Cops’ top lawyer says Nicola Gobbo’s snitch role was no secret
The former head of the state government claimed he was “astounded” and had no idea Lawyer X Nicola Gobbo was a police informer. But Victoria Police’s top lawyer has contradicted the evidence, saying her role was “no secret”.
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A claim by the former head of the state government’s legal team that he didn’t have “any knowledge” that police used a gangland barrister as an informer has been contradicted by Victoria Police’s chief lawyer.
John Cain — now the State Coroner and the son of the late former Labor premier John Cain — claimed in a sworn statement to the Lawyer X royal commission that he was “astounded” in 2015 when he learnt Nicola Gobbo had been a snitch.
But the director of Victoria Police legal services, Fin McRae, on Friday questioned this evidence, saying Gobbo’s role as an informer was “no secret” in 2010 when Mr Cain and other lawyers discussed her multimillion-dollar civil lawsuit against the state.
The royal commission is preparing to hear from the woman at the centre of one of the biggest legal scandals in Australian history.
On Tuesday, Gobbo is due to deliver her explosive testimony. Last year, she was ordered to do so from a secret location over four days next week — after she had spent months attempting to avoid interrogation through repeated claims of ill-health.
Yesterday, chief police lawyer Mr McRae said he discussed the “extraordinary circumstances” of Gobbo’s civil claims with Mr Cain, then head of the Victorian Government Solicitors’ Office, and others at a meeting with the Office of Public Integrity.
The OPI meeting was called to discuss Gobbo suing police, after investigators called her as a witness against suspected corrupt cop Paul Dale.
She claimed that had ended her career and seriously endangered her life.
“I’d spoken to John Cain because this is a matter of such high public importance,” Mr McRae said.
“We’re proposing to settle a matter that involves a defence practitioner who has been a human source (police informer) and it involves the government,” he said.
Mr McRae said he and Mr Cain discussed how to brief then police minister Bob Cameron about the settlement in a “safe way”, given Gobbo’s background as a police informer and the risks to her safety.
Mr Cameron ultimately signed off on the $2.8 million taxpayer-funded settlement shortly before the November 2010 state election.
Asked by lead counsel for the commission, Chris Winneke, if Gobbo’s dual role was “openly discussed” at the OPI meeting, Mr McRae said: “Oh yes.”
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But Mr McRae maintained it wasn’t until 2012 that he learned Gobbo had informed on her own clients.
Mr Winneke put to Mr McRae: “Mr Cain, who was present (at the meeting) has no recollection of a discussion — of knowing that Ms Gobbo was an informer. Now what do you say about that?”
Mr McRae said he believed Mr Cain had “forgotten” the discussions as they didn’t raise concerns for him at the time, but pointed to written “background information” he gave Mr Cain which described her as an informer.
“There was no secret amongst the legal practitioners that this person was a registered informer,” Mr McRae said. Asked whether he believed the police minister was made aware of Gobbo’s informer status at the time, he said he did not know.