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Last week’s judgment denouncing the scandalous behaviour of the legal team running the Banksia Securities class action cast a spotlight on the conduct of lawyers for some of the defendants, asking whether “untenable” defences were maintained beyond an acceptable point in the case.
Lawyers running the scandal-ridden Banksia class action have been struck from the roll of practitioners, will face criminal investigation and must pay group members $11.7 million in damages.
It has been described as the darkest chapter in Victoria's legal history, an exemplar of all that is terrible with class actions in Australia. A case of greedy lawyers who found their golden egg in a group of retirees who had lost their life savings, never thinking the chickens might come home to roost. Until now.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission says beleaguered investment group Mayfair 101 should pay a $12 million penalty after a judge found the company misled investors about its financial products.
The founder of embattled investment group Mayfair 101, James Mawhinney, has said he received legal advice approving the company’s advertising of financial products that a court has found misled investors.
Allowing former senior barrister Norman O'Bryan to reopen his defence in the Banksia class action while "avoiding the witness box" was clearly prejudicial, and futile to boot, a judge has said in his reasons for refusing the silk's last-minute application.
Once high-flying barrister Norman O'Bryan might seek to challenge a refusal by the judge overseeing the Banksia class action to revisit his abandoned defence and accept into evidence a document he claims proved he did not secretly hold shares in the funder behind the case.
The litigation funding company controlled by the late solicitor Mark Elliott has told a court of its "remorse and regret" for its misconduct in the Banksia Securities class action, a case that has been described as the "darkest chapter in Victoria's legal history".
The son of Banksia class action funder Mark Elliott was no Michael Corleone of the Godfather, and was not knowingly complicit in an alleged scheme masterminded by his father to defraud group members and destroy evidence, his lawyer has told a court.
Barrister Norman O'Bryan SC has failed in his last-ditch bid to reopen his defence in the Banksia class action to submit evidence he says shows he did not retain an interest in the litigation funder behind the case.