The FBI is said to have apprehended Comanchero chief Mark Buddle as he headed back to his base on the Cyprus border, making him Australia’s most sought man.
The Comanchero “global leader” recently traveled to Germany to meet with another international gang member after leaving his most recent safe haven in Cyprus.
Then, according to underworld sources, he returned via Turkey, a country where many Australian fugitives hide out, and FBI agents pounced as he attempted to re-enter Cyprus.
“Mark Buddle has been arrested.” One Sydney insider informed Daily Mail Australia that the guys were aware of it hours earlier.
When previous leader Mahmoud “Mick” Hawi was imprisoned for a fatal brawl at Sydney Airport in 2009, Buddle took over the Comancheros.
After becoming a person of interest in the 2010 murder of a security guard, Buddle left Australia for Dubai in 2016, where he established a new life with his partner Melanie Ter Wisscha.
The 44-year-old fled Dubai last year shortly after a video of him shoving vacationers at a resort pool circulated online.
Since then, he is said to have moved around a lot of nations until landing in Cyprus.
Police were unable to establish if Buddle had been taken into custody by the FBI despite the fact that the AFP has a life order for his arrest.
The criminal boss, who was born in Sydney and was raised on a Maroubra housing commission estate before joining the Comanchero, is said to have moved to Cyprus in the middle of 2021.
His tenure hasn’t been low-key, though; he frequently makes local headlines and was on the main page of the Cyprus newspaper Kibris Gercek last year.
According to the news source, Buddle made the decision to dwell in Northern Cyprus after meeting with powerful lawmakers, who gave him resident status till August 6, 2022.
The reason given for the resident permit was because he would bring ‘high income to the country’.
The Bakirkoy Gazetesi claimed Buddle – said to be worth $100million – arrived on the island on a 30-day visa before he got a resident’s permit.
The newspaper article report claimed Buddle was under the protection of a group of ‘business people’ in the north of Cyprus, as well as ‘official authorities’.
‘He hasn’t made any investments, but there are other developments with him…It is now certain that someone inside the state is protecting (him),’ the newspaper stated.
According to recent reports, Buddle was suffering greatly from the exile lifestyle since he was cut off from his daughters, who were reportedly living apart from him in Australia as the Commander of the Comancheros’ Australian section.
In 2016, Buddle left Australia and gave Sydney commander Alan Meehan, national sergeant-at-arms Tarek Zahed, and national president Mick Murray control of the Comanchero in Australia.
Zahed amazingly escaped an attempted murder in May at the Body fit Gym in Auburn, where he had been shot many times with more than 20 bullets discharged.
He was taken into surgery with 10 bullet wounds to his head and body after being transported to the hospital in a life-threatening situation. One bullet went straight through his eyeball.
His brother Omar, 39, was killed during the shooting.
With Zahed recovering from his injuries and Murray facing charges in Victoria, Meehan has been named Comanchero national president.