Royal Commission into the Management of Police Informants
[8] On 31 March 2014 an article written by Anthony Dowsley was published in the Herald Sun which outlined, without going into detail, the role of Gobbo, under the pseudonym Lawyer X, in assisting Victoria Police by providing information.
[10]: 251 The Herald Sun responded to the injunction with a front page editorial article about the efforts of Victoria Police to stop publication of information relating to Gobbo's actions.
[10]: 244 On 14 July 2014 the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC) appointed former Victorian Supreme Court Justice Murray Kellam AO KC to undertake an enquiry, called Operation Leven,[11] into Victoria Police human source management.
[10]: 270–272 In 2016 it was claimed that documents had been withheld from the enquiry by Victoria Police but the complaint was dismissed[15] and during the Royal Commission it was stated that IBAC had not looked into the impact of Gobbo's actions on criminal cases as part of their review.
In March 2019, Ashton said "Over the preceding 12 months, numerous people had been murdered, some in very public locations and high-profile criminals were vying for control of drug operations that were inflicting serious harm on the Victorian community, It was accordingly a desperate and dangerous time".
[23][24] After the suppression orders relating to the judgement were lifted, in which Gobbo informing Victoria Police about her clients was called a "fundamental and appalling breach" of her obligations by the High Court,[13] Premier Andrews announced the Royal Commission shortly afterwards.
[27] In defending the money and effort spent attempting to keep the work of Gobbo secret Ashton stated "At all times when handling these matters our absolute concern has been for the protection of the lawyer and their family, who Victoria Police believed would be murdered if this information was released.
[32] After the Royal Commission was announced Victoria Police created the 117 person Taskforce Landow which sits under the Specialist Operations executive command which is led by Deputy Commissioner Wendy Steendam.
[41] In May 2020 it was reported that the number of legal professionals being investigated by the Royal Commission was now "at least a dozen", of which 2 were judges, including some that provided information during the period 2014-2016 whilst police were dealing with the consequences of working with Gobbo.
[51] During testimony Victoria Police were represented by Justin Hannebery KC and Renee Enbom who frequently called for information to be suppressed with around 370 exclusion or non-disclosure orders in operation.
[56] Patterson also testified that even though handlers raised concern in 2008 and Gobbo was officially deregistered as an informer on 12 January 2009,[9] Victoria Police didn't seek legal advice on the matter until August 2011.
[48] In early September 2019 transcripts from an August 2008 meeting between Gobbo and her handlers were discovered and tabled at the Royal Commission in which she claimed that she had gone into the offices of the Purana Taskforce, headed at that time by former Victoria Police Detective Inspector James (Jim) O’Brien, and changed the statements of an unnamed witness who was integral to multiple convictions including that of Carl Williams and Faruk Orman.
[70] Assistant Commissioner Thomas (Luke) Cornelius appeared before the Royal Commission on 12 December 2019 and 23–24, 29–30 January 2020[55] and answered questions about the $30 million that Gobbo gave as a figure she felt that she deserved whilst she was moving from being an informer to being a witness in the Dale case.
[33] In June 2019, in response to criticism by McMurdo relating to the withholding of 1,000 documents that Victoria Police had not deemed relevant, Ashton denied that there was an attempt to frustrate the Royal Commission and mentioned that they were spending $1.5 million per month on legal and support costs.
[52] Materials of interest to the Royal Commission were made available by Victoria Police throughout the hearings including 38 hours of phone intercepts, some containing Gobbo, which were provided in late April 2020 after all of the appearances of those directly involved had been completed.
[31][77] During his testimony at the Royal Commission on 13 December 2019,[55] former Deputy Commissioner (Crime) for Victoria Police Sir Kenneth Lloyd Jones who worked under Chief Commissioner Simon Overland, said of the handling of Gobbo that “It began as highly irregular and unethical and deteriorated over a number of years to something that was illegal and chaotic.”[78] When he was initially made aware of the role of Gobbo he approached the Office of Police Integrity, a former Supreme Court justice and the Victorian Ombudsman in a failed attempt to initiate an investigation.
