Lawyer’s case against court dismissed

An Invercargill lawyer applied for a judicial review of the decision of a judge in the Invercargill District Court who gave him a final warning and threatened to fine him.

The case centres around the lodging of a case management memorandum, a checklist outlining various pieces of information relevant to a defendant’s case.

The completed memorandum must be lodged no later than five working days before the date of the defendant’s case review hearing.

A High Court decision outlines the issue, saying that in a matter from November 2014, lawyer Keith Owen was criticised by Judge Kevin Phillips in the Invercargill District Court for not filing a case management memorandum on time. The judge maintained that failing to file the memorandum had resulted in the abandonment of a case review hearing, delaying the timetable to trial unnecessarily by two to three weeks.

Judge Phillips threatened to fine Owen and gave him a ‘‘final warning’’. The warning triggered an inquiry by the Legal Services Commissioner, the decision says.

Owen later lodged an application with the High Court for a judicial review of the matter, claiming the final warning was illegal, it was disproportionate given his generally acceptable standard of performance when it came to case management memorandum, he was not given reasonable notice of the judge’s intention, and in all circumstances the decision to issue a warning was irrational.

However, the decision, issued by Justice Williams, says not enough information was known about the intentions of the Legal Services Commissioner and the application was dismissed, subject to two qualifications - that it did not affect the reinstitution of proceedings involving both the Commissioner and the District Court at Invercargill, and that costs should be left to lie where they fall.