Ugly brawling before Fingleton's fall
07.06.2003
QUEENSLAND'S Chief Magistrate, Di Fingleton, is today in prison serving the third day of her 12-month sentence.
In June 1999, her predecessor, Stan Deer, resigned after holding the position for 11 years.
His departure followed months of bitter public brawling within the magistracy, during which time he was criticised for his administration of the court.
In 1991, the Goss government introduced the Stipendiary Magistrates Act. At that time the government saw the need to apply a ``separation of powers'' convention -- transferring power for the administration of the magistracy away from the government and giving it to the chief stipendiary magistrate.
Importantly for the new Labor government, it also allowed external appointments to the magistracy, a career which previously had been very much a closed shop.
Fingleton's appointment was made in circumstances almost as strained as her departure.
A significant factor in Deer's departure was his contretemps with Jacqui Payne, an indigenous magistrate and mother of six children who was the first Aboriginal judicial member appointed in Queensland.
Payne at that time was estranged from her husband, solicitor Andrew Boe, who represented her in the matter. Deer told her she was to be transferred to Townsville -- but she did not want to go, because that would mean taking the children away from their schools, and interrupting an arrangement she had with Boe that he have contact with his children every day.
When the appeal was upheld, Deer resigned, and then Labor attorney-general Matt Foley appointed Fingleton to the position.
Fast-forward two years, and Boe is the solicitor engaged by magistrates Sheryl Cornack, Anne Thacker and Basil Gribbin in legal battles against Fingleton.
In an ironic return to recent history, Thacker was told by Fingleton she was to be transferred to Townsville, and she objected. Cornack too was to be moved from the Gold Coast and Gribbin came to her defence in the ensuing verbal battle with Fingleton.
When the slanging match got totally out of hand, Boe was brought in.
Boe is acknowledged as a clever, concise lawyer, and a forceful advocate. With his track record and intimate knowledge of the system, why wouldn't magistrates turn to him?
But Boe is not one who is satisfied with letting legal processes take their course. His handling of the case took it beyond the courts and guaranteed it became a political conflict.
And why wouldn't it? The allegations were of great public interest and were embarrassing and even damaging to the judiciary. Almost certainly, they would set in train events that could lead to the downfall of Fingleton.
It did not take a genius lawyer to appreciate that were the details of a heated squabble within the judiciary to get into the public arena, it would soon become a highly politicised issue -- particularly when a major player was already branded by the Opposition as a Labor hack unworthy of being appointed to the position.
And so it did. Very quickly the issues were passed to the Crime and Misconduct Commission, an independent investigator appointed, and the rest is history.
So Boe has been the common link in the downfall of two chief stipendiary magistrates. Life goes on for him, with his wife remaining on the bench in Brisbane, and his children at hand to benefit from his fathering.
The magistracy is in tatters; the justice system derided by citizens who are dumbstruck that Fingleton is to spend a year behind bars. All smart magistrates now know that if they get into trouble, be sure to have Boe's work number on the speed-dial of their mobile phones.
The State Government is suitably embarrassed that legislation it enacted a year ago to deter the likes of organised crime figures threatening witnesses has claimed as its first victim the state's Chief Magistrate.
Fingleton won't suffer in prison. The women who are down on their luck -- the Aboriginal and Islander women, victims of domestic violence who retaliated and ended up in prison for their ``crime'' -- know that Fingleton, before and after she was a magistrate, was their one real champion.
And there is no doubt she has been treated very harshly.