During testimony Overland claimed that although using Gobbo as an informer was dangerous and put her at risk her life was already under threat due to her work acting as lawyer for Tony Mokbel and he was not aware that she was breaching legal requirements.
[100] Early on her first day of testimony Gobbo admitted to having a "drunken interlude" with a police officer with whom she discussed money laundering with[103] and also stated that, contrary to the promise that she agreed to in an affidavit she swore as part of her application to practice law, she had failed to act with integrity in her actions as a lawyer.
[103] Gobbo was asked about her interactions with Wayne Strawhorn, a Victoria Police officer who was later convicted of drug charges that she described as manipulative, and agreed that she should have known that it was improper to give him the information that she did but she was scared of him.
[104] After initially having no recollection of the conversation even though "It's something you would think would stick in your mind", Gobbo conceded that she had told police after she was shown text messages claiming credit for it.
[108] In February 2022 it was revealed that during 2020, whilst the Royal Commission was in progress, Victoria Police offered to pay for Gobbo to leave Australia for one of several countries that would allow her to avoid investigation and prosecution.
[55] On 12 February 2020 Victoria Police Superintendent Paul Hollowood appeared in front of the Royal Commission[55] and claimed that he was excluded from meetings during 2008 once he asked if legal advice on the use of Gobbo had been sought.
[104][105][113] Former Assistant Commissioner Stephen (Steve) Leane of Victoria Police who was head of the professional standards command in 2014 when information about the role of Gobbo started becoming more widely know, appeared in front of the Royal Commission on 8 February 2020.
[42] On 7 May to 13 May 2020 the Royal Commission heard from Deputy Commissioner Wendy Steendam, Victoria Police and Professor Sir Jonathan (Jon) Murphy, Liverpool John Moores University, United Kingdom on the topic of current policy and practice.
[126][127] Some of the more notable recommendations include: The information presented about Gobbo at the Royal Commission and elsewhere caused widespread comment with Melbourne University law professor Jeremy Gans declared that "Nothing to this extreme, that we know of, has happened anywhere in the world".
[133] and their attorney Ruth Parker called the actions of Gobbo and Victoria Police "the biggest criminal police-corruption conspiracy in the history of the Western world"[9][128] and "typical corruption ... you only see in movies".
[134] After the release of the report Attorney-General of Victoria Jill Hennessy said "What we've seen and learnt throughout this royal commission over the past two years is truly appalling" and promised to implement all of the recommendations[130][135] whilst Shadow Attorney-General Edward O'Donohue said that Gobbo put the "integrity of the Victorian justice system at stake" and was described the record keeping of Victoria Police practicing "astounding and unacceptable"[38] and the Victorian Legal Services Board and Commissioner Fiona McLeay noted the damage that Gobbo had done to the reputation of the legal profession and justice system.
[128][136] The President of the Victorian Bar, Matt Collins, called the allegations of what happened "wholly aberrant,"[137] the President of the Victorian Court of Appeal Justice Maxwell called the actions of Gobbo and others involved in her informing "disgraceful" and a "matter of profound importance"[134] and former crown prosecutor in Victoria, Gavin Silbert, said that "It trashes the whole criminal-justice system" and "If people can't seek legal advice without being turned over, being betrayed by a legal practitioner, it's the fundamental root of the whole system we operate on.
[146][147] In September 2020 the book "Lawyer X" by Patrick Carlyon and Anthony Dowsley, both reporters from the Herald Sun, was published by HarperCollins presenting the story of the Melbourne Gangland Wars and the role that Gobbo played.
[153] Nettle reported that he had made recommendations to the Director of Public Prosecutions Kerri Judd to lay criminal charges against a number of people which was refused by the DPP as there was either "little prospect of conviction" or that "the likely sentence does not justify the effort involved".
