Notorious killer cop dies aged 83
Notorious killer cop Roger Rogerson has died aged 83 after suffering a brain aneurysm in his prison cell.
The former decorated detective was rushed to hospital on Thursday night after falling ill in his cell at long Bay prison, where he was serving a life sentence.
The 83-year-old was taken to Prince of Wales Hospital in Randwick where his life support was turned off on Friday morning.
Rogerson died about 11pm Sunday night.
Born in 1941, Rogerson began his long career with the NSW Police Force when he was just 17.
In his early years he was deemed a charming, smart and focused officer and quickly climbed the ranks.
He worked on some of the country’s most high-profile cases, culminating in being awarded the highest police accolade - the Peter Mitchell Award for the arrest of escaped armed robber Gary Purdey.
Years later, his career fell apart.
He was sentenced to life in prison after he murdered student and drug dealer, 20-year-old Jamie Gao in 2014.
Rogerson - who was 73 at the time - and former corrupt cop Glen McNamara lured Gao into a Rent-A-Space storage unit in Padstow before shooting him twice.
They planned to sell the $18 million worth of methamphetamine in Gao’s possession when he was murdered.
However, his body washed up onshore in Cronulla a few days later, eventually leading to their conviction.
Rogerson was also charged with the attempted assassination of police officer Mick Drury but was acquitted by a jury.
He shot and killed heroin dealer Warren Lanfranchi during a police meeting in which he was disarmed in Chippendale in June 1981.
Lanfranchi’s girlfriend Sallie-Anne Huckstepp spent years lobbying police and the media to prove he had been murdered.
In 1986, her body was found in a pond in a Centennial Park.
Rogerson was dismissed from the police force in 1986 after the Police Tribunal upheld seven misconduct charges against him.
More than a decade later he was sentenced to 12 months in jail for lying to the Police Integrity Commission in 1999.
Throughout his decades-long career he was found to have fabricated evidence, bribery, drug-dealing and corruption.
