John Setka’s wife Emma Walters pleads guilty to drink-driving
Emma Walters has escaped a conviction despite pleading guilty to driving while five times over the limit and having a relevant prior offence. Ms Walters was supported in court by her husband, CFMEU boss John Setka.
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Emma Walters, the wife of militant union boss John Setka, has escaped a criminal conviction after pleading guilty to driving with a blood-alcohol level more than five times the legal limit.
Magistrate Therese McCarthy said she was not going to record a conviction despite Ms Walters having a relevant prior offence from 2006, in which she was involved in a car crash after driving drunk, the court heard.
Her barrister John Lavery had opposed a conviction on the grounds it would impact her employment prospects.
“My client is generally a person of good character,” he said.
“A conviction has the potential to impact on her employment role as an electoral officer.”
Ms Walters, 43, was recently hired as an electoral officer for the Victorian Local Government Minister Adem Somyurek.
“I do not intend to impose a conviction,” Ms McCarthy said.
Ms McCarthy instead imposed a 12-month community correction order focused on rehabilitation.
Ms Walters will undergo treatment for alcohol abuse and dependency as well as a road trauma awareness course.
She is barred from driving in the state of Victoria for two years.
Ms Walters and Mr Setka declined to comment outside court.
Police Prosecutor Leading Senior Constable Belinda Ryan told Horsham Magistrates’ Court Ms Walters was pulled over at around 8.05pm on Boxing Day, after she was busted speeding at 126kmh in a 100kmh zone on the Western Highway, near Horsham.
Ms Walters blew .282 and “smelt strongly of the intoxicant liquor … speech was slurred” and was “unsteady on her feet”, Sen Con Ryan said.
The prosecutor told the court when Ms Walters was asked what and when she last drank, she said vodka the afternoon before.
Ms Walters was supported in court by her husband with the pair arriving in his CFMMEU work car. Mr Setka parked in a one-hour parking spot and received a ticket while he was in court.
The court heard evidence from the couple’s psychologist David List, who said: “There had been extremely stressful Christmas Day between the two of them.”
He said Ms Walters had suffered from pneumonia and undergone major surgery in 2018 which, coupled with intense scrutiny after her husband was slapped with charges in 2015 that were later dropped last year, had driven Ms Walters to turn to alcohol as a coping mechanism for stress and anxiety.
Dr List said Ms Walters went into a week-long detox program at a facility in Adelaide following the Boxing Day episode.
He said the couple were working out their difference whereas previously Ms Walters felt “there were significant issues around the dynamic of their relationship in which they both described a cycle of behaviour between them, where she would feel she had to submit to her husband in terms of him being angry and demanding of her.”
Ms McCarthy said she understood Ms Walters experienced issues with her health and in her marriage at the time of the offending but said her blood alcohol content had been “extremely high”.
“I take into account you’ve had a difficult time of it,” she said.
“(But) The focus of this court has to always be on deterrence … thankfully you’re not dead, thankfully you’re here and no one else is dead as a consequence of your behaviour.”
Dr List said Ms Walters went into a week-long detox program at a facility in Adelaide following the Boxing Day episode.
He said the couple were working out their differences whereas previously Ms Walters felt “there was significant issues around the dynamic of their relationship in which they both described a cycle of behaviour between them where she would feel she had to submit to her husband in terms him being angry and demanding of her.”
Dr List said Mr Setka felt like he had “to be a fixer and take charge of everything and (Walters) experienced herself as basically having to support him.”
Dr List, who has been treating the couple since May, said as a consequence Ms Walters became isolated under the pressure and felt she had no one to which she could turn.
“She felt like he depended on her for support and she had none and she felt increasingly isolated and lonely.”
Mr Lavery said his client turned to alcohol after her father died in 1995 to cope with “to cope with anxiety and depression”.
Ms Walters and Mr Setka have publicly said they were going through a difficult period in their marriage at the time of the incident, and released a joint statement earlier in August saying they said and did things they regretted at the “height of emotional turmoil” during their marital troubles.
“We have as a family, had an incredibly difficult few years and I made it clear then as I am now, I was in a very dark place in which I did seek refuge with alcohol during that time and this is something I am not proud of,” Ms Walters said in the August statement.
Mr Setka pleaded guilty in June to breaching a court order and harassing Ms Walters by text messages.
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Ms Walters identified herself as the person who received the harassing text messages.
Opposition leader Anthony Albanese has been pursuing the removal of Mr Setka from the ALP saying his conduct was bringing the entire party into disrepute.
Setka is seeking to appeal a Supreme Court decision rejecting his bid to stop him being expelled from the Labor Party.
Ms Walters was recently hired as an electoral officer for the Victorian Local Government Minister Adem Somyurek.
Originally published as John Setka’s wife Emma Walters pleads guilty to drink-driving