Madafferi’s client Mo Abou-Eid, a financial planner with ties to Melbourne underworld figure Mick Gatto and his associate John Khoury, had called three times in one night demanding payment in cash for “the boys”.
These messages are just part of the gangland influence over the chief executive of the small ASX-listed company detailed in a company report that has been uncovered by this masthead. According to a report prepared by KPMG for Dubber, drawn from emails, text messages and a ledger of the trust fund, more than $90 million was funnelled into the trust account between 2016 and 2024. Almost $75 million came from money raised from Dubber’s unknowing shareholders in various capital raising.
Those payments include $200,000 to John Khoury at Star Casino in 2019 who at that time was banned from gambling in casinos in Sydney and Melbourne due to police concerns. Some of these deals include people with no links to any gangland activities. This includes private lenders who provide lines of credit to people at high-interest rates who are known to provide short-term loans to start up businesses around Melbourne. Others are property developers who appear to have been conducting separate business with McGovern and Madafferi.According to the report, a month after the April 2020 capital raising, Abou-Eid texted McGovern: “Looking to sell 2m shares at $1.
“I can tell you that Mick Gatto has nothing to do with this. He has nothing to do with Dubber or Madafferi and he’ll tell you that himself. He’s one million per cent not involved.”