Disgraced Eddie Obeid loses conviction appeal over public misconduct

DISGRACED former Labor power broker Eddie Obeid has had his appeal against his conviction and sentence for misconduct in public office dismissed.

• Obeid appeal: Lawyer says breach of duty ‘matter of conscience’
• Eddie Obeid dubbed ‘King of the Lebs’ in jail

DISGRACED former Labor powerbroker Eddie Obeid will be forced to pay back almost $300,000 in taxpayer-funded legal fees and stripped of his hefty annual pension if he decides not to launch a further appeal against his conviction for misconduct in public office.

The Supreme Court rejected Obeid’s initial appeal today but he has the option of taking the issue to the High Court.

If he does not – or if the appeal is again dismissed – the state government will start proceedings against him to reclaim more than $280,000 in taxpayer-funded legal assistance given to the former Labor MP so he could fight corruption allegations. He was allowed to claim the money because of his role as a former minister.

Mugshot.... Eddie Obeid.

He will also be stripped of his taxpayer-funded pension, estimated to be in excess of $100,000 a year.

“The taxpayers of NSW want their money back,” said Prisons Minister David Elliott.

The state government passed legislation earlier this year enabling it to strip former NSW politicians of their lavish pensions if they are convicted of serious criminal offences which occurred during their time in office.

Mr Elliott suggested Obeid would be moving prisons once his avenues of appeal are exhausted and said, tongue in cheek, that he would be given “very special treatment when he does arrive at his next destination”.

Obeid’s appeal was thrown out of the Court of Criminal Appeal by unanimous decision of five Supreme Court justices.

Obeid was jailed for at least three years in December last after being found guilty by a jury of lobbying a senior public servant in 2007 over profitable commercial leases at Circular Quay without revealing his family had a stake in two of the businesses.

In a three-page judgment summary the CCA dismissed the 13 grounds of appeal including that Obeid did not know he was breaking the law when he lobbied the senior officer at the Maritime Authority.

“The court emphasised that it was inconceivable that a politician of 16 years standing who had been a Minister for four years did not know that his duty was to serve the public interest and that he was not elected to use his position to advance his own or his family’s pecuniary interests,” the judgment read.

Obeid’s son Moses was at the CCA to hear the judgment and left soon afterwards.

‘Abused public trust’..... Former NSW Labor minister Eddie Obeid. Picture: AAP

At a three-day hearing in June Obeid’s new barrister Guy Reynolds SC put forward 13 appeal grounds including that any breach of his public duty was not criminal but rather a matter of conscience.

“Like a duty to be nice to your mum,” he said.

Obeid’s lawyers also argued that Obeid’s conviction should be overturned because of the incompetence of his legal team at the trial.

On sentencing Obeid last year, Justice Robert Beech-Jones said the former NSW Fisheries Minister, “intentionally abused the public trust reposed in him as a member of the legislative council of NSW.”

His appeal judgment comes two months after his political crony and former Labor minister Ian Macdonald was jailed for at least seven years for granting his mate and ex-union boss John Maitland a lucrative coal exploration licence without a competitive tender.

Obeid is being held at the Metropolitan Reception and Remand Centre at Silverwater where he shares a cell with a sex offender.