Louis Vuitton sneakers discovered in a clandestine drug laboratory became the vital clue linking the nightclub owner Steven Wayne Spaliviero to the biggest ecstasy drug bust in Australian history.

The shoebox that had contained the designer runners was later found during a police raid on the waterfront apartment he shared with his fiancee, the Swedish model turned Sydney socialite Charlotte Lindstrom.

The details of how police caught the drug dealer then subsequently charged his love-struck fiancee with a double-murder plot are revealed for the first time in a documentary on Tuesday night.

The documentary is an insight into the love story between the young Swede, who had come to Australia on a working holiday with school friends, and Spaliviero, the nightclub owner 18 years her senior, which ended with both of them behind bars.

Spaliviero pleaded guilty to drug manufacturing and was sentenced to 16 years and three months' jail. Lindstrom admitted conspiring to kill two witnesses and served a reduced three-year jail term.