Rat-a-tat-tat … this man will never stand trial for an Australian contract killing because he has a date with a machine gun execution squad in an Asian jail.
The prosecution case, already weak, was terminally damaged when the woman who made the complaints against Lovitt was arrested a few months later.
COLIN Lovitt, Queen’s Counsel and murder defence expert, was sitting in a North Melbourne bar nursing a fresh beer and an old hangover when his mobile phone rang. It was a newspaper reporter asking if he wished to comment on his pending arrest on rape charges.
The journalist told him a woman had complained to police that only hours earlier she had been assaulted by the respected lawyer in his Carlton apartment.
Stunned, he refused to comment and put the phone down. Within a minute it rang again – this time it was a reporter from The Age with the same story. The expensive QC gave the journalist some free legal advice to be careful about what he wrote before ending the conversation.
He went home – ‘I was devastated’ – but around midnight went to The Age office to pick up a paper to see if there was a story that he was under investigation.
There wasn’t.
But having been the defence barrister in more than 130 murder cases and observed headline-hungry media packs scavenging for salacious quotes he knew this story wasn’t going to disappear. He didn’t have to wait long. Just after 7am next day the 3AW Rumour File ran a story that a prominent barrister had been charged with rape. By 8am every television and radio station had caught up, and were ringing him to ask for interviews. ‘I felt like a prisoner in my own home,’ he said.
It was just the start of a ten-month battle that ended with five criminal charges being quietly withdrawn by the Office of Public Prosecutions on the grounds of ‘public interest.’
Lovitt, Victoria’s best known defence barrister, remains angry and bitter about the experience, believing his public humiliation was at least partially motivated by some he has offended during his thirty-year legal career.
But how did one of the toughest, most streetsmart lawyers in the trade end up being charged with a string of tawdry offences – and why were they discarded without any public examination?
TO some people lunch is a meal, to others it is an event. To Colin Lovitt, fifty four, it can be a marathon. President of the Carlton Cricket Club, vice-president of the Carlton Social Club, Convenor and former President of the Criminal Bar Association and long-time member of the Melbourne Press Club, he is a man who loves company, conversation and liquid refreshment.
Sunday, 28 March, 1999, was to be a big day, even by Lovitt’s standards. It was to be the annual ‘Endless Lunch’ at the up-market Matteo’s Restaurant in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy. It began around 1pm and for the hardy would finish thirteen hours later.
There were top quality wines and food, a band, opera singers, aerobics sessions and a light-hearted debate on whether smoking should be banned in restaurants. Lovitt and businessman John Elliott spoke for the smokers while Sam Newman and a police inspector spoke for the health conscious. More than seventy people went to the lunch and most drifted away by the evening, but a small, hard core ploughed on.
Among them was a woman in her late twenties whom Lovitt had met at the lunch the previous year. According to the barrister, he was sitting with about seven people ‘relieved’ the event he had helped organise had gone so well. Not wanting a good night to end he ‘made the mistake of inviting everyone back to my place.’ Only one accepted. The young woman.
‘I had only met her twice before, was not remotely interested in her romantically and I knew she was not interested in me. But try telling that to those who want to put their own gloss on events,’ he was to say later.
What happened then will never be tested in open court but what can be established is that during the dispute and the protracted aftermath there was no evidence of rape or gross sexual misconduct.
Lovitt says the woman became abusive, threw compact discs at him, dropped a wine glass over the balcony and then slept on the bed while he dozed on the couch. She then left in a rage around 7.30am. He says she returned, banged on the door, entered the apartment in search of her jacket and became abusive again.
He said he believed she was ‘out of control and was going to assault me again or smash something else so I tackled her and sat on her ribs. I pinned her in an attempt to render her harmless.’ He said he weighed ‘twice as much and towered over her’ and ‘she rapidly calmed down’ after he restrained her.
She left the apartment but later went to the Carlton police station to make a complaint that she had been attacked.
She had old bruising on her face from an accident and an unexplained red mark on her face.
While she was in the police station Lovitt was at another lunch, unaware he was now the subject on an intense police investigation. His barrister, Con Heliotis, QC, later described it as ‘akin to a murder investigation.’
