Robert Welfare: Meet bikie boss Mark Buddle’s knockabout Darwin lawyer
Comanchero bikie Mark Buddle’s lawyer is a well-known character around Darwin’s courts, adding a layer of colour to Buddle’s top-secret deportation saga. Read about him here.
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When Australia’s formerly most wanted man, Comanchero bikie king Mark Buddle, finally arrived back on home turf we couldn’t help but be struck by the man who it fell on to legally represent him – veteran Darwin lawyer Robert Welfare.
Wearing Wayfarer sunglasses and sporting a white beard that would rival novelist Ernest Hemingway’s, Mr Welfare brought the type of colour to Buddle’s top-secret deportation saga that perhaps could have only come from the swashbuckling tropics.
And people in the Northern Territory’s legal fraternity have told Confidential that Mr Welfare is definitely a character around the top end’s courts.
Raised in Melbourne and a talented footballer, Mr Welfare was a master mariner by trade and in the mid-1980s was in Indonesia working on a boat that was intended to be used in Perth when the city held the America’s Cup.
But en route to Perth his vessel broke down and he ended up in Darwin.
He later went to university and was admitted as a criminal defence lawyer in 2002.
Mr Welfare, who can speak Indonesian, has been involved in numerous high profile cases, including defending Scott Rush, an Aussie tradie convicted in Indonesia as a member of the Bali Nine.
Mr Welfare said too many people were jailed in the Northern Territory and that the system was in need of reform.
“I believe everybody should get a fair go and a fair trial,” he told Confidential.
Meanwhile, Buddle, who police allege is connected to a 160kg cocaine shipment destined for Melbourne, faced court while on the phone on Wednesday after being escorted to Darwin from Turkey.
But it was Mr Welfare who also stole the show, arriving at court with a half tucked-in shirt and a seemingly nonchalant manner that made him instantly likeable.
Away from the courtroom and coincidentally similarly to Hemingway, Mr Welfare has a passion for boats.
He has been instrumental in salvaging a World War II navy patrol boat that sunk in Darwin Harbour in 2016. The boat transported Aussie Special Forces Diggers behind Japanese lines during the bloody Pacific theatre of the war.
Originally published as Robert Welfare: Meet bikie boss Mark Buddle’s knockabout Darwin lawyer
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