The year that was: Major Tasmanian court cases that came to a head in 2023
The past year has been a dark and often disturbing one in Tasmania’s justice system. Here is a list of some of the top court cases that stood out in 2023.
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Suspicious deaths, long-unsolved mysteries, defrocked priests and bizarre allegations made for a dark – and often disturbing – year in Tasmania’s justice system.
From an almost-septuagenarian couple jailed over a stake-out murder, to a former New Age leader who defended the use of “genital-rubbing” in her personal development courses, there have been few dull moments in court during 2023.
Perhaps one of the most shocking developments, however, was that criminal charges were pressed against Supreme Court judge Gregory Geason in the latter part of the year.
It’s the first time in Tasmanian history that such an event has unfolded.
However, Justice Geason’s time away from the bench on voluntary leave also means the court is one judge down – dealing a hard blow to plans to plough through a case glut compounded by the 2020 pandemic.
The past 12 months have been extraordinarily busy in the Tasmanian justice system with a swathe of huge cases having come to a head.
Here is a list of some cases from the criminal, civil and coronial courts that caught our eye.
CRIMINAL COURTS
Murder trial of Cedric and Noelene Jordan
The married senior couple from the sleepy seaside town of Swansea looked like anything other than murderers.
But Cedric Jordan, 71, and Noelene Jordan, 69, had motivation to end the life of their daughter’s ex-husband – which they carried out in a premeditated execution in the driveway of his Campbell Town home.
Lying in wait on the night of August 2, 2009, the pair shot Shane Geoffrey Barker, three times in the back and once in the chest.
The case remained unsolved, with the Jordans alibi of a trip to KFC seemingly holding up for more than a decade – until police were finally able to piece together what had actually happened.
Following a 10-week trial, in June this year the Jordans were found guilty of murder and jailed for 22 years each, with a non-parole period of 12 years.
Sentence for Ulverstone murderer Colin William Drake
It was a senseless murder – a random act of violence against a stranger that stole the life of a young woman.
Young Queensland mum Gabrielle Marshall, 23, had only been in Tasmania for a few weeks and was looking for a fresh start when she was killed in June 2021.
Colin William Drake, 37, stabbed her to death in a friend’s house on Main Street, Ulverstone.
Drake pleaded guilty to the murder.
While sentencing in the Supreme Court of Tasmania in December, Justice Tamara Jago said there was no clear reason for the killing, although the motive could have been either sexual or to steal cigarettes.
Describing Drake as a danger to society, she sentenced him to life in jail, with a non-parole period of 20 years.
Renee Ferguson Cricket Tasmania stealing
She made national headlines when her sexting entanglement with the Australian test cricket captain ultimately led to his resignation.
But Renee Ferguson’s unrelated court case ensured her name continued to capture attention right throughout 2023.
In March this year, Ferguson was sentenced to eight months’ home detention after pleading guilty to dishonestly acquiring a financial advantage and 10 counts of stealing – committed while she was working as a Cricket Tasmania receptionist.
The case took years to drag through the courts, thanks to Ferguson’s repeated failures to appear in court, and her repeated changes of plea and lawyers, since she was first charged all the way back in 2017.
Death of prison escapee Nicholas Aaron Scott
It was a New Year’s horror story – a troubled Risdon prisoner escaping custody, only to be found shot dead in the early hours of the next morning.
When young prisoner Nicholas Aaron Scott escaped while being treated at the Royal Hobart Hospital about 10.50pm on January 2 this year, it triggered a large-scale manhunt in and around Hobart.
Tragically, police located the 26-year-old’s body at Granton about 1.30am the next morning.
In a “chaotic” scene, Scott had smashed a Jack Daniel’s stubby over another man’s head, likely in an atmosphere of paranoia.
An altercation broke out, with David Ian Charles Coles ultimately shooting Scott to the chest with a sawn-off 12-gauge shotgun.
Coles pleaded guilty to manslaughter, and will be sentenced in March next year.
Darren Mark Wake admits to murdering former wife
On Christmas Day two years ago, Darren Mark Wake did the unthinkable.
He stabbed his former wife, Hobart midwife Rachel Wake, multiple times with a knife.
Ms Wake, 52, died in the Royal Hobart Hospital later the same day after she was allegedly attacked in front of her two teenage children at her home on Binalong Road, Mornington.
It took almost two years for Wake to plead guilty to the abhorrent murder, with his plea finally coming this December in the Supreme Court of Tasmania.
It came after repeated adjournments in the Hobart Magistrates Court, and after Wake took 10 months to enter an initial plea of not guilty, flagging his intentions to stand trial.
With a guilty plea now entered, a trial will no longer take place – although a disputed facts hearing may proceed in February 2024 ahead of sentence.
Grandmother jailed for biggest drug trafficking case in Tasmanian history
Over a period of 18 months, Gold Coast grandmother Jacqueline Pauline Fiala was responsible for moving potentially $26 million worth of the drug ice into Tasmania.
The 50-year-old answered to a man she referred to as “the boss” – but was essentially responsible for organising drug trafficking in car tyres on the Spirit of Tasmania.
She used 13 different couriers in what was deemed a “sophisticated operation” aimed at “generating very significant profits”.
