Carter initially denied the charge but in October it emerged he’d changed his plea to guilty.

The following month, the 25-year-old missed a court appearance because he was in an overseas rehabilitation centre, leading a magistrate to blast his no-show as “absolutely unacceptable”.

His lawyer, Daniel Grippi, at the time said Carter was suffering “significant stress and anxiety”.

Court documents show the cocaine incident occurred a week after his final game for the Roosters, when Carter went out with team mates Kenny-Dowall, Mitchell Pearce, Liam Knight, Tony Unsworth and an unidentified male. The group caught an Uber to the Ivy where the unknown man shook hands with security staff and introduced Carter, who was then directed to an entry line that required no identification to be scanned.

About 1am, Carter was observed by police in a corner of the club speaking on his phone before Kenny-Dowall approached him and was passed .29 of a gram of cocaine.

Detectives were standing approximately 1.5 metres away and arrested Kenny- Dowall, who refused to co-operate other than to say he got the drugs from “a mate”.

Carter was recorded on CCTV leaving the club and called Pearce and Knight. Subsequent police inquiries showed Carter’s phone also contacted Roosters Executive Assistant Cathy Kelly, who the next morning called Roosters CEO Joe Kelly, Roosters Group CEO Scott McDonald, Kenny-Dowall and a sports psychologist, among others.

The Roosters announced on June 7 Carter had been released from his contract. Two days later, Carter left Australia and told a friend he was attending The Cabin in Chiang Mai, Thailand, for rehabilitation.

Kenny-Dowall, who now plays for the Newcastle Knights, was previously spared a conviction after he pleaded guilty to possessing cocaine at the nightclub. He was placed on a 12-month good behaviour bond in June.

Two men involved in a dramatic arrest in Centennial Park last week have been charged with the supply of almost one tonne of cocaine, carrying an estimated street value of $360 million.

Aukuso Junior Paulo, 34, from Crows Nest, and Kigi Kamuta, 39, from The Ponds, were two of three men arrested while travelling with two semi-automatic weapons and $650,000 in cash, during a planned police operation in the eastern suburbs park.

A third man, Royce Royal Hura, 27, was also arrested at the scene.

Both Mr Hura and Mr Paulo are former players of the Parramatta Eels rugby league club.

Following their arrest, all three men were charged with possessing an unauthorised pistol, possessing ammunition without holding a licence, knowingly dealing with proceeds of crime and participating in a criminal group.

However, on Monday, strike force investigators laid further charges against Mr Paulo and Mr Kamuta for the supply of 900 kilograms of cocaine.

The “far more serious charge” was apparently news to the lawyer for Mr Paulo, Nick Hanna, who had the intention of applying for bail on behalf of the 34-year-old at Central Local Court on Tuesday.

“On arriving in court, I was informed first by a journalist and then by the prosecution that a new charge had been laid against Mr Paulo,” Mr Hanna told the court, later adding that “not even the DPP were given notice of the charge until Tuesday morning”.

“It is bewildering that this charge was not filed and served on the defence yesterday … my staff and I worked very late preparing the release application.”

Expressing his frustration, Mr Hanna said he was “not in a position to apply for release” and withdrew the application.

Bail was formally refused and Mr Paulo will spend Christmas behind bars, to reappear via audio-visual link on February 20 next year.

As Mr Hura was not charged in relation to the supply of the 900 kilograms of cocaine, his legal representation continued with an application for bail on Tuesday, on grounds that the Crown’s submission was “not a strong case”.

His lawyer Arjun Chhabra​ argued that Mr Hura was merely the driver of one of the two vehicles stopped in Centennial Park and that he did not know the contents of the backpack in the vehicle; which contained two semi-automatic firearms and ammunition and lay at the feet of the co-defendant in the passenger seat.

The $650,000 in cash and a number of encrypted Blackberry devices were located in the second vehicle.

Mr Chhabra told the court of Mr Hura’s extensive family support network, many of whom were in court on Tuesday, and who would put up their own homes as surety if he were released.

However Magistrate John Andrews ultimately found the prosecution had presented a “much stronger case”.

He pointed to detailed police surveillance that indicated conversations and evidence between all three men, including Mr Hura, in relation to the “laundering of money and the possession of firearms in Centennial Park”.

Bail was formally refused, with Mr Hura to also appear in court via audio-visual link on February 20.

Last week’s dramatic arrests, in which non-lethal projectiles were deployed by police in front of a park cafe, were the result of Strike Force Mangowa, a joint State Crime Command and Australian Crime Intelligence Commission investigation into the activities of an organised criminal group in Sydney.

On Tuesday Detective Chief Superintendent Tony Cooke, head of the Organised Crime Squad, said the latest charges would “send a signal to all criminals that they can expect the full scope of the law”.

“We’ll use every law at our disposal to prosecute those criminals and disrupt their operations,” he said.

Chief Superintendent Cooke said he could not speak about the operation in detail, but added that more arrests and charges were anticipated.