Striking off … Francis Burt alumnus sent packing … Murder and defamation trials followed by disciplinary proceedings … A gruelling 13-year grind through the courts … The final lap uncontested … Wife illegally recorded … No legal professional privilege … Telling pork pies to the court … Janek Drevikovsky explains  

Oddly, there have been precious few reports of this development in the daily tissues.  

The decision by the Full Bench of the WA Supremes comes 13-years after the death of Rayney’s wife, Corryn, and nearly 10-years after his acquittal for her killing. 

In the years since, Rayney, once a leading light at Francis Burt Chambers, has been through the wringer of WA justice. 

In 2017, his defamation case against the state police netted record damages, though an appeal bid to increase the payout to $11 million was unsuccessful. 

His efforts to continue in the lawyering trade, however, have been less successful. After being charged with Corryn’s murder in 2010, he was allowed to keep practising – but only so long as he didn’t take jury cases. 

For Rayney, a seasoned criminal brief, that condition would have been a bitter pill to swallow. By the end of 2012, he announced he had ceased to practice. 

After his acquittal in 2013, Rayney applied to return to the fold – upon which the Legal Practice Board cancelled his ticket. 

In 2015, a Perth tribunal restored his licence – but by then, the Legal Profession Complaints Committee was investigating Rayney for misconduct. 

That investigation led to a 2018 decision by the WA State Administrative Tribunal, which found Rayney guilty of professional misconduct. 

The relevant misdeed had their origins in early 2007, just before the death of his wife. 

At the time, the Rayneys’ marriage was on the rocks. Rayney believed his wife had become infatuated with the father of one of their daughter’s school friends. Lloyd Rayney did not approve of this fellow: 

“He describes him as having long hair, not having a job, drinking a lot of alcohol, being a heavy smoker of roll your own cigarettes, taking drugs, being drunk at social events and frequently making inappropriate comments of a sexual nature.” 

In fact, Corryn did have “sexual interactions” with the man, according to an appeal judge in one of Rayney’s criminal trials. 

Whether Rayney knew so at the time is unclear – at any rate, things were so bad that both husband and wife hired family lawyers. 

Between April and July 2007, Rayney recorded several of his conversations with his wife. He transferred some of the recordings onto a compact disk and played them to his solicitor. 

After Corryn’s death, police found the recordings and sought to use them as evidence in their murder case. Rayney claimed the recordings were subject to legal professional privilege.  

In 2009, Magistrate Flynn of the WA Magistrates’ Court determined the claim of privilege. 

During that hearing, Rayney argued he had made the recordings to protect a legitimate interest. He said Corryn had made a serious “insinuation” about her husband during a face-to-face conversation. 

He started recording Corryn’s conversations (so he said) in the hope she would say something proving the “insinuation” was made up. 

The magistrate rejected this explanation. He also refused to believe Corryn had consented to the recordings, finding that Rayney, an experienced lawyer, would have ensured there was a record of Corryn’s consent. 

In the misconduct proceedings, the tribunal agreed with the magistrate. It concluded that the “insinuation” was made up and that there was no legitimate interest to protect. 

Rayney also knew the recordings were illegal, the tribunal found, and his affidavit and evidence to the Magistrates’ Court was therefore false. 

The tribunal remitted its findings to the Full Bench, recommending that Rayney be sent into the world of ex-lawyers – a recommendation Rayney did not oppose. 

Dutifully, Justices Kenneth Martin, Michael Corboy and Jennifer Smith of the Supreme Court struck him off. 

Their Honours found Rayney was no longer fit or proper for the lawyering trade. His criminal conduct alone warranted at least “suspension” from practice. 

It didn’t help that Rayney repeated his dishonest evidence three more times, during the 2015 tribunal proceedings, his defamation case and during the initial stage of the tribunal’s most recent misconduct proceedings. 

Further, there was no remorse his gross dishonesty and that his case of PTSD did nothing to excuse the misconduct. 

Legal Profession Complaints Commission v Rayney 

Janek Drevikovsky’s reporting for Justinian is supported by the 
Judith Neilson Institute for Journalism & Ideas