Tony Mokbel’s lawyers claim Legal Aid sum for his defence ‘wholly inadequate’

Less than two weeks after Tony Mokbel won a bid to have taxpayers foot the bill to fight his drug trafficking conviction, issues have been raised with the proposed figure.

Lawyers for jailed drug baron Tony Mokbel have slammed the “wholly inadequate” sum proposed by Legal Aid to fund his long-awaited Lawyer X appeal.

Less than two weeks after Mokbel won his bid to have taxpayers foot the bill for his fight to overturn his drug trafficking conviction, his legal team have raised serious issues with the proposed dollar figure.

Julie Condon QC, for Mokbel, told the Court of Appeal on Friday morning that while Victorian Legal Aid had, in principle, agreed to provide funding for the appeal, the amount proposed “has no bearing to the reality of what would be required”.

While not specifying the exact amount granted, Ms Condon said the current funds were not even enough for Mokbel’s legal team to begin reviewing the material – which includes up to
“a million” documents.

Pictures of Tony Mokbel in jail.

Ms Condon said she had called an urgent meeting with legal aid to address the issue.

“This is a matter that requires them to make an extraordinary and urgent decision,” she said.

The top silk said she anticipated needing to hire an additional lawyer to join Mokbel’s team – which includes Chris Wareham and Lee Ristivojevic – “so an equality of arms could be respected”.

“The (Mokbel) matter is one of the largest to emerge from the Lawyer X commission,” she said. 

“We’ll be seeking to meet the unending resources of the state to do justice to the argument for (Mokbel)”, Ms Condon said.

Mokbel, 56, is serving a 30-year sentence for drug trafficking but is fighting to walk free from prison, arguing his former barrister Nicola Gobbo was snitching to police while

representing him.

The broke underbelly figure’s appeal has been delayed by court battles over the production of documents by Victoria Police.

Mokbel after being discovered on the run in Greece.

These delays led to Mokbel being unable to continue funding his previous legal team, which was headed by Ruth Shann, SC.

Mokbel then turned to Victoria Legal Aid for help as his case ground to halt.

The former Brunswick resident was once estimated to have assets of $20m, including properties, a Ferrari and cash holdings, which were all seized by police.

In previous hearings, the court heard Mokbel was dealing with a “high level of distress’’ since first filing his appeal almost five years ago.

Ms Condon said she hoped the matter of funding would be resolved within weeks.

“We don’t want the matter to be derailed by this,” she said. 

The matter will return to court at a later date.