Early release of Sofronoff report sets off fresh chaos … Bad move by Walter … Denial of fairness … Credibility of findings shot … Another Cossack in the wings … More litigation rushing towards us … Theodora reports
In August 2023 he crash landed his report into the ACT rape case of R v Lehrmann – but this time he is likely to sustain a few injuries.
Excitable conspiracies theories are on the loose, bringing colour and movement to the early release of the Sofronoff report.
One line of thinking in the Twitterverse/Xverse is that Walt leaked it to the media because the ACT government might bury the report forever.
Chief Minister Andrew Barr denied this, saying he never contemplated the suppression of the report.
Another line of loose thinking is that Shane Drumgold’s resignation as the ACT DPP somehow or other validates Sofronoff leaking the report to Planet Janet Albrechtsen, the culture warrior at Murdoch’s broadsheet who is on the warpath against #MeTooism and “victim-centric” sympathies in sexual assault cases.
It’s getting nuttier by the moment.
The Cossack’s report now has been released by the ACT Chief Minister and we also have the outgoing DPP Shane Drumgold’s statement.
Board of Inquiry into the ACT criminal justice system
DPP Shane Drumgold’s media statement
Sofronoff’s inquiry is misnamed in that it was not a broad investigation into criminal justice in the ACT, rather a specific inquiry into the roles played by the police and the DPP in the Bruce Lehrmann rape trial.
Even so, there are little to no surprises in either document.
The consuming issue now is why did the Cossack release his report to Planet, knowing that she was peddling a hyped agenda against the prosecution of Lehrmann and against Drumgold?
In doing so, he refuelled her animus towards the prosecutor. The fact that he also dropped the report to the ABC which published a version on Thursday (August 3) might be seen as cover for the fireworks he ignited on the front page of Murdoch’s propaganda sheet.
The ABC’s report by Elizabeth Byrne went online after The Australian broke the embargo.
In giving the government’s report to media reptiles before giving it to the Chief Minister Andrew Barr the Cossack breached the ACT Inquiries Act, here and here.
Not only did he leak the report, but he was briefing journalists while the inquiry was underway. He explained to Barr that he believed it was “possible to identify journalists who are ethical” and that neither Albrechtsen nor Byrne would “take the serious step of betraying his trust by behaving unprofessionally”.
Clearly, in the case of Murdoch’s fishwrap he misidentified.
It leaves Sofronoff open to criticism that having made his mind up about Drumgold’s failings in the case, he wanted reinforcement from a reliable crusader in the cause.
He has undercut his own findings about Drumgold’s misjudgments by making a colossal misjudgment himself and undermined the functions of the territory government.
Chief Minister Barr is looking at “pathways” to examine the conduct of the board of inquiry – with the ACT Integrity Commission as one way to do that.
Intriguingly, the Integrity Commission is run by Michael Adamovitch, aka Michael Fatty Adams KC, another Cossack.
Here we go again.
Albrechtsen and her side-kick Stephen Rice came up with the unoriginal ruse that they didn’t breach the embargo because they got the same report from a different source without conditions on its publication.
Breaking an embargo is one thing. Pretending you didn’t break it is a whole other scale of deceit.
Drumgold was then blindsided by the torrent of findings against him in the media, without notice and without the benefit of having read the report and being able to respond pronto.
Integrity campaigner Geoffrey Watson SC says to that extent Drumgold has been denied procedural fairness, which vitiates the report.
ACT Chief Justice Lucy McCallum stepped in with what some interpret as a backhander to the ramped-up tone of Cossack Sofronoff’s criticism. In a note to ACT lawyers, the CJ said:
“The administration of justice in the ACT has been the subject of unprecedented attention in the past year. While public scrutiny is a welcome and necessary incident of open justice, a point can be reached where the personal toll on the practitioners concerned becomes oppressive and unfair.
I urge all practitioners to show kindness and respect towards each other at this time and look forward to continuing to work with the local legal profession to build on the many strengths of this jurisdiction.”
Until a last minute withdrawal from the event, vast crowds were anticipated to hear Walter on August 25 at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre discuss Politics, journalism and social media v The presumption of innocence – with Headless Thomas of The Australian as compare.
Bruce Lehrmann, the former accused, has flagged more litigation.
“I have instructed my lawyers to prepare a statement of claim against the state [sic]. I’ve got lawyers that need to be paid, people who have supported me, like my mum and uncle, who need to be supported.
I’m not interested in becoming a millionaire, but I do want to perhaps get on with my life and maybe buy a house.”
This comes in the face of Sofronoff finding that the decision to prosecute the former Liberal staffer was justified.
Further, this is not a case of wrongful conviction so possibly he might be looking at another defamation claim – his fourth, this one focussing on Drumgold’s statement of December 2, 2022, when he announced he was discontinuing the prosecution:
“I closely considered the reasonable prospect of conviction test when I first examined the brief of evidence in the week of 21 June 2021, and I formed the clear view that there was a reasonable prospect of conviction. This is a view I still hold today.”
A defamation claim about that statement would involve relitigating the rape allegation with the strong likelihood that the complainant Brittany Higgins would give evidence.
This is a criminal case that became politicised, with the result that lawyers, governments, journalists, police and contenders are eating themselves, and each other.