Ulladulla Harbour Foreshore Motel owner Charlie had a drug bust front row seat for half an hour on Tuesday morning but like other residents in Crescent Street was stunned when he heard gunshots.
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What unfolded was part of a police operation by Strike Force Idlewild, backed up by the State Protection Group’s Tactical Operations Unit, that saw 10 people arrested and 12 search warrants executed along the South Coast.
At five past, seven two men were sitting in a small car in Rotary Park, 30 metres from where Charlie was having his customary “morning cup of tea and a fag”, out front of his motel in Crescent Street.
“Several unmarked cars containing at least eight, maybe 10 police in helmets drove in quietly, then this thing like a refrigeration van came, four officers in that had rifles.
“They pulled up beside this little sedan the blokes were in.
Video: Ron Aggs, Milton Ulladulla Times
“The guys in the car were very big blokes, very tough and fit, Anglo Saxon appearance, blokes you would not mess with.
“Then I heard bang bang bang bang bang must have been about a dozen shots and yelling get outa the car, get outa the car and they ripped the doors open and dragged these guys out.
“But nobody was hurt - they would have been stun bullets, it sounded bloody real, not live ammo but made a lot of noise.
“It was an amazing operation, so smooth, extraordinarily synchronised, the cops were in so quietly and knew exactly what they were doing.
“There was nothing to be afraid of, they had these guys surrounded, they were going nowhere so I just watched the whole thing.
“They had a big dog with them.
“And there were these other guys with TV cameras on the spot who recorded and analysed the entire event.
“There were other coppers in suits, detectives.”
“There was nothing to be afraid of... so I just watched the whole thing."
- Witness Charlie
“No-one else came out and if you had only heard the shots and not seen it you might have just thought it was a bunch of school kids mucking around.”
That’s how it was for Charlie’s next door neighbour, Allan “who heard a few bangs but saw nothing”.
As she boiled her kettle beside the kitchen window two doors from the motel, Jacqui Mulligan had the advantage of a direct line of sight – “I saw the cars, heard a lot of screaming and the guys were taken away”.
Cannabis, cocaine, methamphetamine and pills with a street value or more than half-a-million dollars have been seized as part of co-ordinated raids in Ulladulla, Moruya, Batemans Bay and Nowra.
Wednesday May 18: Two men from Ulladulla, a Burrill Lake man, and a man and woman from Worrigee are among nine people charged as part of Strike Force Idlewild investigations into drug supply on the South Coast.
