Prosecution hides evidence … The Map – where the Old Mates Club runs the island kingdom … Tina Huang and Charles Waterstreet … Weinsteins Downunder … When a personal relationship with a judge might create apprehension … Theodora reports
The accused, known as JB, was convicted of the murder of Edward Spowart in 2008.
It’s been a troubling case ever since. JB’s appeals to the CCA and the High Court were turned down. In 2014, after findings by R.A. Hulme J the attorney general decided the case should be referred to the Court of Criminal Appeal under s.78 of the Crimes (Appeal and Review) Act.
Led by Cliff Hoeben CJ at CL the court overturned the conviction and entered a verdict of acquittal. By this stage JB had served nearly seven years of a 23 year sentence.
It emerged that the crown had not disclosed that it’s main witness, known as A107, was a registered police informer. Notes provided to JB’s barrister, “appeared to have been edited” and failed to mention this vital detail.
In April 2008, when JB was in custody, the police used A107 as a support person. After a conversation with JB in his cell, A107 told the officers that the suspect had confessed to the stabbing of Spowart during a melee at Granville railway station.
Robert Kaufmann was the solicitor for both JB and in the fraud case for A107. In his CCA reasons, Michael Adams said that “the involvement of Mr Kaufmann – as to which the evidence is not in dispute – adds a troubling feature”.
Kaufmann rejects the suggestion that he was conflicted.
The CCA said there was “no evidence [from CCTV footage] of anyone, in particular JB, producing a knife at the time of the initial altercation …”
Justinian had many of these details in a report published a year ago, here.
The prosecutor at JB’s trial was Terry Thorpe. DPP Lloyd Babb ordered an inquiry. Twelve months later no word had emerged from the clam-like DPP HQ about the progress of this investigation – until just recently a parliamentary estimates hearing flushed out an answer to a question on notice.
For the better part of two years shadow attorney general Paul Lynch has been pushing for details about the case in estimates committees and it was taken up by an ALP colleague in the Legislative Council.
Lynch has followed up with a question asking the AG on notice what is the result of the referral to the NSW LSC.
The answer is due on November 14.
There are talented and delightful people all over the island and one of them is Greg Geason, who has taken the retiring Shan Tennent’s spot on the Tas Supremes.
Greg has been chairman of the Resource Management and Planning Appeal Tribunal plus the Parole Board. He served on the the footy tribunal and is a past president of the Law Society.
Geason’s appointment comes under the auspices of recently upgraded Justice Minister, Elise Archer, who when she occupied the Speaker’s chair, booted Premier Hodgman out of the House.
She saw fit to have a press secretary. As Speaker. To spin what?
How difficult it must be in the tight-knit scheme of things for people with close associations not to run into to each other coming around corners.
Further, we’re advised by a usually reliable source that he was Hodgman’s best man at his wedding to Mrs Hodgman.
As Joan Rivers said, “Looks are everything”. But just because the right people know the right people it doesn’t mean that Greg is other than meritorious.
Marque Lawyers has everything wrapped up on the Tina Huang front.
Tina is the law student who had the misfortunate to be interviewed for a job by desiccated barrister Charles Waterstreet.
The interview process allegedly involved him showing her nude photos of women and a video of someone masturbating. Waterstreet told her he likes “pretty young things” and enjoyed women snorting cocaine off his delightfully aged body.
When she took the job for a matter of hours she was required to respond to emails about missed payments for sex toys and to organise his rendezvous.
Police are said to be investigating and the University of Sydney has stopped Waterstreet’s Rake Chambers advertising for paralegals on CareerHub.
Michael Bradley, the managing partner at Marque Lawyers, is acting for Ms Huang while at the same time Marque also acts for New Matilda.
Let’s hope this doesn’t turn into an uncomfortable straddle.
Waterstreet denies all Huang’s allegations, which have been “taken out of context”, so much so that he complains of being “victimised”.
He made a rambling explanation here.
It was all a dreadful misunderstanding and Waterstreet, who is a tireless self-promoter, hates sexual harassment. However, two other women have now stepped-up with their memories of working for the old sex-pest.
They too allege that Waterstreet exhibited sex toys to them, viewed porn in front of various other women in chambers and in the case of Ms Geraldine Wilks did not pay her for weeks. Apparently, Waterstreet had been told by his financial adviser to prioritise the payment of “floor fees and sex” over wages.
He responded to the latest revelations with another ramble, this time of Twitter.
Desperately, Waterstreet clings to the Rake myth, which Richard Roxburgh did his best to explode here.
Here’s a question that is entirely hypothetical. If a judge had a love affair with a barrister who appears in the court over which the judge presides, is this something the other side should be told, particularly as the judge and the barrister have remained close friends?
Should recusal in this circumstance be the proper course to take?
What if, hypothetically, people in the law know about this connection but remain silent?
An affair is one thing and most likely no-one else’s business, but what if it crosses into the court room and gives rise to apprehensions?
Just asking.