Gold Coast company accused of bribing foreign officials

A former director of the FBI has heavily criticised an Australian Federal Police investigation into a Gold Coast company accused of bribing foreign officials in the South Pacific.

The Australian Federal Police were criticised for their investigation.

A former director of the FBI has heavily criticised an Australian Federal Police investigation into a Gold Coast company accused of bribing foreign officials in the South Pacific.

Phosphate company Getax Australia Pty Ltd is charged with one count of conspiracy to bribe a foreign government official.

The company, which is accused of bribing officials on the small island of Nauru to benefit its phosphate business, has applied for a stay on proceedings in Brisbane’s District Court.

The Courier Mail is unable to identify the officials after the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade was granted a temporary non-publication order.

Getax’s barrister Saul Holt, KC, called former FBI director Louis Freeh, who wrote a report on the AFP investigation, to give evidence in person on Tuesday.

Mr Freeh, who was FBI director between 1993 and 2001, attacked the decision by the AFP not to send investigators to Nauru for the Getax probe.

“It’s like having a crime scene and not sending your investigators to visit the crime scene,” Mr Freeh said.

He said sending investigators into foreign jurisdictions, particularly those where the rule of law was fragile, was difficult but it was not reasonable to not try.

“The fact that it wasn’t even tried here and just discounted immediately, to me, was a very bad decision,” he said.

Mr Freeh also criticised the length of investigation which he put at 10 years while Jeff Hunter, KC, for the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions said it was more like five years.

Mr Hunter gave examples of Australian judicial officers working in Nauru being effectively booted from the country as well as the Nauruan government’s treatment of journalists.

“You think it’s likely that some of the alleged conspirators would have actually sat down with police and spoke with them,” Mr Hunter asked.

“Yes I think the effort should have been made … the decision not to contact them is, from a law enforcement point of view, absolutely unexplainable,” Mr Freeh said.

“You say it’s inexplicable because you think it should have been a straightforward matter … to facilitate the arrival of the Australian Federal Police on Nauru,” Mr Hunter continued.

“If you’re an investigator and you’re afraid or reluctant to knock on the door to talk to a key player, someone with critical knowledge, you have to have a good reason. And I’ve not seen anything … that supports my understanding of not having a good reason,” Mr Freeh said

Earlier Andrew Berger, KC, for DFAT argued for a non-publication order in respect to some of the proceedings including the names of several individuals/officials on national security grounds.

“We urge your honour to consider the profound long term risks and consequences for our interests, including our defence and security interests, that could be prejudiced if the information we seek to protect is put out into the public domain,” he said.

Mr Holt opposed the NPO arguing it was too broad and “would make the conduct of this criminal trial not look like a criminal trial”.

“If the Commonwealth wishes on the one hand to prosecute by making allegations a whole lot of people have accepted bribes. And on the other hand, doesn’t want anyone to know that it’s done so – then it just needs to decide which of those it wants to proceed with,” he said.

Judge Nicholas Andreatidis KC made a temporary NPO suppressing the identities of several individuals/officials until the application for a permanent order is decided next month.

The stay application, in which the defence argues it has been prejudiced by delay, continues before him on Wednesday.

Originally published as Gold Coast company accused of bribing foreign officials