MOKBEL FIGHTS FOR LIFE
DRUG lord Tony Mokbel was last night fighting for his life in hospital after a brutal Lara prison ambush.
The 53-year-old crime kingpin is in intensive care after he was stabbed deep inside the maximum security Barwon Prison.
Mokbel and a 31-year-old man were set upon in a vicious onslaught by two inmates in a mainstream unit at 2.45pm. It is understood the other man was stabbed when he rushed to Mokbel’s aid.
The incident unfolded just 15 minutes before the jail was to go into lockdown for the day, with prisoners making their way back to their cells.
Detectives were inside the jail late into the evening as part of a major inquiry. CCTV is ex- pected to be crucial. Prisoner witness accounts may be scarce because of the jail system’s heavily-enforced code of silence.
Mokbel was stabbed in the upper-body with what is believed to have been a shiv, a homemade prison knife. It is not known whether any weapons have been recovered.
The motive remained unclear last night. There was speculation the attack could be connected to revelations Mokbel intervened in a standover racket operating at the prison.
It has been reported that Mokbel — who is eyeing freedom as part of the Lawyer X scandal — disrupted an extortion scheme run by a group of Pacific Island inmates.
He was flown direct to Royal Melbourne Hospital in an air ambulance.
A hospital spokeswoman last night said Mokbel was in a critical condition.
The other man injured was taken by road ambulance to Geelong hospital.
Earlier, paramedics and prison officers — among them members of the security and emergency services group — were seen crowded around Mokbel as he lay on a stretcher on grassland at the complex.
Eight paramedics were working on the stricken criminal as he lay between an air ambulance and a road ambulance.
Mokbel was bare chested and wearing shorts, with paramedics working to treat wounds to his upper body and stomach.
Mokbel is regarded as being among the most powerful organised crime figures in Australia, building a $100 million drug syndicate at the height of his outlaw career.