THE EARLY YEARS OF TONY MOKBEL
Antonios Sajih Mokbel, known as Tony Mokbel, was born in 1965 in Kuwait to Lebanese parents. At the age of eight, his family made the move to Australia, seeking a new life. They settled in Melbourne’s northern suburbs, where Mokbel experienced a childhood marked by financial hardship.
As a teenager, Mokbel began his working life in a humble pizza shop owned by his brother. However, his ambitions quickly propelled him beyond those beginnings, and within six years, he had ascended to the helm of a lucrative drug operation.
INITIAL CRIMINAL RECORD
During the early 1980s, Mokbel’s criminal activities began to catch up with him. He faced a range of charges, including assault, making threats to kill, resisting arrest, and illegal firearm possession, setting the stage for his notorious future.
* Early 1980s: Mokbel is convicted of a variety of offences including assaults, threats to kill, resisting arrest, possessing a gun
* 1992: Sentenced to 12 months in jail for trying to bribe a County Court judge
* 1998: Convicted for amphetamine manufacturing
ESCAPE TO GREECE, DRUG TRAFFICKING AND MURDER CHARGES
* March 2006: Mokbel disappears while on bail during a trial over the importation of 2kg of cocaine and is sentenced in absentia to 12 years in prison, with a minimum of nine
* December 24, 2006: Mokbel arrives in Greece after fleeing Australia on a yacht – he hid in rural in Victoria for eight months before driving to WA to make his escape
* February 2007: Mokbel is charged over the 2004 murder of gangland patriarch Lewis Moran
* June 2007: He is arrested at a cafe in Athens and police apply to extradite him to Australia, later that month charged with a second murder – of kickboxer Michael Marshall in 2003
* 2009: The Marshall murder charge against Mokbel is dropped by prosecutors and a trial over the Lewis Moran murder begins, however a jury finds him not guilty
* 2011: Mokbel pleads guilty to two counts of trafficking a large commercial quantity of drugs, and incitement to import a prohibited import – known as Quills, Magnum and Orbital charges, relating to MDMA and methamphetamine trafficking – with details of his former murder charges revealed after a suppression order is lifted
* 2012: He is jailed for drug trafficking for 30 years with a minimum non-parole period of 22 years
MOKBEL’S APPEALS
* 2017: Mokbel files his first application to appeal his drug convictions
* 2019: He is stabbed in Barwon Prison and taken to hospital suffering a brain injury, the same year his former barrister Nicola Gobbo is publicly outed as a Victoria Police informer
* 2020: Appeal court quashes Mokbel’s cocaine conviction, known as the Plutonium charge, after prosecutors concede there had been a miscarriage of justice due to him being represented by Ms Gobbo, his sentence and conviction are set aside and a retrial is ordered
* 2021: Prosecutors file a notice of discontinuance for the cocaine trafficking retrial
* 2023: Mokbel’s total sentence is revised by the appeal court from 30 years, minimum of 22, to 26 years with a non-parole of 20, for the three remaining drug trafficking charges
* 2024: NSW Judge Elizabeth Fullerton issues judgment ahead of his appeal of remaining drug trafficking charges, saying police and Ms Gobbo perverted the course of justice in a joint criminal enterprise to take Mokbel down
* April 1, 2025: Mokbel applies for appeal bail due to delays in his long-awaited Lawyer X legal challenge being heard, the strength of his case and his poor physical health in custody
* April 4, 2025: Three judges grant Mokbel bail, his first taste of freedom since his arrest in Greece 18 years before, which is secured by a $1 million surety put up by his sister and that he must abide by 30 conditions
* September 2, 2025: Mokbel’s appeal on his remaining drug trafficking charges begins in Melbourne
* October 3, 2025: Victoria’s Court of Appeal delivers a split decision on his three remaining charges. He was acquitted over the Quills charges, ordered to face retrial on Orbital and lost his appeal of the Magnum brief. His bail was extended
* December 19, 2025: Prosecutors slammed by Mokbel’s lawyer after asking for more time to decide whether Mokbel will face a re-trial on his remaining drug trafficking charge
* February 6, 2026: Mokbel walks from Victoria’s Supreme Court a free man after the Director of Public Prosecutions announces the last charges hanging over him have been withdrawn and he will not face another trial over the Lawyer X offending
