Legal Precedents
Woman Sacked for Dirty Divorce Tactics
A WOMAN who used Australian Federal Police databases to dig up dirt on her former husband during a bitter divorce has lost a claim for unfair dismissal.
Fair Work Australia heard the woman, who worked as a financial analyst for the AFP, also tried to rope colleagues into her battle against her former husband but was sacked in April last year after he hired a private investigator and complained to police.
She was found to have breached the AFP code of conduct after getting a co-worker to send her records on her former husband’s businesses, which she described as ”gold” and forwarded on to her mother.
Police also found two sexually inappropriate photos on her work computer, including an image of ”two men’s buttocks” which she described as ”jovial”.
European Court of Human Rights does a backflip: Biological fathers’ lawsuits dismissed
Judgment of the European Court of Human Rights: Biological fathers have no right to recognition of paternity if the mother lives with another man.
In 2010 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that German legislation prohibiting biological fathers from having any contact with their child without the biological mother’s consent was discriminating against fathers and a violation of the men’s human rights.
Refer to article: European Court Bolsters Fathers’ Rights
However, the European Court of Human Rights has just announced a backflip on its previous position, now claiming a ludicrous exception to this ruling by removing the parental rights of the biological father merely because the mother has moved in with another man.
Its a bizarre case of one step forward, ten steps backward for fathers all around the world, and this particular decision exemplifies the entrenched discrimination against biological fathers at every level of the legal system.
Divorcees Beware: Negligent Lawyers Cannot Be Sued in Australia
In what can only be described as a remarkable Supreme Court judgment, a Judge has found that a family law lawyer, a Mr Andrew Goddard from Goddard Elliott lawyers , who negligently advised his mentally incapacitated client resulting in a breathtakingly unjust property settlement,  cannot be sued due to Australia’s archaic advocates’ immunity laws.
This decision was made despite finding that Mr Andrew Goddard was extremely negligent in his representation of his client, resulting in a $900,000 shortfall. In a remarkable twist that defies logic, the client was ordered to pay a further $68,000 in legal costs to Goddard Elliott lawyersï»ż.
–A JUDGE said today he found it “deeply troubling” that a law firm can avoid paying $675,000 to a mentally incapacitated client that it negligently advised because of an ancient law that protects lawyers from being sued.
Justice Kevin Bell found that Goddard Elliott lawyers were negligent in preparing the case of client Paul Fritsch and as a result he only received less than a third of his share of a marital pool of $4.3 million.
In his Supreme Court judgment, Justice Bell said Mr Fritsch was entitled to substantial compensation from the Glen Waverley law firm but the Common Law “advocates’ immunity” shielded the firm for paying for their negligent handling of his case.
“Goddard Elliott is not liable to pay damages for the loss its negligence caused to Mr Fritsch, a conclusion to which I am driven and find deeply troubling,” Justice Bell said.
Courts Sending Mixed Messages to Fathers About Child Discipline
A MAN was recently found guilty of hitting his teenage son with a wooden spoon during an argument over homework.
The Canberra man was found guilty in the ACT Magistrates Court, but avoided a conviction after the magistrate accepted he was genuinely remorseful for his actions.
The court heard the man hit his son with a wooden spoon after he refused to do his homework and called his mother a ”bitch”.
The 50-year-old originally pleaded not guilty to a charge of common assault after hitting his son around the legs and hands.
His defence argued it was ”lawful chastisement” but Magistrate David Mossop yesterday found the man had taken things too far and had left the boy bruised and scratched.
However Mr Mossop accepted the boy had a history of poor behaviour and that the insult to the mother went too far. He accepted that the father displayed ”a significant degree of remorse” while still maintaining he was only trying to discipline his son.
However not long after, another judicial officer found that SMACKING your kids can be OK.
Mum’s hate campaign against stepmother in custody battle at Family Court
A MOTHER has lost custody of her two young daughters after she conducted an “obsessive” campaign against their new stepmother.
Family Court judge Justice Peter Young said he suspected it was the mother, 30, who painted “bitch” on the woman’s house and wrote “die dad haters” on her own car in felt-tipped pen and then sought to blame the stepmother, 28.
The judge said the sisters, aged 10 and seven, would be better off living with their father, 29, and his new wife, because their mother “would not likely change”.
He ordered an end to the shared custody which had been going on for more than five years and said the two girls should live full-time with their father.
“I find that he is capable of a greater level of responsive behaviour and conduct than is the mother and that is one of the considerations I have evaluated,” Justice Young said.Caught between warring parents, the sisters had to “tiptoe” around both households for fear of upsetting anyone.
Family Court lets wealthy wife keep the lot
IT is taken as given that when a man gets divorced after 21 years he’s going to lose a chunk of whatever fortune he has made to his ex-wife.
What, though, if it’s the wife who has made all the money? Does she lose half too?
