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| NEWS > 24 November 2005 |
Other related articles:
Ethics panel: Ex-Boca police c
Former Boca Raton Police Chief Andrew Scott should pay a $5,000 fine and receive "public censure and reprimand" for misusing his power in asking a probationary sergeant to pull over a contractor for a Miami television reporter's ambush interview in 2005, the state Commission on Ethics decided today.
The commission had two complaints about Scott, one about the TV reporter and the other regarding Scott's ordering police officers to release his wealthy developer friend, Greg Talbott, from a holding cell following a drunken ruckus at a restaurant in 2005.
Scott resigned as ch... Read more
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 Article sourced from
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NEWS.com.au - Australia
24 November 2005
This article appeared in the above title/site.
To view it in its entirity click this link.
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Conspiracy theory ... 'It's a
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Lawyer fears police plot
LAWYER Zarah Garde-Wilson has accused Victoria Police of engaging in an elaborate conspiracy aimed at forcing her out of the legal profession.
But while police believe she has joined one of the Melbourne underworld's "significant tribes", she says her recent conviction for contempt of court was part of a plan in which police put her in to a position where it was inevitable.
Garde-Wilson, who represents a string of Melbourne figures, said the plan had been put together by officers of the Purana gangland taskforce.
The 27-year-old solicitor was convicted of contempt earlier this month after she refused to testify at the trial of Keith Faure and Evangelos Goussis, the two identities convicted of the murder in May last year of her de facto husband, Lewis Caine - himself a convicted murderer.
Garde-Wilson was not called to give evidence at the accused duo's committal hearing in March and she thought she would not be required to take the stand at their Supreme Court trial.
However, just a week before the trial was due to start, Garde-Wilson was subpoenaed to give evidence.
She said that as police knew she held genuine fears for her life (they were aware of her claim that Faure threatened to kill her if she ever spoke about the night Caine was killed), forcing her to take the stand was a ploy to discredit and endanger her as part of an US-inspired gang-busting strategy in which lawyers are targeted along with their clients.
But during her initial contempt of court hearing in October, Purana detective Andrew Stamper suggested that Garde-Wilson might want to avoid being questioned in the witness box because it would be put to her that Caine was a violent man and she would be quizzed on allegations that he had assaulted her during their two-year relationship.
He also revealed that her links to some of her underworld clients extended well beyond the courtroom.
It was alleged that Garde-Wilson was in an "on-off sexual" relationship with accused drug trafficker Tony Mokbel and that she lived in the house and drove the car of another one of her clients, convicted drug trafficker Roberta Williams, when Williams was in jail. Garde-Wilson has denied the allegations.
The court also heard Garde-Wilson had suffered from suicidal thoughts and had only twice gone out socially since Caine was killed, finding it difficult to do so because even though she knew he was dead, she "felt an overwhelming need to look for him".
However, she was seen laughing over breakfast with Williams before Tuesday's court case.
She made the accusations of a police witch-hunt yesterday ahead of a decision by the Law Institute of Victoria whether to take professional disciplinary action over her contempt of court conviction.
But with her professional future at stake, she has received unexpected support from leading authorities on lawyers' ethics who believe there are no grounds for drumming her out of the profession.
"Lawyers should not be criticised for protecting their lives instead of giving evidence," said Ysaiah Ross, author of Ethics and Law.
In an interview with The Australian Ms Garde-Wilson said one of the central elements of the plan was the denial of her application to join Victoria's witness protection plan.
Ms Garde-Wilson also revealed that long before she refused to give evidence she had informed the Law Institute of her fears that she was being targeted for a police "set-up".
"The plan Victoria Police have adopted in relation to the gangland matters was threefold. It is based on the American model. Firstly you charge the clients - the accused. Secondly you restrain all their assets. Thirdly you go for the lawyers.
"I caused major disruption to their attempts to restrain my clients' assets, which just inspired them to go down the third line," she said.
Ms Garde-Wilson warned that the next target for the Purana taskforce would be Melbourne silks.
"My clients are still represented by senior counsel and they (police) are not happy about that."
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