FORMER USC ATHLETE WANTED BY AUSTRALIA FOR DRUG SMUGGLING

Owen Hanson, an ex-USC football and volleyball player, was arrested by the FBI and Australian federal police on suspicion of drug smuggling and money laundering

FBI agents and Australian federal police officers arrested Los Angeles real estate developer Owen Michael Hanson, 33, last Wednesday at the Park Hyatt Aviara Golf Club in Carlsbad, California and took him to the San Diego Metropolitan Correctional Center where he is being held on suspicion of drug smuggling and money laundering.

Hanson has been charged in federal court with one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine. Australia intends to extradite Hanson. A federal judge denied bail pending reconsideration at a later hearing.

On the same day (last Thursday in Australia) the New South Wales police arrested concert promoter Andrew McManus, 54, at the Melbourne airport while mobster Craig Haeusler,55, Kings Cross Attorney Michael Croke, 65, and Auburn pastry shop owner Zeki Atilgan, 32, were arrested in Sydney for the importation of 300 kilograms of cocaine into Australia and money laundering.

The Sunday Morning Herald reports:

In court on Friday, Assistant US Attorney Timothy Coughlin told the judge that Mr Hanson ordered a five-kilogram methamphetamine deal on Tuesday, a day before his arrest. That allegation is expected to be added to the existing charge against him.

Some of the case is built on Mr Hanson's numerous statements to an undercover federal agent, Mr Coughlin said. Those include statements that Mr Hanson had drug customers in Australia, that he was selling a kilogram of cocaine in Australia for $US125,000 ($176,241) and that he was trying to get a fake Mexican passport under an assumed name, the prosecutor said. Mr Hanson's wife is Mexican.

The prosecutor also said Mr Hanson told the agent that he took payment for a drug or gambling debt recently in the form of a sailing boat that he keeps in Newport Harbor and that he owns property in Costa Rica and Mexico.

The prosecutor outlined several transactions in recent months in which Mr Hanson allegedly wired hundreds of thousands of dollars to Mexican bank accounts, often in $US50,000 increments.

Mr Hanson also allegedly asked the agent if he was interested in laundering the proceeds from the money Mr Hanson was making in Australia, and offered the agent the use of a private investigator who obtained license-plate information and located debtors when needed.

The investigation in this case began in August 2011 when NSW police, acting on a tip, caught personal trainer and ex-cage fighter Sean Caroloan with a suitcase containing $702,000 cash at Sydney's Hilton Hotel. Caroloan claimed the cash belonged to his business partner, Owen Michael Hanson, who was investing it in Advanced Peptide Solutions, his weight loss business. But later McManus claimed the money was his and that it was to repay Hanson, who had fronted the money for a ZZ Top concert in Australia, that his company One World Productions had promoted.

However, Australian authorities said the money was proceeds from the trafficking of 300 kilograms of cocaine, and was to be laundered in Sydney and Las Vegas casinos. The cocaine came from Mexico via the U.S.

McManus has promoted Australian concert tours by Aerosmith, KISS, Fleetwood Mac, Lenny Kravitz and Chris Isaak.

Hanson won the 1998 USA Junior National Beach Volleyball Championship. He played on the USC volleyball team from 2001-04 and also was a tight end on the Trojan football team. Hanson resides in a plush Redondo Brach home. Among his possessions, Hanson owns a silver-plated AK-47.

Like so many otherwise law abiding businessmen, lawyers and other professionals before him, Hanson was lured into drug trafficking by the siren song of illegal drug profits.