Lawyer doesn’t know Mensink
THE lawyer acting for Clive Palmer’s fugitive nephew, Clive Mensink, has never spoken to the man despite representing him for the past two years, a court has heard.
Mr Mensink and Mr Palmer’s lawyer Sam Iskander was yesterday grilled by lawyers for Queensland Nickel’s liquidators in a public examination hearing designed to pin down the whereabouts of Mr Mensink.
Mr Mensink was the sole registered director of the refinery when it collapsed in 2016. He left Australia months after the collapse.
Mr Mensink has been living the high- life on the run ever since, refusing to return to Australia for questioning, despite several warrants being issued.
Under cross- examination by barrister Tom Sullivan QC, for special purpose liquidators PPB Advisory, Mr Iskander told the court he had “never” directly communicated with Mr Mensink during the time he had been acting as his solicitor.
The court heard Mr Palmer had been “conduit” between the pair since November 2016.
“My understanding was that Mr Palmer was the main conduit of instructions and he had the authority to act on his behalf and so therefore I would follow those instructions … as I was not receiving instructions from anyone else,” he said.
Signed authorities were later provided, the court heard.
The solicitor said he had been told Mr Palmer’s brother- in- law, George Sokolov, met Mr Mensink in Bulgaria after Easter last year.
“To the best of my recollection, he ( Sokolov) went to Bulgaria around that time … he met with his father ( Alex Sokolov) and his father was able to lead him to Mr Men- sink …,” Mr Iskander said. “I said: ‘ Do you have contact directly with him?’ And he ( George Sokolov) said: ‘ I have to go through my father’ and they have some friend over there, who would be able to lead him to Mr Mensink … I thought it was obscure, I didn’t understand why all the fuss.”
Ryan Mensink, who works for Mr Palmer’s Waratah Coal, also gave evidence yesterday.
Liquidators are seeking to retrieve conversations from his phone, which he had with his father in February via encrypted messaging app WhatsApp.