Current Royal Commission into Lawyer X gangland convictions on tainted evidence & police corruption

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"A Melbourne gangland underling who has been in jail for years for driving a murder getaway car has won the right to appeal following 'Lawyer X' revelations.

Melissa Iaria and Amber Wilson
Australian Associated PressJUNE 26, 20196:58PM
A man found guilty of acting as the getaway driver for an infamous Melbourne gangland murder could walk free from jail following the 'Lawyer X' scandal.
Faruk Orman was jailed for 20 years in 2009 after the underworld slaying of career criminal Victor Peirce at the hands of hitman Andrew "Benji" Veniamin.
Orman was found to have helped plan the execution and drove the getaway car.
The now-37-year-old has remained behind bars for 12 years, including pre-sentence detention, despite professing his innocence throughout and having previously fought all the way to the High Court.
But that could all change following revelations gangland lawyer Nicola Gobbo - also known as Lawyer X - was informing to police about the figures she represented, including Orman.
On Wednesday, Attorney-General Jill Hennessy announced she would refer Orman's matter to the Court of Appeal, which will decide if his case involved a miscarriage of justice.
Ms Hennessy said it was not necessary to wait until the final report by an ongoing royal commission into the management of police informers, given the volume of material already available about Ms Gobbo's conduct in relation to Orman. ..."



And then we have this - we have a right to know but only if the media can charge us for it.

This is the confusing bit for me

Did Gobbo get on the stand during Ormans trial and implicate him?

ie how do her whispers to police change if he was or wasnt in the car ? In all of these cases did she give testimony or were they built on information given and why does it change based on her being a lawyer? ( I understand the ethical argument)

''I heard Orman was the driver the night Victor got killed''

How does that change whether it is from Gobbo or Gabbo? The police still need to investigate the claims. If they hold up in court then so be it
 

petedavo

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1 of them, "No kitty!, you can't have my cheesy NTTAWWTs!" moments, Adam?

She must of had a big hat rack...or a multiple personality disorder


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Ron Iddles refused, against a directive by Simon Overlander to swear in Gobbo's statement that Mark Perry had confessed to having Chartres-Abbott killed.

Most people do not bowl into their lawyers office and say "I murdered someone and got caught. (provides details only the killer would know just so their lawyer knows they're not lying) but I want to plead not guilty and hire you to get me off.

Mark Perry confessed to Nicola Gobbo that he murdered vampire gigolo Shane Chartres-Abbott but police withheld the evidence from a jury to protect Ms Gobbo’s identity as a police informer.
The Lawyer X Royal Commission today produced an unsworn and previously unseen statement made by Ms Gobbo to Briars taskforce detectives in 2009 which includes Mr Perry’s alleged confession to the 2003 slaying.

Mr Perry and his co-accused, Warren Shea and Evangelos Goussis, were acquitted of Charters-Abbott’s murder by a Victorian Supreme Court jury in 2014.

 
The West all the way over in WA is even reporting on this, I hadn't noticed they were too much interested in anything that goes on here.

Meanwhile, the identities of some of Melbourne's gangland snitches will be kept secret after judges ordered their names continue to be protected.

Crooks who turned on fellow criminals to get shorter jail sentences at the height of the city's gangland wars have long been protected by suppression orders preventing them being named or identified.

Commissioner Margaret McMurdo applied to identify five individuals in the hearings, worried the inquiry would otherwise be hindered.

Police objected, citing concerns for safety of the individuals and their families.

Three Court of Appeal judges agreed to allowing the people to be named in closed hearings, but they rejected an attempt by some media to lift all protections.

Earlier on Thursday, Victoria Police Commissioner Graham Ashton defended the force - which has been blamed for tardiness providing evidence to the commission - against multiple complaints.

"I know we've been regularly criticised for slowness. The complexity of the task is enormous," he told 3AW.

More than 100 officers are working on the inquiry and, between staffing and legal costs, the top officer estimated a cost of about $1.5 million a month.

Over 18 months, he anticipated a bill as high as $27 million.

Police are also appearing in appeals by some of Ms Gobbo's former clients.

Jailed getaway driver Faruk Orman, convicted over the underworld slaying of Victor Pierce, has been granted an appeal.

Convicted drug traffickers Tony Mokbel, Rob Karam and Zlate Cvetanovski are also seeking leave to appeal.

 

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Ron Iddles refused, against a directive by Simon Overlander to swear in Gobbo's statement that Mark Perry had confessed to having Chartres-Abbott killed.

Most people do not bowl into their lawyers office and say "I murdered someone and got caught. (provides details only the killer would know just so their lawyer knows they're not lying) but I want to plead not guilty and hire you to get me off.

