How Roger Rogerson charmed his way to become most notorious cop in Australia
In a new book, former colleague Duncan McNab chronicles how a charismatic one-time detective manipulated fellow officers and gangsters, until he was revealed as a ‘vile and vicious’ criminal
In 1984, Duncan McNab was a New South Wales police internal affairs investigator when a deathbed statement from undercover drug cop Michael Drury came across his boss’ desk. It implicated Roger Rogerson in Drury’s attempted execution at the behest of a heroin trafficker.
“Aw mate, it couldn’t be Roger, he’s too good a bloke,” the boss said.
McNab quit the force in dismay. It would take years for the police to get serious about bringing its shiniest (though far from its only) rotten apple undone.
More than three decades later, Rogerson now stands as both the definitive figure of police corruption in Australia and also arguably the best-connected figure ever to stalk the criminal underworld.
But as McNab now recalls, Rogerson was protected in large part by his aura within the police’s own ranks.
He was “utterly charming, very smart, a great conversationalist, witty, with great one-liners”, says McNab, a once starry-eyed colleague who remembers how others in the New South Wales criminal investigation bureau would be drawn to Rogerson and bask in some of that reflected charisma.
