A bustling French bistro with a cult following in South Yarra. <\/p>\n
A riverside restaurant and bar selling high-end cocktails on the water at Southbank.<\/p>\n
A glamorous, Italian-inspired lounge in a grungy Melbourne laneway frequented by celebrities including Drake and Gordon Ramsay.<\/p>\n
These three iconic establishments in the heart of Melbourne are part of what makes the city so special. <\/p>\n
But all three \u2014 France-Soir, SoHo and Bar Bambi \u2014 have been circled on a map by criminals wreaking havoc on the city in a way that we have never seen before.<\/p>\n
In the early hours of the morning, when the city and its suburbs are still dark, individuals as young as 15 are carrying out their end of a deal with organised crime groups to set fire to venues previously never targeted.<\/p>\n
Youths carrying machetes, jerry cans and phones to film their work take just seconds to carry out a firebombing \u2014 pour accelerant in, strike a match and run.<\/p>\n
Unlike the tobacco wars that have become so familiar to Melburnians, the targeting of long-established venues is \u201cpuzzling\u201d authorities and owners who say they have not been threatened or warned.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In April alone, the attacks are a near-nightly occurrence. Not all venues are refined eateries \u2014both the Men\u2019s Gallery and Kittens Strip Club have been hit on April 14 and 16, respectively.<\/p>\n
But all venues have one thing in common \u2014 the sale of liquor.<\/p>\n
As the map above shows, there is no other pattern to the offending. <\/p>\n
On April 15, the night after the Men\u2019s Gallery was targeted, The Albion Hotel in South Melbourne saw three separate fires lit around 3am.<\/p>\n
A night later, about 4am, the thriving Emerson nightclub in South Yarra was set alight.<\/p>\n
SoHo, on Southbank, was bombed by two teens, including one seen running from the venue as flames poured out. He was carrying a machete.<\/p>\n
Bar Bambi, in ACDC Lane, a venue hugely popular with sportspeople and local celebrities \u2014 and which Drake hired out last year when he visited Melbourne \u2014 was targeted. <\/p>\n
It would be set alight a week later.<\/p>\n
On April 23, France-Soir \u2014 a sophisticated French bistro on Toorak Road in South Yarra \u2014 was the target of a suspected arson attempt foiled by passersby who noticed a pair of individuals loitering with a jerry can.<\/p>\n
A distillery, 80 Proof in Keysborough, erupted in flames about 10.30pm on April 24.<\/p>\n
And on April 26, footage emerged of the moment arsonists jumped from a vehicle and set Bar Up alight. The popular Chapel Street venue was engulfed in flames around 5am and completely destroyed. <\/p>\n
There have been more than 20 attacks since February 4.<\/p>\n
The theory for what\u2019s behind the surge is simple. A message is being sent \u2014 either start stocking black market liquor or suffer the consequences.<\/p>\n
Responding to the frequency of crime in Melbourne on Friday, 3AW host Jacqui Felgate said: \u201cThe place is a ghetto\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t think of a time when Melbourne feels like more of a ghetto.\u201d<\/p>\n
Between nightly home invasions, thugs leaping from cars to assault people in the streets and machete attacks outside bustling cafes, it\u2019s hard to disagree.<\/p>\n
But this particular offence is something new.<\/p>\n
As recently as Monday, police were responding to another attempted arson attack on a licensed venue at Southbank \u2014 the busy pedestrian promenade that is hugely popular with tourists and locals.<\/p>\n
Two boys, aged 15 and 16, were seen putting on balaclavas and latex gloves outside Left Bank when police swooped in. Police found a sledgehammer and jerry cans inside a vehicle used by the pair.<\/p>\n
Detective Inspector Chris Murray, the man in charge of Victoria\u2019s arson and explosive squad, has had to take the extraordinary step of warning not only business owners but those who frequent night spots that it may not be safe to do so.<\/p>\n
He said the teens are used because of their age and that they are roped in through secure messaging apps by organised crime.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we generally see is this: individuals are responding to what the equivalent would be of Airtasker, being Crimetasker,\u201d he told the media. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey go and get paid to do a task that\u2019s offered by someone. Get paid a few hundred dollars.<\/p>\n
\u201cOften they don\u2019t even know who they\u2019re working for. That\u2019s the business model that we see. So they\u2019re being used.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we suspect is that these jobs are being tasked out to anyone, and probably the one common denominator is that there is someone sitting above who is pulling the strings.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re the ones we\u2019re interested in. These young kids are being used as cannon fodder for a few hundred dollars.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd when they do go to prison, I can tell you now they\u2019re not getting phone calls from the people who have put them up to it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ex-detective Charlie Bezzina said there\u2019s a clear shift away from tobacco.<\/p>\n
\u201cCriminal gangs are moving on from tobacco, now into alcohol; they\u2019ve obviously seen an easy dollar to be made.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact that they\u2019re engaging possibly the junior people, the youth, to get paid a small amount to conduct the arson attacks is so worrying.\u201d<\/p>\n
Melbourne Lord Mayor Nick Reece said it was \u201cold school gangsters using new school technology with online platforms \u2014 encrypted \u2014 being used to recruit people to undertake these tasks\u201d.<\/p>\n
Dr Marietta Martinovic, Associate Professor of Criminology and Justice at RMIT University, says gangs \u201cactively target structurally vulnerable youth, including some from migrant and refugee groups\u201d but \u201cdisadvantage and exclusion, not ethnicity alone, are the key risk factors\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cMarginalised adolescents facing poverty, racism, school exclusion, family stress and prior victimisation (are being recruited),\u201d she previously told news.com.au.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are groomed through friendship, material inducements, peer pressure and then coerced via debts, threats and shame.\u201d<\/p>\n