcement agencies,investigators have probed if he has ever exploited his unwitting relatives or any part of their business empire to shift or conceal his wealth.
The revelations of the designation and the probe are news to his family,which is not accused of any wrongdoing or in any way assisting George Dib’s suspected activity.
“George Dib jnr is a much-loved son of my brother,John,and nephew of myself,” said George Dib snr,who co-owns The Dib Group and Metro Petroleum chain with John.
“He has no current business relationship with The Dib Group of companies or with John,his father,or with me,his uncle,or to the best of our knowledge and belief with any other family members here in Australia.”
The targeting of the younger George Dib’s wealth is part of a years-long effort by Australian agencies to dismantle an international criminal empire allegedly responsible for multiple drug importations.
It also signifies a shift in Australian police tactics as they deal with a generation of suspected organised criminals who have sought to elude capture by moving offshore.
That strategy has already paid significant dividends,with Australian police convincing authorities in the UAE and Cyprus to arrest or deport key targets.
George Dib’s story has been uncovered by this masthead as part of an investigation into a group of suspected Australian organised crime bosses and their associates agencies’ efforts to dismantle the so-called Aussie Cartel.
Last week,this masthead and60 Minutes teamed with a coalition of investigative journalists to reveal how a massive leak of UAE land title data had enabled reporters to pinpoint the Dubai multimillion-dollar property acquisitions of Aussie Cartel members and associates,along with warlords,corruption suspects and corrupt political figures from around the world.
The property leak prompted sharp criticism of the UAE over its lax anti-money-laundering controls and highlighted its role as one of several Middle Eastern bases offering a degree of impunity for suspected organised criminals flooding the Australian drug market.
The revelations also prompted calls by former federal police officer turned anti-money-laundering expert John Chevis for more action by Australian authorities to stop dirty money leaving Australia.
While George Dib isn’t a Dubai property owner,serving and former law enforcement officials,along with an underworld figure close to Dib,confirmed that he had used Dubai as an operating hub before shifting to Lebanon,where he has suspected connections to senior government and military officials.
Tim O’Connor,the former director of operations at the NSW Crime Commission,says George Dib featured consistently as a suspect in major drug importation investigations and was regarded by law enforcement agencies as “a well-connected person who was regarded as a prominent member of the Aussie Cartel”.
A former federal investigator said George Dib was suspected to have cultivated connections to senior Lebanese officials to “tip him off about Australian law enforcement interest”.
A police file sighted by this masthead also warns that George Dib has connections to government officials in Australia,but does not specify who they are or where they work.
Tristan Waters admitted to conspiring to possess more than a tonne of cocaine.Supplied
The AFP’s lengthy pursuit of George Dib resulted in the recent jailing of his long-term associate,the formerly Dubai-based Canberra-born businessman Tristan Waters.
Waters was in connection to a $1.5 billion shipment of cocaine bound for Australia and seized in 2017.
George Dib and Waters have a long history together. In November 2008,Dib,then 24 years old,was under police surveillance in Canberra,and police alleged he was seen with a bag over his shoulder getting into a ute being driven by his mate,Waters.
The pair drove to a shopping centre where they were pulled over. At Dib’s feet,police found a bag containing a trafficable quantity of cocaine and MDMA.
Having been cautioned,Waters was offered the opportunity to call a friend or relative. He called his uncle,Egon Struss.
The judgment from that 2011 judge-only trial reveals that Waters would later helpfully offer that:“Struss was wanted by the police in relation to a number of matters,including drug-trafficking and either money laundering or ripping people off,stealing lots of money from all types of individuals including his family.”
Waters told the trial that his uncle had been sitting in the passenger seat earlier that day and that he had not seen Dib put the bag in the car. Waters said his uncle had since disappeared.
The possibility that it was Struss who had placed the bag of drugs in the car was key to the defence,and in the end,the case against Waters was dropped while the judge found Dib not guilty. Struss has no criminal convictions to this day,although police still believe he is an associate of Dib and Waters.
By 2016,Dib and Waters had left Australia for Dubai and were allegedly involved in large-scale drug importations and money laundering.
Court records show that the next year,one of the nation’s biggest tax frauds,the Plutus Payroll scandal,exposed Dib’s associates,Waters,Struss and the late Peter Larcombe as involved in the alleged laundering millions of dollars.
Larcombe,understood to be a close associate of Dib,had fled to Dubai in late 2015 allegedly with $17 million he had stolen from the tax fraud conspirators. He died in mysterious circumstances when he jumped from a Los Angeles car park in 2016.
At the time,he was connected to two major drug syndicates and was making millions laundering their dirty money through property deals in the ACT and Sydney. In early 2017,the tax fraud conspirators were picked up on phone taps planning to blame the fraud on Larcombe or Waters should the scheme collapse.
Months later,when major raids relating to the tax fraud were under way,underworld phones were running hot. Alex “Little Al” Taouil,the late Sydney standover man,texted that Larcombe prior to his death had been operating from Dubai with his “mates … George Dib&turstian[sic] big players who are closely aligned with commos[Comanchero outlaw bikie gang]”.
The standover man said that George Dib,who lived in Dubai and Lebanon,was “apparently on the run” and that “his dad owns all the Metro service stations”.
In its letter to Colombian authorities,the federal police implicated Dib in the 2017 shipment that recently saw Waters jailed,along with several other large importations.
“Dib moved from Australia to Europe or the Middle East in June 2015 to evade the attention of security agencies in Australia,” the federal police file alleges.
The decision of George Dib jnr to pursue a life of suspected crime despite being born into an exceedingly wealthy family has long intrigued detectives.
Police intelligence reports from 2008 first described how Dib’s family was building a thriving petrol station franchise business down Australia’s east coast,Metro Petroleum.
Since-retired investigators from the Australian Crime Commission (now renamed the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission),who briefed this masthead a decade ago,said an early investigative line of inquiry involved whether George Dib was using his access to his family members’ legitimate wealth without their knowledge to conceal his own activities.
Five official sources not authorised to talk told this masthead confidentially that federal agency investigators had recently revitalised efforts to trace George Dib’s assets.
There is no suggestion that John Dib or any other family member has any knowledge of or offered assistance for any of his son’s suspected unlawful activity.
John’s brother,George Dib snr,stressed that the Dib family and the “Dib Group and its related companies have not had any financial dealings with my nephew George since he left Australia approximately 10 years ago,including via overseas banks”.
Corporate records reveal that George Dib was last formally involved as a director of a family company,Dib Group Air Services,in 2014,having been appointed to the firm’s board in 2004.
His uncle,George Dib snr,said that while the company was established with the intention of providing travel services,he did “not know or recall whether it ever operated” prior to its deregistration in 2014.
Until 2016,ASIC records listed Dib’s address as that of his uncle George’s Illawong house.
George Dib snr said the family became aware that Dib was suspected of wrongdoing after media coverage “a few years ago” but had no knowledge about his activities.
While he insisted the family had severed all financial ties,George Dib snr made no secret they remained in contact.
Last week,he offered to call his nephew in Lebanon to pass on this masthead’s questions,before saying they were best handled by a lawyer.
John Silvester lifts the lid on Australia’s criminal underworld.