Lovitt believes some police tipped off the media, even before the woman has signed her statement. By 5.30 that evening the press were after him for a comment.
‘I haven’t the slightest doubt that some police took an unholy delight in contacting the media to maximise my embarrassment.’
A week later a warrant was served to let police search his apartment. They took his robe, the doona, fluff from the carpet, a pair of shorts, a CD and a broken CD cover. They had already photographed and collected the broken wine glass in the lane six floors below. None of the exhibits assisted the investigation.
The man who has rigorously cross-examined police hundreds of times about search procedures watched as police examined his possessions. ‘It is a very different feeling when it happens to you.’
Meanwhile, he was to feel the brunt of the rumours that swept the Bar. He heard colleagues claim he had broken a woman’s nose and jaw and was about to be charged with rape.
’The Bar is a cesspit when it comes to gossip. There are quite a few counsel who are like a pack of vultures dying to think the worst. They chortle away at other people’s expense.’
Barristers who every day solemnly lecture juries on the importance of the presumption of innocence gleefully condemned Lovitt as guilty and enjoyed seeing their high-profile colleague squirm.
For the first time in twenty-nine years the outgoing barrister felt uncomfortable going to his office at Owen Dixon Chambers and felt vulnerable – not to strangers – but to legal identities he had known for years who wanted to believe unproven allegations.
‘I received many messages of support from many decent people,’ he said, but added that he remains ‘somewhat disenchanted’ with the Bar.
Rat-a-tat-tat … this man will never stand trial for an Australian contract killing because he has a date with a machine gun execution squad in an Asian jail.
Smoking is bad for your health … the Marlboro hat that police used to track the killers and the vases used to import heroin.
The victim … murdered in Melbourne by American killers on the orders of a Hong Kong crime boss.
Steve Tragardh with The Executioner.
Lunch in a Vietnamese prison … pondfish and dog. Yum!
Prison snaps: Australian detectives with Vietnamese prison authorities. Don’t skip lunch.
Brother Phuc’s ‘black pawns’ … arrested while
trying to collect money for The Brotherhood.
A Hong Kong office raided as part of the international police investigation.
Yummy. Brother Phuc about to get his last airline meal before landing in an Australian jail.
Not so yummy … the list of phone numbers rescued from a black pawn’s mouth as he tried to swallow the evidence.
Richard Mladenich … survived a spade in the head, but not a bullet years later.
Another victim … Gerardo Mannella.
Mad Charlie … victim of an underworld war.
Death by shotgun … Mark Moran, murdered as he returned to his million-dollar home.
Big Ray Watson. A colourful cop.
Ray Watson talks tactics with a peaceful demonstrator.
Jane Thurgood-Dove with mother Helen and husband Mark at Easter lunch.
Caught on film … the getaway car torched by the hitmen minutes after Jane’s murder.
Precious memories. Jane with youngest daughter Holly.
Colin Campbell Ross … was the wrong man hanged?
THERE is no doubt that many police and some fellow barristers enjoyed watching the confident Lovitt cut down publicly during the months he stood accused. He has the ability to offend and enrage – in and out of the courtroom.
He is known as one of the toughest cross-examiners in the business and some take offence at his tactics. There are people who think I go in too hard but no-one can ever say that I have done anything dishonest,’ he says with a voice timbred by decades of good reds and bad cigarettes.
He has taken on many high profile cases, including defending Greg Domaszewicz over the murder of Jaidyn Leskie, and was a constant critic of police methods at the Coroner’s Court when representing the family of Graeme Jensen, a man shot dead by police in 1988.
In the long-running police shootings inquest he was particularly severe on John Hill, a respected homicide squad investigator. After one savage cross examination Lovitt saw Hill wandering through the car park of the Coroner’s Court. ‘I said to him, “Cheer up, it’s really just a day in court, don’t take it too seriously”.’
Hill responded: ‘It’s all right for you – you haven’t just seen your career go down the toilet.’
Detective Senior Sergeant Hill was later charged over his handling of the Jensen matter. Although the charges would certainly have been withdrawn, he committed suicide in September, 1993, days before he was to be cross examined in another case – again by Colin Lovitt.
