Victoria Police hit with $150,000 bill after offences dropped against Nicole Debs

Victoria Police has been forced to pay $150,000 in legal costs for its failed prosecution against a potential star witness in a high-profile murder retrial.

Taxpayers have been hit with a $150,000 bill after dishonesty charges were dropped against Nicole Debs, who was charged before she was set to take the stand in ex-boyfriend Jason Roberts’ police murders retrial.

The Chief Commissioner has been ordered to pay costs to Ms Debs — the daughter of serial killer Bandali Debs — and her three co-accused after the charges were dropped over an $1800 alleged medical certificate fraud.

The nurse was due to give crucial alibi evidence in Roberts’ 2022 retrial that they were together the night Sergeant Gary Silk and Senior Constable Rodney Miller were murdered outside the Silky Emperor restaurant by her father in 1998.

But she was charged before the trial began over allegations she faked a medical certificate to get paid $1800 while doing volunteer work, and was never called to the stand.

Despite her lack of alibi evidence, Roberts was acquitted by the jury and freed after 22 years behind bars, while her father Bandali Debs remains in jail for the police killings.

Jason Roberts and Nicole Debs. Picture: Supplied

Magistrate Brett Sonnet announced to a near deserted courtroom on Wednesday that the Chief Commissioner would pay $144k to Ms Debs and her three co-accused after charges against them were dropped last month.

The payments included $110k to Ms Debs, $8000 to her sister Joanne Mizzo, $6300 to her partner John La Rocca and $19,699.50 to Dr Irene Lepustin, all who were accused of conspiring to produce a false medical certificate so Ms Debs could take leave she was not entitled to.

The bar table was empty during the costs announcement, with no representatives of the Chief Commissioner, the Office of Public Prosecutions or any of the four accused in court or on the video link.

The Chief Commissioner has been ordered to pay costs to Ms Debs after a failed prosecution over an $1800 alleged medical certificate fraud.

The anticlimactic ending to the three-year saga came after Ms Debs was surveilled for 15 weeks, her phone tapped and home raided, while an officer from the Lorimer taskforce – set up to probe the police murders – spent five days watching CCTV for footage of Ms Debs walking without a moon boot.

Police officers were grilled in court last month over their decision to tap the phone of Ms Debs, a warrant for which was only granted because they claimed she may have committed the offence of assisting an offender in a murder.

The alternate crime of attempting to pervert the course of justice didn’t meet the threshold for a warrant.

Days after Magistrate Sonnet pondered whether it was open for him to “find there was impropriety” by the police, charges were dropped against all four co-accused.

A Victoria Police spokeswoman said: “As the matter has now concluded, we will not be commenting further.”