Lombard directors avoid paying court costs

Sir Douglas Graham. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Sir Douglas Graham and his fellow Lombard directors have avoided having to pay courtroom costs for their "completely misconceived" bid to recall a decision over their convictions.

Graham, former Justice Minister Bill Jeffries, Lawrie Bryant, a former PR man for Queen Elizabeth II, and Lombard director Michael Reeves were convicted of making untrue statements in company offer documents before the firm's failure.

Their convictions were upheld by the Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court in 2013 refused leave to challenge them.

But the Lombard four continued their fight and applied to recall that Supreme Court decision.

That bid was dismissed in July and the Supreme Court at the time said it was satisfied the grounds on which the recall application was based were "all misconceived".

The issue of whether the four should pay costs for the application was left unresolved until today when the Supreme Court decided not to make any such orders.

"Some of the arguments presented in support of the application ought not to have been advanced and invited an award of costs; and this despite such awards being unusual in criminal cases," three judges of the Supreme Court said this afternoon.

"We have, however, decided not to award costs. We recognise that the applicants' perceptions of events associated with the investigation and their trial are coloured by the personal consequences of the convictions. They were not well-positioned to consider dispassionately the merits of the arguments which were advanced. They were legally represented in relation to the recall application and may well have thought that, if devoid of merit, the application would not have been advanced by counsel (who is no longer representing them)," the judges said.

Sentences

Doug Graham: 300 hours of community work and reparations of $100,000.

Lawrie Bryant: 300 hours of community work and reparations of $100,000.

Bill Jeffries: 400 hours of community work.

Michael Reeves: 400 hours of community work.