By Adam Cooper
Former Police Association boss Paul Mullett has failed in his bid to have Victoria’s highest court reopen his civil case that claimed he was the victim of a malicious prosecution by former Victoria Police chief commissioner Christine Nixon.
Mullett last year applied to the Court of Appeal, claiming he had fresh evidence that could help him prove he was the victim of a plot to oust him from his job after his suspension from Victoria Police in 2007 and the later decision to charge him over allegations he tipped off a detective who was the subject of a murder investigation.
Paul Mullett, the former secretary of the Police Association, in 2009.Credit: Craig Abraham
The fresh evidence, Mullett’s lawyers argued earlier this month, were documents he obtained in 2020 during the Royal Commission into the Management of Police Informants, which centred on Nicola Gobbo’s position as a registered police informant while she was a defence barrister.
Mullett had hoped the Court of Appeal would grant him a retrial in his multimillion-dollar civil case against Nixon, former deputy commissioner Kieran Walshe and Superintendent Wayne Taylor, after a Supreme Court judge found against him in 2016.
However, on Tuesday, the Court of Appeal dismissed Mullett’s applications for an extension of time, for leave to appeal and to rely on fresh evidence. In a further blow, the three judges ordered Mullett pay the legal costs of the three original respondents and the additional respondents, the state of Victoria and Victoria Police.
Mullett can appeal to the High Court, but said he first wanted to go through the latest judgment with his legal team.
Mullett after a meeting with then commissioner Christine Nixon in 2006. Credit: Wayne Taylor
“We’ve got to digest the judgment and look at all the options,” he said.
Mullett had a strained working relationship with Nixon, and he was suspended from the force in 2007 over an allegation he tipped off a colleague who was being investigated over an alleged involvement in the murder of male prostitute Shane Chartres-Abbott.
Shane Chartres-Abbott in 2003.Credit: Andrew De La Rue
Chartres-Abbott was shot dead outside his Reservoir home in 2003 as he prepared to leave for court, where he was facing trial on an allegation he raped a woman. He had also threatened to expose police corruption.
Two detectives were suspected of a role in the murder but were never charged. Three men who were charged with murder were all acquitted. There is no suggestion Mullett was involved in Chartres-Abbott’s death.
After his 2007 suspension, Mullett was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice and perjury, over allegations he tipped off his colleague and gave false evidence to the then Office of Police Integrity over the alleged leaks.
He resigned from his position as Police Association secretary in 2009 and the criminal charges were later dropped.
In his civil case, Mullett argued he was the victim of a malicious prosecution and that Nixon, Walshe and Taylor engaged in public misfeasance against him. They denied those claims.
At the Court of Appeal this month, Mullett’s lawyers argued that documents unearthed in the royal commission should have been provided to him before his civil trial.
The royal commission heard Gobbo elicited information from one of the detectives suspected of an involvement in the Chartres-Abbott murder, and that the information was discussed in a high-level police taskforce that investigated the murder and police corruption.
The Court of Appeal wasn’t satisfied there was a breach of disclosure by the respondents or that they engaged in misconduct.
The appeals court found: “... there was nothing in the new evidence that Mr Mullett sought to rely upon which might give rise to the possibility that, if the evidence has been produced at trial, Mr Mullett may have succeeded in any of his claims against the named defendants.”
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