Former union boss John Maitland has no money to fight trial: court
John Maitland has had to sell his Sydney property to pay legal bills from a decade ago and faces a significant tax bill, the Supreme Court heard.
Police & Courts
Don't miss out on the headlines from Police & Courts. Followed categories will be added to My News.
The former high-profile union boss John Maitland has had to sell his Kemps Creek property to pay legal bills from a decade ago and faces a significant tax bill leaving him no money to fight his latest trial, the Supreme Court was told on Thursday.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions said it would be pressing ahead with the retrials for Mr Maitland and his one-time mate, former NSW Labor mineral resources minister Ian Macdonald, after a decision had been put on hold pending the outcome of a separate trial involving Macdonald, Eddie Obeid and Obeid’s son Moses Obeid.
Macdonald, 72, Eddie Obeid, 77, and Moses Obeid, 52, are awaiting what they have been told are possible jail sentences after being convicted of a single charge of conspiring for Macdonald to misconduct himself by doing acts in connection with the granting of the multimillion-dollar Mt Penny coal exploration licence over the Obeid family’s farm, Cherrydale Park, in the Bylong Valley in 2008.
Macdonald would be appealing that conviction, the court was told on Thursday.
Macdonald and Mr Maitland, 75, the former boss of the CFMEU, face retrials over another 2008 coal deal, this one involving Doyles Creek Mining, a company chaired by Mr Maitland, in the Hunter Valley.
Macdonald was convicted by a jury in 2017 of engaging in misconduct by issuing the licence to Doyles Creek without a tender. He was jailed for 10 years with a minimum of seven.
Mr Maitland, who made $6 million from the sale of the shares related to the deal, was found guilty as an accessory and sentenced to six years with a non-parole period of four years.
Mr Maitland has maintained Doyles Creek was going to be a training mine and not a commercial operation.
They were both released from jail after the Court of Criminal Appeal quashed their convictions and ordered fresh trials which the Supreme Court on Thursday sat down for September 2022.
But Mr Maitland’s barrister, Edward Anderson, told the court he would be making an application to have the case adjourned or stayed because his client had been refused Legal Aid funding despite having no money.
His application will be based on a High Court ruling that determined while there is no right to have public funding for lawyers, in most circumstances a judge should grant any request for an adjournment or stay when an accused is unrepresented.
Mr Anderson said Mr Maitland had a significant debt to the Australian Taxation Office. He has sold his property at Kemps Creek and the entire proceeds will pay his legal bill for solicitors who represented him before the ICAC a decade ago.
“There is no money and nevertheless he has been denied Legal Aid,” Mr Anderson said.
Both men have pleaded not guilty to the Doyles Creek charges.
A hearing has been set on September 8 for the sentencing of Macdonald and the Obeids.
‘Insulting’: Grace Tame Foundation pushes for big change to court system
A push to stop pedophiles using “good character” references in courts has sparked opposition from the state’s top prosecutors, but victim advocates say the practice is “insulting” and “retraumatising”.
‘I could feel the heat’: Man’s belongings burn in ‘huge’ house fire
A southwest Sydney resident has described how he escaped from a “huge” house fire, which burned all his belongings and damaged the home he had only just moved into.