TUSSLE FOR DRUG TSAR’S FLASH RIDE
A BITTER legal wrangle over a drug baron’s $240,000 Lamborghini has taken a surprise twist.
An accountant’s claims to own the car appear to have suffered a blow after two witnesses came forward to swear it was sold by her former defacto partner.
Nelli Gennad’evna Erchova, 50, from Helensvale, has gone to the Supreme Court in a bid to claim the 1991 black Lamborghini Diablo, with Queensland registration DIABLO, as her own.
Ms Erchova, also known as Nelli Robertson, said the car was a gift to her from her defacto partner, Rick Mayne, now deceased.
Ms Erchova told the court she was given the car on July 7, 2008, her 40th birthday, but it “went missing or was stolen” from Mr Mayne’s Southport workshop “between July 10 and July 17, 2010”.
She said she did not believe Mr Mayne would have sold the car without her knowledge.
Ms Erchova did not call police to report it stolen until after she saw it on the TV news when the Pimpama home of cannabis kingpin Justin Corke was raided by police in 2014.
The car was seized by the state under proceeds of crime laws after it was found during the raid.
Corke claims he bought it from car dealer Terrence Thornbury in late May or early June 2010.
In a surprise twist in court this week, Mr Mayne’s ex-wife Janice Lucielle Stewart, from Arundel on the Gold Coast, told state government lawyers that Mr Mayne told her he had sold the car in 2010.
“It was getting too old and expensive to run and … he needed the money,” Ms Stewart told the court, in a sworn statement filed on Wednesday on behalf of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
Ms Stewart’s statement was supported by her son Donald, who swore Mr Mayne sold the car through Terrence Thornbury. Thornbury is serving a prison sentence for cannabis trafficking, but in 2010 he was running “Smick Car Sales”.
Donald Stewart told the court Mr Mayne told him a tow truck was organised by Thornbury to pick up the Lamborghini.
“I do not believe Mr Mayne gave the Lamborghini to Ms Erchova because he sold it,” Mr Stewart swore in his statement filed in court.
The case returns to court on Tuesday, when Thornbury and Corke have been summonsed to appear for examination by lawyers for the state government.