Nicola Gobbo’s deception perverted the course of justice, royal commission hears
Nicola Gobbo could be facing a string of criminal investigations including burglary and fraud, as the depths of her double-agent deception is revealed.
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Lawyer X is facing an ever expanding list of alleged crimes she could be investigated over including perverting the course of justice, perjury, fraud and burglary as a royal commission examines her time as a police informer.
Gangland barrister Nicola Gobbo’s recruitment as a police double agent has not only called into question underworld convictions but may have also led to criminal acts directly linked to her informing role.
The Lawyer X Royal Commission has heard Gobbo and police may have perverted the course of justice by denying her clients impartial legal advice.
Senior legal figures also believe she may have committed offences of obtaining financial advantage by deception when charging legal fees against clients she was informing on.
Mokbel was among them, Gobbo charging the gangster more than $84,000 in fees while she was providing intelligence to police on his drug trafficking operations.
Counsel assisting the Royal Commission Chris Winneke twice suggested to one of Gobbo’s handlers — who is giving evidence under the pseudonym Sandy White — that she had perverted the course of justice.
In one instance, Gobbo billed Mokbel’s sister-in-law Zahroula $2600 for legal advice before reporting back to police weaknesses in the brief.
Mr White said he considered arresting Gobbo for perverting the course of justice when she ignored warnings and appeared at a police station to act for an arrested drug trafficker she had snitched on.
Mr Winneke also questioned if Gobbo, while representing a gangland hitman accused of two murders, was actually acting as an “agent of police” denying the man independent legal advice.
Mr Winneke said police were using her to assist getting the man to “roll” on Carl Williams and other underworld figures in a series of murder cases.
Gobbo’s fears she could be exposed as an informer may have also prompted her to commit a burglary on a colleague’s office. Gobbo told her police handlers about going into her colleague’s chambers, but no action was taken.
The Lawyer X Royal Commission heard Gobbo somehow got into Carl Williams’ barrister’s chambers in 2007 to seek out sensitive legal documents.
The royal commission also had evidence before it that Gobbo had told untruths while appearing in a secret hearing.
Gobbo was warned by corruption buster Tony Fitzgerald QC during an Office of Police Integrity hearing in August, 2007, that she was at risk of being charged with perjury.
Mr Winneke, QC, has also said police should have investigated Gobbo for proceeds of crime offences after a Mokbel drug cook had claimed he had left large sums of money with the barrister.
The commission has heard Gobbo was used as a “mailbox’’ by her criminal clients to pass messages, keep safe documents and was even alleged to have been the conduit for a payment for a murder.
But before her official informing began, a senior homicide investigator says Gobbo was being probed over being an accessory to the leaking of confidential police documents to the underworld.
Since 2014, the Herald Sun has examined the leaking of “protected’’ informer documents to gangland boss Tony Mokbel, which occurred in February, 2004.
The leaking of the police dossier, stolen from its headquarters, contained 31 pages of intelligence given to police by drug criminal Terence Hodson.
Hodson and his wife, Christine, were executed on May 16, 2004, three months after the leaking of the documents.
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Detective Sergeant Sol Solomon in a statement to the royal commission says Gobbo was under investigation when police command shut their taskforce down.
Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton last month said police would be guided by the royal commission as to whether criminal charges should be laid against Gobbo.
But he said he was unaware of any immunity ever given to her.
“No, she hasn’t been given any immunity that I’m aware of. Ever,’’ he told ABC radio.