Clive Palmer’s nephew Clive Mensink loses contempt of court appeal

A controversial former Queensland Nickel refinery director and nephew of Clive Palmer has suffered another legal setback.

The controversial fugitive nephew of mining magnate Clive Palmer has lost his bid to have contempt of court proceedings thrown out.

Clive Theodore Mensink fled Australia in 2016 after the Queensland Nickel refinery he was the director of went into voluntary administration, owing $30m to employees and $196m to other creditors.

Clive Mensink has failed to front.

His last publicly known location was Bulgaria where journalists spotted him in 2018 with then girlfriend Gabriela Konstantinova.

After refusing to comply with repeated requests to attend the Federal Court for questioning about the Queensland Nickel liquidation, Mr Mensink was hit with contempt of court charges and a warrant was issued for his arrest.

In 2018 an appeal lodged by Mr Mensink, against the validity of the court’s orders, was dismissed.

He launched another appeal to the full bench of the court, claiming he had not been given a reasonable opportunity to present his case and was denied procedural fairness.

Court documents state Mr Mensink also claimed the registrar of the court, who had been given authority to take over management of the contempt case, had no power to take over the case.

Clive Palmer is Clive Mensink’s uncle. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

In a judgment handed down on Thursday, Justices Robert Bromwich, Michael Lee and Tom Thawley dismissed Mr Mensink’s latest appeal and said parts of his claims were “without merit”.

“There was never any serious possibility of it being demonstrated that there was any denial of procedural fairness in the necessary sense of practical injustice, nor in sustaining any argument as to injustice – let alone substantial injustice,” they said.

Mr Mensink has been ordered to pay costs to the registrar of the Federal Court of Australia, whom he launched the failed appeal proceedings against.

Originally published as Clive Palmer’s nephew Clive Mensink loses contempt of court appeal