August 10, 2011
MELBOURNE (AFP) - Notorious Australian gangland matriarch Judy Moran was Wednesday jailed for 26 years for orchestrating the execution-style murder of her brother-in-law as he drank coffee at a busy suburban cafe.
The 66-year-old was locked up for the slaying of Des "Tuppence" Moran, who died from multiple gunshot wounds to the head in Melbourne in June 2009.
The man who fired the seven shots that killed Moran, Geoffrey "Nutts" Armour, was also sentenced to 26 years.
Des Moran, 61, was a brother of Judy Moran's husband Lewis Moran, a member of the so-called Carlton crew who was gunned down while enjoying a beer at a Melbourne club in 2004.
Judy's children Jason and Mark were also shot dead in the city's gangland war, which claimed about 30 lives after it began in the 1990s and was dramatised in the hit Australian series "Underbelly".
After she was sentenced, Moran, who is in ailing health and uses a motorised wheelchair, proclaimed her innocence from the dock.
"Sir, you are wrong. I am innocent," yelled the grandmother, who was the getaway driver for Armour and stashed the gun, a wig and a jacket worn by him in a hidden safe.
Sentencing judge Lex Lasry called the crime "appalling".
"This was an appalling murder both in the way it was carried out and in the public manner which it occurred," the judge said.
"This was a deliberate and brutal killing. There is of course no sign of remorse on your part."
