CFMEU officials John Setka and Shaun Reardon launch legal action against Boral bosses

CFMEU officials John Setka and Shaun Reardon have launched legal action against Boral bosses over “malicious prosecution”.

CFMEU’s Victorian state secretary John Setka. Stuart McEvoy/The Australian

CFMEU officials John Setka and Shaun Reardon have launched legal action accusing Boral executives Paul Dalton and Peter Head of false imprisonment and malicious prosecution over the failed prosecution of the union bosses for blackmail.

In a writ filed in the Victorian Supreme Court, Mr Setka and Mr Reardon claim Mr Dalton and Mr Head caused the botched prosecution when they “provided false information to the police and withheld relevant information from the police”.

Mr Dalton, who is Boral’s general manager of innovation and transformation and Mr Head, who is the company’s general manager of quarries, are also accused of false imprisonment by causing the arrest and detention of Mr Setka and Mr Reardon in early December 2015.

Mr Setka, the CFMEU’s Victorian state secretary, and Mr Reardon, his deputy, are seeking “exemplary and aggravated” damages from the Boral executives.

In a statement to The Australian, the CFMEU said today marked “three years to the day that John and Shaun were arrested on trumped up charges”.

“As one of the claims involves a potential time limit of three years to commence proceedings, steps have been taken to protect John and Shaun’s legal rights.”

A Boral spokesman said the company had not been served but was “confident that Boral and our executives have always acted with the utmost integrity and honesty in this case and will continue to do so.”

Mr Setka and Mr Reardon were charged with blackmail after Boral boss Mike Kane “respectfully” suggested the Trade Union Royal Commission, headed by Dyson Hayden, refer the matter to police.

Mr Sekta and Mr Reardon were accused of threatening Boral during a coffee meeting in April 2013 with Mr Dalton and Mr Head dealing with the union’s bitter war with construction company Grocon.

At the time, the CFMEU was running a secondary boycott of Boral over its supply of concrete to Grocon, an action that went on to cost it millions of dollars in fines and settlements with the company.

However, during a committal hearing in May this year, Mr Head gave evidence that the meeting was “calm” and “pleasant”.

“There was no overt aggression but there was certainly passion for the cause,” he told the Magistrates Court.

After considering his and Mr Dalton’s evidence, prosecutors decided to drop the blackmail charge.

In their writ, filed on Tuesday by high-profile solicitor Peter Gordon, Mr Setka claims to have been held by police for “about two hours and 25 minutes” after being arrested in front of his two small children on December 6, 2015.

Mr Reardon says he was held for about three hours and 23 minutes.

Mr Dalton and Mr Head “engaged in conduct that amounted to a direct request, direction or procurement to the police to make the arrests” and “are to be regarded as having directly brought about the arrests”, the CFMEU men allege in their writ.

The union officials claim that in addition to providing false information to police, the Boral executives “set the criminal proceedings in motion” and played an active role in the conduct of the proceedings, including by putting “the police in possession of information which virtually compelled the police to bring criminal charges” and by “prejudicing” the judgment of prosecutors.

“The criminal proceedings against Setka and Reardon were commenced by Dalton and Head without reasonable and probably cause,” they allege.

“Dalton and Head, in initiating and maintaining the criminal proceedings, acted maliciously and were actuated by a sole or dominant purpose other than the proper invocation of the criminal law,” the writ alleges.