Health Minister Yvette D’Ath frustrated by delays to punishment for DNA bungle

Months after disturbing revelations from the DNA inquiry surfaced, Queensland Health is yet to rule on the employment future of three managers blamed for the failings.

The employment status of staff blamed for the extraordinary failings at the Queensland DNA laboratory remains in limbo, which Health Minister Yvette D’Ath admitted was frustrating.

More than four months after damning findings were handed down from the inquiry, forensic lab boss Cathie Allen — whose leadership was blamed by Commissioner Walter Sofronoff as the “single biggest problem” within the lab — remains on suspension, with Queensland Health yet to finalise the future of her employment.

Forensic Scientific Services team leader Justin Howes and lab manager Paula Brisotto also remain on suspension amid ongoing extensions to show cause notices.

Ms D’Ath told reporters on Thursday two of the three identified during the inquiry remain on full pay while on suspension.

Inside Qld Health’s biggest failures over the years

The original deadline to the show cause notices expired about three months ago but Ms D’Ath said all had sought extensions.

When asked if the delays were frustrating given the seriousness of the DNA bungle and explicit blame placed on failings, the Health Minister replied: “of course it is”.

DNA lab boss Cathie Allen is understood to be one of a number of staff stood down.

“But there’s procedural fairness — they’ve got a right to seek extension and put forward their reasons for that and have that properly considered,” Ms D’Ath said.

“That’s not considered by me (and) it shouldn’t be. It’s considered by the department as to whether there should be extensions on those show causes and what the outcome of that should be.

“Importantly, they’re not there in the workplace right now and they’re still on suspension while we go through this process.”

The inquiry revealed the state run lab misled police and manipulated data to force an arbitrary sample limit for testing critical evidence from murders and sexual assault cases, leading to more than 1800 false witness statements in at least 1260 court cases.

As a result of the findings, authorities are sifting through the enormous pile of potentially false tests and reanalysing thousands of samples.

“We know for a fact that when we do that further testing of the samples, there will be a proportion that show DNA that otherwise had been deemed to have no or insufficient DNA,” Ms D’Ath said.

“That’s why the Commission of Inquiry made the recommendations they did because they identified there was quite a significant number of those that were showing DNA.”

Health Minister Yvette D'Ath admitted the delays were frustrating. Picture: Kevin Farmer

Ms D’Ath said the Queensland Police Service was working through the thousands of samples needing to be retested, prioritising cases that are before the courts as well as the specific relevance of each sample.

“Even if they do find DNA, it may not be substantively relevant for that case because it may have been that there were other samples, other DNA, other evidence that doesn’t change the outcome.”

Earlier this week, a man convicted of brutally murdering his estranged wife with a hammer launched an appeal citing the failings at the lab.

Andrew John Cobby claimed fresh testing as part of the review into the lab has provided him with exculpatory evidence to have his conviction quashed.

The disturbing revelations of the appeal prompted Queensland Law Society president Bill Potts to warn it was “without a doubt the first of many”.

Ms D’Ath said “we always expected that this would occur”.

“But what the outcomes of those will be, that will be a case-by-case basis relevant to the evidence that’s put forward,” she said.

Originally published as Health Minister Yvette D’Ath frustrated by delays to punishment for DNA bungle