Four weeks ago, it seemed that the Lawyer X Investigation was done and dusted for good following the winding up of the Office of Special Investigator headed by former High Court judge Geoffrey Nettle after there was a conflict between him and the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Kerri Judd surrounding his recommendation for several people to face charges. To see what I wrote initially, click here
It has now blasted back into the spotlight following calls from a series of legal experts to refer the evidence gathered by Special Investigator Geoffrey Nettle to an interstate prosecutor after concerns were raised about a potential conflict of interest concerning current DPP Kerri Judd.
These barristers who are calling for the evidence to be referred to a prosecutor interstate have also pointed out that "a perceived conflict of interest may not be an actual conflict of interest."
Now I'm going to be fair here. The law is a complex beast. Lawyers and barristers will argue technicalities and sometimes they argue to such an extent that the government then needs to come in to enact new legislation to take into account the new interpretations set by courts and barristers.
There is difficulty and I completely understand that. I equally understand where these barristers are coming from especially given it was 15 years ago that she was the barrister for Simon Overland. It could be deduced that their argument is that 15 years is long enough to remove claims of conflict of interest.
Here's the problem though.
The law might suggest that "a potential conflict of interest may not be an actual conflict of interest" but in the court of public opinion, it looks very much like a conflict of interest.
When someone has been a barrister for Victoria Police in the past (2008) and they are then asked to accept or decline recommendations from a Special Investigator regarding charges against people, some of who could potentially be Victoria Police hierarchy, from a scandal that occurred around that time, well, regardless of time, that is a potential conflict of interest.
It's a matter of perception here and how it could be perceived is that Judd protected those people from facing charges based on her work in the past for those same people. She should have recused herself from making that decision but she did not. Perception matters and unfortunately, this could be seen as a potential failure of integrity.
Equally perplexing but unsurprising was the response from Victorian Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes who said "The Victorian Gov't has full confidence in the DPP and OPP's capacity as an independent prosecutorial body."
So there's been a potential conflict of interest that's been highlighted and you still support their independence without looking into the possible claims at play. You could infer from that statement that they're ok with potential conflicts of interest but then again, given how this government operates, somehow that doesn't surprise me.
For me, I look at this and while I do acknowledge the complexities involved here, what cannot be denied at this point is that $135m was spent on a Royal Commission and a Special Investigator and no one has been held to account for their role in this scandal.
The fact that a potential conflict of interest could've railroaded this is absolutely outrageous and unacceptable and is something that thoroughly needs to be addressed.
The reality that these calls will probably fall on deaf ears and nothing will ultimately happen is basically a summary of Victoria as a whole right now.
As for Kerri Judd, well, nothing will happen there because the Government are happy with how she's going as Director of Public Prosecutions but for people who understand what's really going on in this state, this is another kick in the guts. It's probably too soon to call for a resignation but at this point, I don't particularly have a lot of confidence in the DPP right now.
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