Ironically, Lovitt made no secret of the fact he believed the charges brought against Hill and several other police over the Jensen death were ridiculous and expressed that view while giving evidence in court.
But some police never forgave Lovitt over the death of a colleague. Others held grudges over his take-no-prisoners attitude in court. Some prosecutors have no time for the barrister who has wounded them in heavy legal clashes. For the past twenty years he has attended the annual homicide squad party. Late last year he was confronted by one detective who made it clear he felt Lovitt was not welcome.
Yet, while there is no shortage of police who will bag the hard-nosed brief, there are others who see Lovitt as a great fighter who does the best for his client. ‘He has tried to tear shreds off me in the (witness) box and when you leave the court almost punch drunk he’ll walk over and say “let’s have a beer”. It is just business and he is good at his,’ a veteran detective said.
At least one high-profile policeman and several judges were prepared to give character evidence for Lovitt if his trial had gone ahead.
Lovitt, the son of an Age photographer, toyed with the idea of being a journalist before turning to the law. While finishing university he was a secondary school maths teacher. ‘I would have loved to have been a teacher if the wages were better.’
It is clear that Lovitt likes a lifestyle that doesn’t come cheap but money is not his driving force – there is more money and less stress in corporate law or picking open loopholes in tax legislation for big business.
But, despite the way he has been treated, the ‘Embarrister’ defended a financially struggling man for nothing because a serious conviction would have cost the defendant his job.
The man was a policeman.
IT took police five months of investigation before they charged Lovitt with five offences. False imprisonment, intentionally causing injury, recklessly causing injury, common law assault and indecent assault.
As he was being informed by his solicitor, the tenacious Tony Hargreaves, that the charges had been served his mobile telephone rang. It was a Herald Sun reporter asking for a comment. Lovitt remains convinced that some police were feeding the media snippets as a pay back for old court battles.
He also maintains that some police ensured the charges were as extreme as possible. For example, he says, the indecent assault related to an allegation he tried to kiss the woman – a charge he vehemently denies – and the unlawful imprisonment related to pinning her to the floor after she returned voluntarily to the flat.
They must have thought that all their Christmases had come at once and that this was a wonderful opportunity. They were ridiculous charges, designed to humiliate.’
Police sources say that expert investigators from the Rape Squad looked at the allegations within twenty-four hours of the complaint and concluded there wasn’t sufficient evidence to prove any sexual offences.
They based their opinion on the fact that both parties were drunk, there was no independent corroboration, no strong forensic evidence and possible credibility problems as the complainant suffered from blackouts on the night.
The case went back to Carlton CIB where investigations continued. Finally, detectives handling the case recommended assault and unlawful imprisonment charges be laid, but the Detective Senior Sergeant supervising the case said the evidence was too weak to justify a prosecution.
The unlawful assault charge was laid because of Lovitt’s admission that he pinned the woman down. ‘What was I to do – allow her to attack me because she was a woman?’ he asks.
It is believed that, ultimately, an acting Detective Inspector authorised laying the charges.
The matter was not referred to the Office of the Director Public Prosecutions for a legal opinion before Lovitt was charged. Police sources said the investigators originally did not recommend the indecent assault charge. It is not known when it was added it to the list.
Police launched an internal investigation into allegations that information from the complainant’s statement was leaked to a prominent member of the Bar who was not connected to the defence or prosecution. The barrister denied seeing the document, but a senior member of the Rape Squad was later transferred.
There will be no independent examination of exactly what happened in Lovitt’s apartment. But what can be established is that the prosecution case, already weak, was terminally damaged when the woman who made the complaints against Lovitt was arrested a few months later during an alcohol-related disturbance in which her behavior mirrored Lovitt’s version of events in his apartment.
The case was formally withdrawn – the day the four-day Magistrates’ Court hearing was to begin. A Sydney QC in to prosecute and the legal costs would have been around $100,000 if it had gone ahead.
In the eyes of the law Colin Lovitt is innocent. The charges have blown away – but the experienced counsel fears he could remain tainted.
For all his knowledge of detailed legal and Latin expressions he prefers to put it more succinctly. ‘Shit sticks.’