Mark Perry confessed to Nicola Gobbo that he murdered vampire gigolo Shane Chartres-Abbott but police withheld the evidence from a jury to protect Ms Gobbo’s identity as a police informer.
The Lawyer X Royal Commission today produced an unsworn and previously unseen statement made by Ms Gobbo to Briars taskforce detectives in 2009 which includes Mr Perry’s alleged confession to the 2003 slaying.

Mr Perry and his co-accused, Warren Shea and Evangelos Goussis, were acquitted of Charters-Abbott’s murder by a Victorian Supreme Court jury in 2014.

I don't get it. Why did Iddles refuse to swear in the statement? To protect Gobbo in her capacity as an informer? Why didn't Overland then get someone else to do it? If Overland knew she was an informer, and apparently he did (?), why would he want her statement sworn? What am I missing?
 

sprockets

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The West all the way over in WA is even reporting on this, I hadn't noticed they were too much interested in anything that goes on here.

Meanwhile, the identities of some of Melbourne's gangland snitches will be kept secret after judges ordered their names continue to be protected.

Crooks who turned on fellow criminals to get shorter jail sentences at the height of the city's gangland wars have long been protected by suppression orders preventing them being named or identified.

Commissioner Margaret McMurdo applied to identify five individuals in the hearings, worried the inquiry would otherwise be hindered.

Police objected, citing concerns for safety of the individuals and their families.

Three Court of Appeal judges agreed to allowing the people to be named in closed hearings, but they rejected an attempt by some media to lift all protections.

Earlier on Thursday, Victoria Police Commissioner Graham Ashton defended the force - which has been blamed for tardiness providing evidence to the commission - against multiple complaints.

"I know we've been regularly criticised for slowness. The complexity of the task is enormous," he told 3AW.

More than 100 officers are working on the inquiry and, between staffing and legal costs, the top officer estimated a cost of about $1.5 million a month.

Over 18 months, he anticipated a bill as high as $27 million.

Police are also appearing in appeals by some of Ms Gobbo's former clients.

Jailed getaway driver Faruk Orman, convicted over the underworld slaying of Victor Pierce, has been granted an appeal.

Convicted drug traffickers Tony Mokbel, Rob Karam and Zlate Cvetanovski are also seeking leave to appeal.

... The complexity of the task is enormous ...
Trying to work out the spin to put on it takes time.
 
I don't get it. Why did Iddles refuse to swear in the statement? To protect Gobbo in her capacity as an informer? Why didn't Overland then get someone else to do it? If Overland knew she was an informer, and apparently he did (?), why would he want her statement sworn? What am I missing?

Iddles has said previously iirc he wouldn't swear one of her statements in because it was corrupt. He was sent to Bali where she was hiding out with some police, having fun I imagine somewhat like the Wendy Peirce fiasco with the Drug Squad, to take her statement. Then after he got it and had a big think about the whole thing, decided he didn't want to get involved and refused to go any further.

Maybe he learned a bit more on that trip to Bali.
 
This is the confusing bit for me

Did Gobbo get on the stand during Ormans trial and implicate him?

ie how do her whispers to police change if he was or wasnt in the car ? In all of these cases did she give testimony or were they built on information given and why does it change based on her being a lawyer? ( I understand the ethical argument)

''I heard Orman was the driver the night Victor got killed''

How does that change whether it is from Gobbo or Gabbo? The police still need to investigate the claims. If they hold up in court then so be it

They throw suppression orders over everything so who knows and when the convicted go to jail, their contact to the outside world is heavily restricted and visitors monitored.

With the Chartres-Abbott murder, Ron Iddles refused to swear Gobbo's statement in as evidence against Mark Perry. (That was very smart by the way he knows what 'pervert the course of justice' means.) The three charged with his murder walked. I think the difference between getting a conviction and not, might have been Nicola Gobbo's statement. Was it even true? Probably not.

Had to drop charges against Paul Dale because Gobbo changed her mind and decided not to give evidence against.

How many cases have actually hinged on this lawyer testifying against her clients?

Compare that case to Ormann, would they have got a conviction if Gobbo wasn't an informant? There is no way it could be said he got a fair trial. imo.
 

petedavo

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Nobody seems to of twigged to the significance of this story yet.
Or have you?
Tell me why this old story is extremely significant, and I'll tell you if your right.
http://web.archive.org/web/20081205...heraldsun/story/0,21985,24750166-2862,00.html
c77b8d0c48df9b6649e12fd66636f540.jpg


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sprockets

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Nobody seems to of twigged to the significance of this story yet.
Or have you?
Tell me why this old story is extremely significant, and I'll tell you if your right.