Not in every case, according to a recent judgment of the Family Court, which has allowed a wife to keep the bulk of the $4 million in assets she holds in her name, while leaving the husband with pretty much nothing.
The judgment, known as Stiller and Power, was made in September but has only now come to light. It concerns a Brisbane couple, described as “intelligent and creative” who got married in 1991, when both were 53. Each had “a reasonable level of unencumbered assets” including properties held in their own names before they tied the knot.
Court makes remarkable Apology to Malicious Mother who poisoned children against their Father
Editor: The below article is about a disgraceful act by Australia’s Family Law Courts, Â to completely destroy any shred of child protection provisions left in Australia’s Family Law act, by making an unprecedented apology to a malicious mother who has alienation her children against their father.
This is the Court, at its highest levels, Â over-turning a sitting Magistrates decision and rewarding a Mother who has engaged in Parental Alienation to an extreme degree, for no apparent legally justified reason.
You have to seriously ask why the Family Law act was amended by the Gillard Labor government recently when the Judiciary has already interpreted out any provisions designed to promote a child’s meaningful relationship with both parents.
Judicial Fraud and Entrenched Discrimination: Labor Govt stays silent on Serious Allegations
Serious Allegations of Judicial Fraud unanswered
It has now been over 5 years since Australia’s High Court delivered a stunning judgment in the Magill v Magill paternity fraud case in Australia, effectively creating two remarkable precedents in terms of the perpetuation of fraud in this country.
According to Anti Paternity Fraud Advocate Cheryl King, “Paternity fraud was effectively endorsed by Australia’s highest court, the High Court, denying the plaintiff Mr Liam Magill any legal recourse against the woman who fraudulently deceived both Mr Magill and two of his three children into believing that he was their father.”
King further stated that “this deception continued even after separation, involving financial fraud which the Court deemed as not required to be re-paid”.
King alleges that in the second, another type of fraud was exercised by one of the presiding judges, Justice Susan Crennan.
Open Letter to the Senate Inquiry by a Concerned Father on the Family Violence Bill
The following is a rebuttal to the Senate made by a concerned father in response to erroneous, misleading and misguided research submitted to the Senate Inquiry into the Family Violence Bill, 2011, claiming that Australia’s 2006 Shared Parenting legislation has forced children to live with paedophiles, and other absurd and unsubstantiated claims that lack any credible or relevant evidence.
This is an admirable initiative from one man, and is a great example of constructive activism.
==
Dear Senators,
I am writing to rebut the âevidenceâ that shared parenting forces children to live with paedophiles, submitted on notice by Justice for Children.
I point out that this submission cites caselaw made 30 years before the shared parental responsibility amendments were enacted and quotes irrelevant UK judgements in which supervised contact was ordered to protect the father from further child sexual abuse allegations. Briggs consistently refers to interim orders where findings of fact cannot be made. Apparently they donât expect anyone to check.
US mum convicted of baby microwave murder
JURORS in an American woman’s third trial have found her guilty of burning her baby daughter to death in a microwave oven.
China Arnold, 31, was convicted of aggravated murder in the death of 28-day-old Paris Talley in August 2005.
Arnold could receive the death penalty. The sentencing phase will begin on Monday next week.
Arnold’s first trial ended in a mistrial.
She was found guilty in the second trial, but that conviction was reversed last year. An appeals court found there was misconduct by prosecutors and the trial court made an error by not allowing a material witness to testify in Arnold’s defence.
Prosecutors have said Arnold intentionally put the baby in the microwave after a fight with her boyfriend. The defence had argued someone else was responsible.
Medical experts testified that the baby died after her temperature reached about 42 degrees Celsius and she probably was in the microwave for more than two minutes, dying quickly afterward.
“She died because she was overheated,” said Dr Marcella Fierro, retired chief medical examiner for Virginia. “She was cooked.”‘
Messages seeking comment from the prosecutor and defence lawyer were left at their offices, but a gag order in the case prevents anyone connected to it from commenting outside court.
Assistant Prosecutor Dan Brandt told jurors in court Arnold’s actions were “even more purposeful” than a slaying with a gun or knife, the Dayton Daily News reported.
“Baby Paris is without life, but she’s not without a voice,” Mr Brandt told jurors in closing arguments. “Please listen to her.”
Mr Brandt said Arnold had to carry the baby over, place her in the microwave, shut the door and press buttons.
Then she waited while her child cooked to death, Mr Brandt said.
Defence lawyer Jon Paul Rion argued the evidence pointed as much to Terrell Talley, the baby’s father, as it did Arnold, however the jury was unconvinced by the compelling evidence against the mother.
“This doesn’t make sense to you,” Mr Rion told jurors. “It doesn’t. I’ve been watching your faces.”
The prosecutor cut and fit evidence to show “this loving mother somehow was so evil that she killed her baby in this way”, he said.
