Margaret Cunneen: ‘I can never forgive or forget the torment of ICAC’

As her son Stephen, and his girlfriend Sophia, take legal advice on possibly suing the anti-corruption body, Ms Cunneen has spoken of her anger and confusion at them being dragged into the drama.

MARGARET Cunneen SC is seeking answers on why she was pursued so relentlessly by the ICAC.

As her son Stephen Wyllie, 27, and his girlfriend Sophia Tilley, 26, take legal advice on possibly suing the anti-corruption body, Ms Cunneen has spoken of her anger — and confusion — at them being dragged into the drama.

“It causes me so much grief that Steve, Sophia and all the members of our families have been subjected to such oppressive treatment,” the Deputy Senior Crown Prosecutor told The Saturday Telegraph.

The high-profile prosecutor can recall no angry words with ICAC commissioner Megan Latham — her former friend and colleague of 29 years.

Greg Wyllie — the father of Ms Cunneen’s three sons — also taught Ms Latham’s son taekwondo and the women spoke regularly when Ms Latham visited her personal trainer, who lived next door to the couple between 2005 and 2011.

‘No idea’

The women last spoke at a Christmas function in 2013, chatting about their children. Six months later Ms Latham signed an order to seize phones belonging to Ms Cunneen’s family and Ms Tilley, an action later judged unlawful.

Ms Cunneen was in her dressing gown when officers arrived and, under ICAC protocol, none of the family were told why their phones were being seized.

“We never blamed each other but we had no idea why this was happening,” she said.

“Fortunately we are a very close family and we have remained that way. We will never get over the paranoia we now have about mobile phones.”

“We never blamed each other but we had no idea why this was happening”

Ms Cunneen said killers and rapists have more human rights than were allowed to her family.

“As it stands, murderers and rapists are afforded fundamental legal rights but people coming under the purview of the ICAC — even if they have never worked for the government, like Stephen and Sophia — are regarded as not deserving the same right to silence and the right not to have their phones seized illegally,” she said.

Sophia Tilley leaves Downing Centre Court. Pic John Grainger

The genesis of the investigation seems to have been Ms Cunneen’s throwaway line to a smash repairer whose tow truck driver collected her Ford Mondeo after a serious accident in May 2014 involving Ms Tilley.

The conversation — conducted on the tow truck driver’s phone, which was being monitored by the Australian Crime Commission in an unrelated investigation — included a joke about “fake chest pain”.

Ms Tilley, who was not at fault and was found to have a blood-alcohol level of zero, had been concerned the accident may have ruptured her breast implants.

The ACC referred the matter to the ICAC which investigated whether Ms Cunneen was insured to allow Ms Tilley to use her car (she was) and even if the car bore a government E-Tag (it didn’t).

The watchdog ended up looking at whether Ms Cunneen had perverted the course of justice by advising Ms Tilley to fake chest pains to avoid a breath test, even though Ms Tilley had been loaded into the ambulance before Ms Cunneen, arrived at the scene.

ICAC NSW commissioner Megan Latham.

Clues on why the ICAC persisted are in Ms Cunneen’s dog-eared copy of the blistering report by the anti-corruption body’s inspector David Levine last month. He branded the investigation “farcical” and concluded: “Nothing like it must happen again.”

Mr Levine, a former Supreme Court judge, accused the ICAC of “breathtaking arrogance”.

He said there was never any evidence Ms Cunneen, her son or Ms Tilley had done anything wrong and questioned why the ACC even referred the conversation.

He revealed he had written to Ms Latham (right), herself a former Supreme Court judge, the day after she announced the inquiry in October 2014 and told her that in his view it was a police matter at best.

“There seemed to be a mania to press on against all sensible opinion”

Ms Cunneen said it seemed as if the more the ICAC was told it was wrong, the more it pressed ahead.

“There seemed to be a mania to press on against all sensible opinion,” she said.

Tellingly, if Ms Latham’s predecessor David Ipp had still been the ICAC commissioner, the investigation would never have gone ahead. He told The Daily Telegraph last April that the commission had made an error of judgment in pursuing the matter.

Ms Cunneen said her sons Matt, 25, and Chris, 23, had been great support to her and their brother.

“Fortunately we are a very close family and we have remained that way.,” she said.

“The upside of this dreadful business is that it has reminded us all that family and loyal friends are really what matters in life.”

Ms Cunneen had been tipped for a judicial position after conducting a 2013 commission of inquiry into child sex abuse in the Catholic Church’s Maitland-Newcastle diocese. She said she believed the ICAC saga had changed her career prospects: “I’m rather jaundiced about continuing in public office, although I will continue in my current role.’’

But she won’t be suing the ICAC. “I personally see it as an unpalatable proposition to sue the state I have served so proudly for 39 years but I will ensure that Steve and Sophia have access to independent legal advice about what, as Mr Levine said, was the illegal, unjust and oppressive conduct they endured,” she said.

Mr Levine made no finding of improper motive on behalf of anyone involved in the investigation.