ACT justice system back on trial

True to form, the ACT corruption watchdog has put itself at the centre of perceptions of bias with a finding against eminent former Queensland judge Walter Sofronoff KC that serves only to debase the definition of serious corrupt conduct. Mr Sofronoff is appealing the findings, which flow from his 2023 board of inquiry into the prosecution of Bruce Lehrmann on charges that he had raped Brittany Higgins.

The conduct of Mr Lehrmann was not at issue in the ACT Integrity Commission inquiry. Rather, it was the fact Mr Sofronoff had given advance copies of his findings to journalists, one from the ABC and another from The Australian, before it was released by the ACT government. Mr Sofronoff said this had been done to ensure the full scope of his report could be digested before publication.

It is worth noting that making available embargoed copies of complex reports is standard practice for corruption watchdogs, public inquiries, corporate developments and political announcements. The ACT Integrity Commission made no findings of any improper conduct on the part of the journalists but said it had concluded “the conduct of Mr Sofronoff in making the impugned communications could constitute a criminal offence”. Mr Sofronoff has filed an application to appeal the findings in the Federal Court to challenge the lawfulness of the commission’s report.

The corruption probe is the latest instalment in a long-running legal drama that has cast a shadow over how justice is administered in the ACT. Mr Sofronoff was chosen to head an inquiry into the Lehrmann prosecution by former ACT director of public prosecutions Shane Drumgold.

Mr Sofronoff was lauded as the perfect choice given his handling of other high-profile inquiries, notably into the Grantham floods in Queensland and failings in the Queensland forensic science laboratory. Rather than finding inappropriate actions by police, something Mr Drumgold had complained about, Mr Sofronoff made a series of damning findings about Mr Drumgold that ultimately cost the latter his job.

Based on evidence given to the inquiry, most particularly by Mr Drumgold, Mr Sofronoff found that Mr Drumgold had betrayed the trust of his junior staff and had lied to ACT Chief Justice Lucy McCallum. Mr Sofronoff also found that Mr Drumgold “deliberately advanced a false claim of legal professional privilege” and “tried to use dishonest means to prevent a person he was prosecuting from lawfully obtaining material”. Mr Sofronoff said Mr Drumgold was guilty of a “serious breach of duty” by failing to comply with the “golden rule” of disclosure that was at the heart of a fair trial.

Mr Drumgold secured a small victory in that ACT Supreme Court Acting Justice Stephen Kaye found that Mr Sofronoff’s conduct during his inquiry into Mr Drumgold’s prosecution of Mr Lehrmann gave rise to “a reasonable apprehension of bias” because of his dealings with journalist Janet Albrechtsen.

Importantly for the criminal justice system in the ACT, Justice Kaye also found that of the eight findings Mr Sofronoff made against Mr Drumgold, only one was legally unreasonable. Justice Kaye found that Mr Drumgold had “not established that seven of those findings were legally unreasonable”.

These corruption watchdog decisions against Mr Sofronoff go to the heart of justice administration in the ACT that is not able to handle thorough external scrutiny. This is true also in the case of Mr Sofronoff’s impartial and thorough investigation of Mr Drumgold’s handling of the Lehrmann trial and the fact that by acting in the public interest Mr Sofronoff ensured that full disclosure was put above the possibility that an unfavourable report could be hidden from public view. The ACT corruption watchdog proceedings raise only further questions about the quality of justice in the territory.