EX-COP TRIES TO EVADE JUSTICE

Ray and Peter Mickelberg last night called on West Australian Sports Minister Bob Kucera to agree to fingerprinting to resolve his role in their framing for the Perth Mint swindle. They want to check if Mr Kucera's prints are on an unsigned draft statement he made about Peter's interrogation at his office in July 1982. "If he's got nothing to hide, there is no reason why he should not let us have his prints," Ray Mickelberg said after obtaining files owned by corrupt former detective Tony Lewandowski, who committed suicide in May last year. He said the documents would be sent to England for expert forensic testing to see if they could be linked to Mr Kucera.

A spokesman for Mr Kucera - who was a police sergeant in 1982 - said the minister would not comment. "It was more than 20 years ago and he views it as ancient history," he said. "He has already given evidence in court and he has nothing to add to that."

The brothers believe the documents will bolster their claim against the Government. Lewandowski confessed last year that he and former CIB chief Don Hancock had bashed Peter Mickelberg in Mr Kucera's office and fabricated confessions. Mr Kucera was not present during the bashing.

The Mickelbergs' lawyer, Martin Bennett, said the statement was stapled to a sketch of Mr Kucera's office and a timeline of events in Hancock's handwriting, suggesting the latter may have been coaching others on what to say in court. "The documents are consistent with after-event concoction. They suggest the Kucera statement needed to be in conformity with the bogus timeline written by Hancock," he said.

Ray and Peter Mickelberg, together with a third brother, Brian, were convicted in 1983 of stealing 68kg of gold - then worth $650,000 - from the mint the previous year. Ray Mickelberg served eight years of a 20-year sentence and Peter served six years of a 14-year term. However, the pair had their convictions quashed on their eighth appeal to the courts last year, with the West Australian Court of Appeal ruling there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice.

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