[1] As well as being responsible for the Yankee Doodles precedent, Justice Atkinson has also made two notable decisions in her capacity as member of the Queensland Legal Practice Tribunal.

She then became an actor and theatre administrator from 1974 to 1978,[2] before becoming a lecturer of literature, Drama, Film and Australian Studies at the Queensland Institute of Technology.

After rejecting the defendant's argument that judgment had been irregularly entered, her Honour discussed the circumstances in which the court will set aside a regularly obtained default judgment, reiterating that the defendant providing a satisfactory explanation for the failure to appear and the length of delay for making the application are both factors that the court will consider.

Tampoe, the respondent, a solicitor and principal of a law firm, had acted for convicted drug smuggler Schapelle Corby.

It was in acting for her that Tampoe was accused of breaching client confidentiality, after he disclosed Corby's criminal history in a television interview published on 26 June 2005 on the Channel 9 program Sunday.

He was also charged with bringing the legal profession into disrepute, after he also referred to Corby and her family in disparaging terms in a documentary to be shown on Australian television, and claimed that he had invented a defence for Corby alleging that baggage-handlers had planted the drugs, when this is not part of a defence lawyer's role.

"[12] In 2014, Atkinson presided over the trial of Brett Peter Cowan, who was found guilty of the murder of Daniel Morcombe.