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Four lawyers might have been informants? The police/DPP/court wanted them to give evidence against their clients? Or is it something to do with Gobbo being Mokbel's lawyer or former lawyer but being called? Or maybe something to do with Goldberg standing down for more than just the stated reasons?

BTW, the only legal people being investigated are Gobbo and VicPol. If there are known other lawyer/legal informers why hasn't the RC been expanded to include them?
 

petedavo

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Four lawyers might have been informants? The police/DPP/court wanted them to give evidence against their clients? Or is it something to do with Gobbo being Mokbel's lawyer or former lawyer but being called? Or maybe something to do with Goldberg standing down for more than just the stated reasons?

BTW, the only legal people being investigated are Gobbo and VicPol. If there are known other lawyer/legal informers why hasn't the RC been expanded to include them?
The article reminds me of something.
Jurisdiction.
This is a State Royal Commission, with the power to hear about State based things.
The clue word is Federal.
Now ask what powers would this Royal Commission have over inquiring about tainted evidence collected by Victoria Police if it happened in a Federal Court Case and/or cases involving Commonwealth charges prosecuted by the Commonwealth DPP?
Oh dear, we might have to have a Commonwealth Royal Commission too. Let's hope that none of this leads to other states, and other jurisdictions, or we might have to have more Royal Commissions.

Google the firms clients from all those years ago....


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petedavo

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Wasn't one of Paul Dale's prosecutions in Federal Court?
Yes, and He wasn't the only one.
Also makes one wonder about a couple of taxation cases, but then again the ATO would never use information passed on by Police, if it the source could not be called as a witness, would they? But then again the ATO has some "interesting" ideas about what's privilege and what's not privileged.
You'd need a Federal Royal Commission to work out how much disrepute that a few callous decisions by a State Agency has made to the matriculation of Jurisprudence in Australia.

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sprockets

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Testimony of Paul Rowe was very interesting and continues Monday. Talked about the circumstances around the initial recruitment of Gobbo and how she was representing crooks at the behest of Mokbel and wanted to get out. Most of this is well known but his testimony was compelling in explaining the circumstances at the time and how it unfolded. Not sure if a written transcript will do it justice.

So now we have her third excuse as to why she became an informer. Obviously she couldn't say no to Mokbel (or any man it seems) and in the end just gave up (and gave up again).

"“She was under an enormous amount of pressure and was looking for a hand of friendship ... that was the way out we could offer her.”" LOL
 
In other words, nobody but a select few is going to get the whole story and I can't see how in these conditions, trust in the system can be restored.

Names, words in common use and numbers and pseudonyms already issued to protect people are being banned from publication.

That's the equivalent of blurring a disguise. A disguise of a disguise, so to speak.

There are currently about 60 suppression and closed hearing orders that restrict what the media can report. Some orders specify to the very second when an offending utterance is made.

As an order is granted the plug from a live web stream is automatically pulled, plunging those watching at home into contextual darkness.

When it comes back on it's like having missed the cliff-hanger from the last episode of your favourite TV show — you have no idea what the hell is happening and there is no recap.

Those on the inside are just as confused.

Victoria Police has also tried to limit passing sensitive information to lawyers representing gangland murderers Evangelos Goussis and Farouk Orman as they try to get to bottom of just what role Ms Gobbo played in their clients's cases.

Some material produced is so heavily redacted, Orman's Barrister Carly Marcs Lloyd expressed confusion as to why her own clients name was blacked out on her copy.

Then, in a move likened to the nightmarish and oppressive world depicted by novelist Franz Kafka, Victoria Police tried to have the lawyers for the very criminals Ms Gobbo worked for booted out of closed hearings.

Police lawyer Ms Enbom said the convicted killers could get transcripts of the evidence, but only after police had decided what information should be left in.

"Kafka himself couldn't have dreamt this up," Goussis's lawyer Adam Chernok said.

The Commissioner agreed they had now entered "cloud cuckoo land".

 

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This is all IMO.

Joe Public never gets the full story. Ever. That's the nature of the beast.

Those who trust the system will say what happened re Gobbo is a necessary evil. Those who don't trust the system will have their mistrust re-inforced by what's happened. Many probably don't care enough and will only care if similar things happen to them. Some will be swayed either way by what is unfolding. I'd say the some is a minority. It's a full time job for an amateur sleuth to keep up even with the limited information available.

So far for me it boils down to the recruitment. Whoever made the original decision to authorise the recruitment, and those above, should pay. To me everything else is noise.

Assuming the phone call to Rowe and the subsequent convo outside the court took place as stated, there were 4 options I can see.

