User:SkyWriter/Morgan Ogg

Morgan Ogg (1963 - 2004) was a journalist and political adviser in Australia. He is best-known for his role as a police reporter for the Australian Associated Press in the early 1990s to expose corruption and malfeasance in the New South Wales Police Service. This reportage resulted in the creation of a special Royal Commission, the Wood Royal Commission, to investigate the increasingly scandalous situation.

Personal life

Morgan Samuel Ogg was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, the third of four sons. When he was four years old his family relocated to Gosford.

His father, Brian (who died of cancer in 1987, aged 51, from cancer), was a health inspector for the Milk Board. In 1966, when Ogg was three, his six-year-old brother, Wayne, drowned.

Ogg attended St. Edward's College, Gosford and Gosford High School.

Career

Ogg first accomplished a cadetship at the Central Coast Express, before relocating to London to work at the British national news agency, the Press Association, where he reportedly established contacts in the British Foreign Office, the Ministry of Defence and Buckingham Palace. He later returned to Australia when his first marriage failed and to further his career in his native land.

At the AAP, Ogg built and maintained a confidential working relationship with Glen Jones (an officer in the Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence). Jones was invaluable to Ogg, remaining anonymous and referred to only as "Mr Black" in Ogg's coverage of the mounting police corruption scandal which eventually led to the creation of the Wood Royal Comission

Last years

For the last two years of his life, Ogg worked as a senior staffer and researcher for the NSW Opposition Leader, John Brogden, quitting several months before his death.

Affiliations

Ogg worked closely but in a private capacity with the Homicide Victims Support Group.

Death

Morgan Ogg died of a heart attack at his Elizabeth Bay home on July 28, 2004, in the presence of his partner of 4 years, Sonia Lear. Ogg was also survived by his mother and two brothers.

Encomium

The former head of the NSW Cabinet office Gary Sturgess declared in the days after Ogg's death that he was not "[not] sure that there would have been a royal commission if it hadn't been for Morgan [Ogg]".