Shocking twist after ‘revenge’ shooting of Lametta Fadlallah

The brazen hitmen tasked with the ‘revenge shooting’ of a Sydney gangster mum were paid at least half a million dollars for the hit, according to underworld figures, with the brutal nature of the attack motivated by revenge.

Lametta Fadlallah, 48, was brutally gunned down in the backseat of a Toyota 4WD at Panania, western Sydney, on Sunday.

Police are hunting four gunmen who unleashed 15 bullets through the windows of the car also hitting Amy Hazouri, 39, who had just finished blow-drying Ms Fadlallah’s hair for an engagement party at a nearby Lebanese restaurant they were both set to attend.

She will be laid to rest today under a heavy police guard at a funeral service at St Charbel’s Church in Punchbowl.

The funeral comes after underworld sources revealed the cost of the execution would have been at least $500k, and say the brutal nature of the killing means it wasn’t motivated by money, but revenge.

‘It was pretty graphic to tap the window and then to look them in the eyes … and that poor girl (in the front seat), she will never recover,’ they told The Sunday Telegraph.

‘That is why (it’s because) she was a snitch.’

It’s believed the was a four-man operation with police on the hunt for two shooters who were paid at least $100,000 each. 

The guns used to end the lives of Ms Fadlallah and Ms Hazzouri would have cost $25,000 each on top of the cost of multiple cars used in the hit. 

They said Ms Fadlallah’s days were numbered after she ‘snitched’ to authorities in order to protect a loved one.

Detectives are convinced Ms Fadlallah was the intended target and that Ms Hazouri was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Sitting in the front seat was a 16-year-old TikTok star with 100,000 followers and her 20-year-old boyfriend. The traumatised pair managed to escape the hail of gunfire.

One of the shooters pushed the teen’s head to one side while leaning through the window of the vehicle and pulled the trigger. She has struggled to eat or sleep since the tragedy.

Police say the 48-year-old had ‘past relationships with … known [criminal] identities’ and will probe whether that played a role in her death. 

Daily Mail Australia revealed on Wednesday Ms Fadlallah may have become a target after reluctantly talking to police about her past. 

When she learned someone she cared about was in serious trouble with the law, she reportedly contacted the NSW Crime Commission.

That decision made her a ‘marked woman’, Ms Fadlallah’s friend said.

In the months before she was shot dead Ms Fadlallah installed multiple high-tech security cameras at her Hendy Avenue home.

Those cameras are likely to have captured the moment she was ambushed in the driveway by shooters that are yet to be identified by police. 

‘I think she knew it was coming,’ the friend said. She was well aware of the price of speaking to police.

‘As it was put to me, the killers don’t think they have broken any rules to stay away from women and family because that’s not why she was targeted. She is dead because she snitched,’ a friend said.

‘She didn’t deserve to die… She was a good woman and did everything for everyone, but they’re the rules. In their eyes, that’s something worthy of being murdered for.’

Ms Fadlallah is understood to have been associated with underworld figures for years and was at one point married to Abraham Derbas in the 1990s.

He was a key member of the Telopea St Gang – coined after the Punchbowl, Western Sydney street which rose to infamy between 1998 and 2000 as a hornets’ nest of Middle Eastern gang activity.

Derbas is understood to have long since turned his back on a life of crime and has not been in a relationship with Ms Fadlallah for several years.

More recently Ms Fadlallah was the long term girlfriend of Kings Cross standover man Helal Safi – who was found dead in an apartment in Pendle Hill unit after a neighbour called for help at around 4am. 

The 45-year-old had been released from prison only weeks earlier, with police locating drug paraphernalia in the unit. 

The ‘major’ gangland player had close links to criminals and was feared among Sydney’s underworld. 

Detectives are investigating the links between Safi and Ms Fadlllah and other criminals she could have associated with – and whether she had information that others wanted to keep under wraps. 

Ms Fadlallah had been dating restaurant owner Adel Dayoub for a little over three months before she died, however the pair had been friends for about a year. 

Mr Dayoub is understood to be assisting police in their investigations with sources confirming he is not involved in the killings. 

Ms Fadlallah had been on her way to an engagement party at his restaurant when she was ambushed by gunmen last week.