A second charge, obtain financial advantage by deception, was dropped in the plea deal.

The court was told Anile, initially sentenced to a minimum three years for the two charges before his appeal, laundered $400,000 given to him in 1994 by a former kickboxing champion, who cannot be named for legal reasons.

Prosecutors did not have to prove where the money came from, only that that cash came from a serious offence and Anile knew it was dirty.

The money was used to buy a plot of land near Kororoit Creek Road in Williamstown.

The court was told the "under-the-table" $400,000 was used to reduce the purchase price to just over $550,000, subsequently avoiding stamp duty.

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Detectives from Operation Tidelands, initially established to investigate a notorious 1994 heist of an Armaguard truck in Richmond, began investigating Anile in 2013 after he was secretly recorded by a key witness talking about the cash.

"I will never tell you where the money came from. You can put a gun to my head and I will never tell you. All I can tell you is that the $400,000 cash was a small proportion of it," Anile was recorded saying, according to court documents.

Anile will face a plea hearing next month.