However, there was little evidence Fiala lived any kind of opulent lifestyle as a result of the racket, and she claimed she’d only become embroiled with the boss after trying to help her son out of a modest drug debt.
Fiala was busted in 2021 under Operation Carnegie, dually run by Tasmania Police and the Australian Federal Police.
She ultimately pleaded guilty to two counts of trafficking in a controlled substance.
In August, Fiala was jailed for 15 years, with a non-parole period of half that time.
Pedophile priests extradited to Tasmania and jailed
Defrocked and disgraced priests Louis Victor Daniels and David Edwin Rapson are now back where they belong – in jail.
Daniels, 76, had already been to prison twice before for sexually abusing 11 young boys between the 1970s and the 1990s, including a victim who later died by suicide.
But he was extradited from Canberra to Hobart in 2022 after another two of his victims pressed charges for Tasmanian offending dating back to 1978.
The former Burnie Archdeacon was a prominent Anglican leader and member of youth group, the Church of England Boys’ Society (CEBS) in Tasmania, when he committed the “heinous” crimes against two boys.
After pleading guilty to two counts of persistent sexual abuse, in May Daniels was jailed by the Supreme Court of Tasmania for six years, with a non-parole period of four years.
Likewise, former Dominic College priest and convicted child rapist David Edwin Rapson was returned to jail in July this year.
After a long series of frustrated attempts, Rapson, 70, was finally extradited from Victoria to Tasmania in May.
The defrocked Salesian pleaded guilty to three counts of indecent assault, for sexually abusing three young Hobart boys in the 1980s while he was a newly-ordained priest.
In July, he was jailed for another three years, with a non-parole period of 18 months.
Read more about Daniels here, and Rapson here.
Criminal charges laid against Tasmanian judge
For the first time in Tasmanian history, a Supreme Court judge was charged with criminal offences this year.
While this case broke in November, Justice Gregory Geason is yet to enter pleas to one count of common assault and one count of emotional abuse – with the saga to unfold during 2024.
Justice Geason’s initial court processing was not without scandal. Members of the media were precluded from entering the Hobart Magistrates Court – in what was deemed a serious deviation from the norm and the principles of open justice.
Attempts to suspend the 62-year-old in a recalled session of parliament failed, with Justice Geason instead continuing his stint of voluntary leave.
According to particulars released by the court, Justice Geason allegedly grabbed a woman by the arms and squeezed, shaking her and striking her chest with his hand.
He’s also accused of tracking a person’s movements using technology, coercing them into establishing a shared phone account to gain access to her electronic records, and interrogating her about her location and details about her companions.
The particulars also reveal he allegedly scrutinised a person’s electronic devices and messages, subjected them to verbal abuse, demanded a person “contribute $300,000 equity from her own home”, and pressured them to sign a contract of sale on a home.
Justice Geason is on bail and will return to court on February 6.
OTHER COURTS
Helen Bird inquest
One of the most surprising cases to arise during 2023 was the inquest into the 2010 death of palliative nurse Helen Bird.
It was long assumed Mrs Bird tragically died by suicide, until a detective began investigating her husband after he set fire to two of their family’s homes to make fraudulent insurance claims.
A former friend told a Hobart inquest in November he believed Mark Gordon Bird had killed his wife and staged the death to look like a suicide, with words he said gave him a “cold shiver”.
The inquest is expected to conclude on January 2, 2024, before Coroner Robert Webster hands down his findings.
Natasha Lakaev alleged “cult” leader defamation trial
It was long, it was drawn-out, and it was incredibly strange.
Former New Age leader Natasha Lakaev, who now calls the Huon Valley home, waged a defamation trial against one of her ex-acolytes in Tasmania over the course of 2023.
The Supreme Court of Tasmania heard weeks of bizarre evidence, including claims Ms Lakaev’s New South Wales personal development courses featured soft porn and “genital rubbing”, a psychic horse betting scheme and claims she was a reincarnation of Jesus Christ himself.
Former follower Carli McConkey is being sued over claims she defamed Dr Lakaev on her website, in her book The Cult Effect, in newspaper articles reproduced within the book, and via social media posts.
Dr Lakaev is these days the proprietor of quaint Geeveston bed and breakfast, The Bears Went Over the Mountain.
Justice Stephen Estcourt is expected to deliver his decision in the first part of 2024.
Multimillion-dollar estate battle of late Hobart property mogul resolves
In January 2021, “self-made man” Ali Sultan died unexpectedly after a bushwalk on kunanyi / Mt Wellington.
His death triggered a massive will dispute between Mr Sultan’s beneficiaries, trustees and executors – a battle that clashed for nearly two years before being resolved without the need for a trial.
All nine defendants bowed out and rescinded their involvement last year, avoiding what was set to become one of the biggest and most high-profile estate battles in Tasmanian history.
In March this year, Supreme Court judge Michael Brett ruled that Mr Sultan’s last true will was made in July 2018, and that a number of wills made subsequently were invalid and did not represent his true intentions.
The reaching of a “compromise” meant Mr Sultan’s $60m to $80m estate was instead left to Ali Sultan’s three children – Sonia, Moe and Saleh – in equal shares.
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