Aussie gangsters eye freedom amid informant scandal

MELBOURNE: Some of Australia’s most dangerous criminals could have their convictions overturned after revelations their defense lawyer was secretly feeding information to police. For a decade before the turn of the millennium, Melbourne’s gangland wars gripped Australia, with police seemingly unable to penetrate the city’s shadowy underworld as the death toll soared. The series of up to 40 bloody retributive murders came as rival gangs battled over Melbourne’s lucrative drug trade and only eased when key mob figures were put behind bars.

But a legal scandal now threatens dozens - if not hundreds - of their convictions, with the shocking revelation that criminal defense lawyer Nicola Gobbo was also acting as a police informant at the time. The former barrister represented some of Australia’s most dangerous criminals on charges ranging from drug trafficking to murder, while also feeding information about her clients to police. Prosecutors last year informed 22 people that they could have grounds to appeal.

But Gobbo - also referred to as Lawyer X and Informer 3838 - claims that at least 386 people were arrested and charged based on the information she provided, according to a June 2015 letter that was made public in December. A Royal Commission inquiry is currently underway to determine how many cases have been impacted by Gobbo’s double life, with hearings set to resume today. “Any conviction in any case where Gobbo played anything but a very minimal role in providing legal services is almost certainly going to be overturned,” Melbourne University law professor Jeremy Gans told AFP. —AFP