Family Court bombing: judge recounts constant threats

A former judge tells the trial of Family Court bombing accused about frequent threats after a fellow judge was gunned down.

A bomb attached to the door of their family home killed Pearl Watson, wife of Judge Ray Watson, in 1984.

The case against accused Family Court bomber Leonard John Warwick was “absurd” and something similar to a scene “out of Monty Python”, his solicitor has told a Sydney court this morning.

Warwick, 71, appeared via video link in the NSW Supreme Court in a judge-alone trial for the murder of four people and the bombing of several buildings in connection with the NSW Family Court in the 1980s.

The offences allegedly stemmed from an ongoing dispute between the former fireman and his ex-wife.

Warwick has pleaded not guilty to 24 charges some of which relate to the shooting death of his brother-in-law and Family Court Justice David Opas.

The charges also relate to the deaths of Justice Ray Watson’s wife, Pearl Watson and Jehovah’s Witness minister Graham Wykes, who were both killed during separate bombings.

Wearing glasses and a dark green T-shirt, Warwick was shown on a large television screen in the courtroom.

After several unsuccessful attempts to adjourn the trial at the start of the day, defence solicitor Alan Conolly delivered his opening submissions, claiming his client had neither the motivation nor the expertise to pull off the crimes he was charged with committing.

The home of Justice Raymond Watson after it was bombed. Picture: NSW Police

“The idea that he could have been able to construct the bombs in the first place is absurd,” Mr Conolly said.

“The evidence that he had the expertise comes straight out of Monty Python”.

He claimed the Crown’s case was “lame” and suggested that NSW Police had unfairly targeted his client by designing a task to “pick a person responsible for all the bombings”.

“Common sense would dictate that not one person in any of the bombings could achieve the results that were achieved,” Mr Conolly said.

Warwick had been a “successful litigant” through the NSW Family Court, which meant he had no reason to attack the institution or it’s judges, Mr Conolly said.

“Mr Warwick been given custody of his daughter and she lived with him until adulthood,” Mr Conolly said.

“As far the Family Court, why ever would Mr Warwick have anything to do with that atrocious, violent, reckless event?”

Former judge tells of constant threats

The first witness to give evidence in the trial was former judge Josephine Maxwell, who served as a Family Court judge in the Parramatta court between 1976 and 1978.

Mrs Maxwell told the court that she and her colleagues had received a number of threats from members of the public in the form of written letters or interviews given to the press.

The threats began shortly after Family Court Justice David Opas was shot dead outside his home in 1980.

She said bomb threats soon became a common occurrence at Family Court, especially after a bombing at Justice Richard Gee’s Belrose home in March 1984, in which he escaped without injury.

“There were threats after that bombing, there were quite a number of bomb scares and we would be evacuated from the court, but nothing ever happened,” Mrs Maxwell said.

Mrs Maxwell told the court she had been at home on leave from work when she learned of the bombing at Justice Gee’s home.

Former Family Court judge Josephine Maxwell outside court. Picture: John Grainger

“I received a phone call from the principal registrar and I took myself off to North Shore Hospital to see if I could be of assistance and he was in the emergency ward of the hospital, and I did a few errands for him,” she said.

Mrs Maxwell was asked about the second bombing, in July 1984, of Family Court Justice Ray Watson’s home in Greenwich, in which his wife, Pearl Watson, was killed.

Following the explosion, Mrs Maxwell said judges in the Sydney and Parramatta registries were assigned two uniformed police officers for 24-hour security over a period of 18-months.

“The house where I was living had quite a large garage which I had erected, and the officers operated out of there,” Mrs Maxwell said.

“In some cases they operated from cars parked outside of judges houses, depending o the particular circumstances.”

She said the officers would change shifts up to three times a day.

Solicitor Alan Conolly asked Mrs Maxwell if judges sitting in the Family Court had discussed the death of their colleague, Justice Opas, or the need for increased security following the bombings.

“Of course we talked!” Mrs Maxwell snapped at him.

“We were absolutely devastated, I had known him from when I was a young student. People were deeply shocked but I don’t remember meetings about it.”

She said the threats from members of the public were “very frequent” and seemed to have become a popular way to interrupt proceedings.

“Perhaps they did it to delay their proceedings, to be a nuisance and cause interruption which was worst for the litigants whose cases were delayed,” she said.

In the weeks following the bombings, Mrs Maxwell received a death threat from someone warning that she would be “dead by midnight”.

“We were in the period when a lot of people were making threats. I took it as someone trying to intimidate me rather than harm me,” she said.

She recalled the Family Court was inundated by threats from a “number of groups”, comprised mainly of disgruntled men and fathers who were dissatisfied with the outcome of their court cases.

“I was very anxious on the Thursday and then on the Friday night I decided to just get on with my life and not be intimidated,” she said.

The trial continues.