Liquidators suing Brisbane lawyers David Tucker and Richard Cowen reveal fresh intrigue

Liquidators of a failed Gold Coast fund manager suing two Brisbane law partners allege there are efforts to drag out the case and drive up its cost.

LAWYERS CLASH

We’ve learned quite a bit more about the intriguing court battle under way against well-known Brisbane law partners David Tucker and Richard Cowen.

Court documents reveal new details in the long-running stoush launched by the liquidators of failed Gold Coast fund manager Equititrust, who are seeking to claw back more than $17 million allegedly acquired at the expense of dudded investors.

Equititrust’s legal eagle, Stephen Russell, in court documents has attacked alleged efforts to prolong the case with cost disputes that he maintains are a bid to undermine the determination of liquidators to keep pursuing the matter.

“This current exercise is merely another example of your clients running up as much in costs as they can in the rather pitiful hope this will weaken the resolve of Equitrust and (litigation funder) Vannin,’’ Russell wrote in a recent letter to Tucker’s solicitors.

David Tucker

Russell also slammed the defence case as “shadowy and unsupported by critical documents’’ and noted that “your client’s own evidence is that (Tucker’s company) Tuckerloan has no assets at all and that a judgment against Mr Tucker will drive him to bankruptcy’’.

Indeed, Tucker has deposed in Federal Court that if he suffers an adverse judgment that he intends to declare bankruptcy.

Equititrust liquidator Blair Pleash alleges in court papers that Tucker, a former Equititrust director, was a key figure in efforts to wrongly snare an outstanding loan book for the rock-bottom price of just $2 million and then reap a windfall profit with others at the expense of investors.

Tucker, who lodged a defence in December, previously represented himself in court but late last year retained Bartley Cohen’s Ben Cohen to go to bat for him. That firm describes its speciality areas as “solicitors’ negligence, ASIC prosecutions and directors’ and officers’ claims’’.

Responding on Tucker’s behalf yesterday, Cohen described parts of Russell’s letter as “inaccurate, at the very least’’. He noted that the statement of claim “has been amended a number of times after having been found or conceded to be deficient (and) the plaintiff has discontinued against five defendants.’’

Cowen’s lawyer dismissed Russell’s comments as “emotive allegations in sensationalist correspondence on the part of a solicitor for one of the parties’’.

FISH OUT OF WATER

We’ve come across something of a fish-out-of-water situation up at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport.

An Air Kiribati jet, a fresh addition to the fleet servicing the tiny Pacific island nation, has been sitting idle on the tarmac for the past few weeks.

It’s one of two spiffy new Embraer 190-E2 plane the carrier splashed out on recently.

City Beat spies tell us that Air Kiribati had tapped Sydney-based Pionair Australia to operate the twice-weekly return passenger service between Brisbane and Tarawa, in Kiribati, via Honiara and Nauru.

But we understand that Pionair’s application with our aviation regulators filed in September has run into a bit of strife, since its focus remains on moving cargo rather than passengers.

Pionair didn’t respond to our inquiries this week.

An Air Kiribati spin doctor told us yesterday that everything was hunky dory even though he made no mention of the Pionair drama.

“The aircraft is going through all the necessary regulatory approval processes with CASA as you can expect,’’ he said.

“The aircraft was registered last week and is having its certificate of airworthiness inspections undertaken in Toowoomba this week. It will then be approved to start proving and training flights. All of these are regular processes in gaining an air operating certificate.’’