By Erin Pearson
Charged gangland lawyer Sarah Tricarico will be allowed to represent high-profile client Tony Mokbel in his upcoming bail and appeal hearings after she won a fight over her blanket suspension.
A Supreme Court judge ordered Tricarico be allowed to continue working under supervision with current clients, on the condition she doesn’t take on anyone new, to avoid disruptions to their cases.
Tricarico leaving court last week.Credit: Jason South
The Legal Services Board suspended Tricarico’s practising certificate without notice on March 14, the day after Victoria Police advised them the 38-year-old had been charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice.
Justice Peter Gray on Tuesday noted the allegations were more than six years old, with no suggestion Tricarico was at risk of committing further offences.
He said Tricarico intended to plead not guilty and there was a recognised presumption of innocence in the state’s justice system.
“There is also public interest in ensuring access to legal representatives for imminent court proceedings and avoiding disruptions in listed matters … particularly those involving issues of liberty,” Gray said.
Tony Mokbel will apply for bail next month.Credit: AAP
“The balance here is best struck [with Tricarico being] ... supervised and not taking on any new clients or new matters for pre-existing clients.”
The court heard Tricarico would work under the supervision of lawyer Stephen Andrianakis, who was prepared to employ her.
Her legal team had argued that before the suspension, Tricarico had been acting for Mokbel for nine years and was “well advanced” in preparing the drug baron’s bail application for April 1.
They said any suspension would also put at risk the legal aid funding she had secured for Mokbel’s matters.
In an affidavit provided to the court, Mokbel said he had “significant concern” about his bid for release being able to go ahead when he heard of Tricarico’s suspension.
He said Tricarico had acted for him during his complicated, long-running and serious litigation in the Court of Appeal and possessed a valuable continuity of knowledge.
Documents prepared for the bail application alone were 300 pages, he said.
He also said he believed it would be “impossible” for another lawyer to get across the facts quickly.
Mokbel’s appeal against his drug trafficking convictions is due to be heard in the Victorian Court of Appeal by the end of the year.
Tricarico and her co-accused, Youssef Samaan Raffoul, 33, appeared in Melbourne Magistrates’ Court last week after being charged as part of an international law enforcement sting.
Police allege Tricarico instructed Raffoul to remotely delete the contents of a mobile phone she believed another man had been using before his arrest in February 2019.
The court heard Tricarico began practising as a lawyer in April 2012 and was the sole principal and director of Sarah Tricarico Lawyers.
The Legal Services Board had argued the public perception of a lawyer being charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice necessitated an immediate suspension, or the public, judiciary and legal procession could lose confidence in the system.
The court heard the authority had the power to suspend and cancel practising certificates for reasons including that doing so would be in the public interest.
Gray ordered the suspension matter return to the Supreme Court for a two-day trial on April 16, where a longer-term decision on her ability to practise could be made.
The criminal matter is set to return to the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court in June.
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