1. Do nothing. - Not the best idea. No.
2. Report her to the bar and then do nothing. - Not bad but puts her in danger. No.
3. Take her perceived threats from Mokbel serious, protect her and investigate the threats. - Yes, if she was willing to go down that path.
4. Recruit her as an informer and use her information against other crooks. - No. Whoever had the ultimate authority to authorise and those who knew and had the power to stop it need to pay.

Does the RC have the balls or the power to recommend charges? If they can recommend charges will they go to the top of the tree or will a senior constable, sergeant and senior sergeant take the fall? Or will they say some very nasty words but recommend better training and a new system for recruiting informers?
The RC can only recommend actions, and this one will, it's then up to others (Govt) to enact them.
 
Faruk Orman will be the first, he's going for bail after being granted a petition of mercy. He's done fourteen years. Here's an admission by Acting Inspector Hatt that they wouldn't have had enough to get a conviction without Gobbo's evidence.

It's really difficult not to spray all over this thread what I really think of them all.

As lawyers for Faruk Orman wrote to the court of appeal, his case was again raised inside the Royal Commission into Management of Police Informants on Friday.

A police officer investigating Melbourne's gangland murders, Mark Hatt, was questioned about the strength of the evidence against Orman.

It was put to him the evidence now under question because of Ms Gobbo's involvement was the most significant piece of evidence in the case against Orman.

But Acting Inspector Hatt told the inquiry separate evidence, namely phone calls recorded by police which implicated Orman, were of equal significance.

That prompted Commissioner Margaret McMurdo to question the officer on the strength of the phone tap evidence, if presented to a jury without the allegedly tainted evidence.

"Would those phone calls on their own lead to his conviction?" she asked.

"I couldn't say," Acting Inspector Hatt replied.

"Probably not."


 

petedavo

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This is all IMO.

Joe Public never gets the full story. Ever. That's the nature of the beast.

Those who trust the system will say what happened re Gobbo is a necessary evil. Those who don't trust the system will have their mistrust re-inforced by what's happened. Many probably don't care enough and will only care if similar things happen to them. Some will be swayed either way by what is unfolding. I'd say the some is a minority. It's a full time job for an amateur sleuth to keep up even with the limited information available.

So far for me it boils down to the recruitment. Whoever made the original decision to authorise the recruitment, and those above, should pay. To me everything else is noise.

Assuming the phone call to Rowe and the subsequent convo outside the court took place as stated, there were 4 options I can see.

1. Do nothing. - Not the best idea. No.
2. Report her to the bar and then do nothing. - Not bad but puts her in danger. No.
3. Take her perceived threats from Mokbel serious, protect her and investigate the threats. - Yes, if she was willing to go down that path.
4. Recruit her as an informer and use her information against other crooks. - No. Whoever had the ultimate authority to authorise and those who knew and had the power to stop it need to pay.

Does the RC have the balls or the power to recommend charges? If they can recommend charges will they go to the top of the tree or will a senior constable, sergeant and senior sergeant take the fall? Or will they say some very nasty words but recommend better training and a new system for recruiting informers?
It appears that the RC doesn't seem interested in whether the DPP and/or Magistrates & Judges knew at the time of the trials.

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Faruk Orman will be the first, he's going for bail after being granted a petition of mercy. He's done fourteen years. Here's an admission by Acting Inspector Hatt that they wouldn't have had enough to get a conviction without Gobbo's evidence.

It's really difficult not to spray all over this thread what I really think of them all.

As lawyers for Faruk Orman wrote to the court of appeal, his case was again raised inside the Royal Commission into Management of Police Informants on Friday.

A police officer investigating Melbourne's gangland murders, Mark Hatt, was questioned about the strength of the evidence against Orman.

It was put to him the evidence now under question because of Ms Gobbo's involvement was the most significant piece of evidence in the case against Orman.

But Acting Inspector Hatt told the inquiry separate evidence, namely phone calls recorded by police which implicated Orman, were of equal significance.

That prompted Commissioner Margaret McMurdo to question the officer on the strength of the phone tap evidence, if presented to a jury without the allegedly tainted evidence.

"Would those phone calls on their own lead to his conviction?" she asked.

"I couldn't say," Acting Inspector Hatt replied.

"Probably not."


But there was more evidence than Gobbo and the phone calls.
 

sprockets

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I think that might be a bit dubious sprockets.
We'll see. :p

Considering Orman's served his 14 year minimum with a few extra years on top there might be a deal - no legal action and we'll let you out. As much as I'd like this kind of person behind bars forever. or to get the same treatment he dished out to his victim, it's a reasonable deal for police.
 
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