Ex-lawyer Barry Hart, left, is back in the saddle as a lay advocate representing banned jockey David Walker. Photos / NZME..
Struck-off and bankrupt Auckland ex-lawyer Barry Hart is back in the saddle, this time as a "lay advocate" representing banned jockey David Walker at a betting appeal in December.
Mr Walker (38) was disqualified for seven years after being found guilty by a racing judicial committee of pulling up the horse Watch Your Man and betting on a rival runner.
Insiders confirmed to CaseLoad that Mr Hart has prepared Mr Walker's appeal against the guilty finding and disqualification and is set to argue his case before an appeals tribunal chaired by retired Court of Appeal judge Sir Bruce Robertson in Wellington on December 1.
Read also:
• Horses left starving on Hart's seized farm
• Hart continues battle in the Court of Appeal
The appeals tribunal last week declined Mr Hart's application for a stay of Mr Walker's disqualification.
A former high-flying crime barrister, Mr Hart was struck-off in September 2012 after a lawyers' disciplinary tribunal found him guilty of professional misconduct by grossly overcharging some of his clients.
Mr Hart, who originally owed ANZ bank more than $30 million, was bankrupted in December 2012.
Lawyers who acted for him in his fight against bankruptcy - Jeremy Bioletti and Davina Murray - were also bankrupted, in Mr Bioletti's case over a tax debt of about $550,000.
In a blogpost in June 2013, Wellington lawyer Stephen Franks described the Barry Hart saga as a disgrace to lawyers - including judges.
"Hart has made a long-running spectacle of the law as he has defied his mortgagees, clients and disciplinary procedures to postpone effective enforcement," Mr Franks wrote.
"The pathetic impotence of the courts in the face of exploitation of protective procedures makes them look like accomplices."
"In fact they (and Hart's creditors) are victims of collective legal funk, and judicial incompetence at pruning legal process excesses."
"Leading judges have been unwilling to cut through the mess created by 'natural justice'. As a trump card it has freed judges and lawyers from having to sacrifice their perfectionism, and from subjecting what they do to the normal disciplines (for everyone else) of constrained resources and time," Mr Franks wrote.
Judges had an easy run the other day, with all the higher courts shut down for a day and a bit for something a senior court mandarin told CaseLoad was "Judicial Studies and Conference - not holiday."
It was the same day as a scuttled Northern Club tribute to Justice Simon Moore QC, planned by CEO Suzy Keppel's Auckland district law society, an event now re-scheduled for March 6 next year - all being well...
"If you repeat one more time that Justice Moore is MIA (missing in action) you could be in for a severe hot-pokering," said Our Man At The Bar.
"Long overdue," said The Scunner.
In a decision which has tongues wagging, Justice Mark Woolford has barred lawyer Warren Pyke from acting for the New Zealand Law Society in disciplinary charges against Auckland barrister Dr Francisc Catalin (Frank) Deliu.
Justice Woolford upheld Dr Deliu's appeal against a disciplinary tribunal's decision to dismiss his application for an order debarring Mr Pyke from acting in the case.
Dr Deliu faces charges brought by the New Zealand law society relating to the interruption of an Auckland district law society committee meeting and making false, intemperate and scandalous allegations against two judges.
The affair has a long and colourful history.
In the latest episode, Dr Deliu effectively claimed that Mr Pyke, a regular law society prosecutor, came to his chambers and "leant" on him to resolve matters.
In an affidavit in support of his application to have Mr Pyke barred, Dr Deliu said he felt his choice was "a stark one - plead guilty to the judges charges, take a moderate suspension, withdraw all of your civil actions and all of your law society problems will go away."
"Or, elect my civil right to defend myself (and, worse yet, claim I have been mistreated) and all hell will be released upon me," Dr Deliu said.
Mr Pyke would no doubt take the view he had done nothing wrong and was acting ethically in trying to reach a settlement with Dr Deliu.
Justice Woolford said the public interest in the administration of justice requires an unqualified perception of its fairness in the eyes of the general public.
"The issue is whether a fair-minded reasonably informed member of the public would conclude that the proper administration of justice requires the removal of the solicitor." (In this case Mr Pyke.)
Such a member of the public would think Dr Deliu should have the ability to have his application determined by an impartial tribunal and an impartial process - which should also extend to Mr Pyke.
Emphasising that disqualification was no reflection of Mr Pyke's conduct, Justice Woolford said it was "a protection for the parties and for the wider interests of justice which must be seen to be done."
Two lawyers present the other day for a fascinating debate on Privacy and the Right to be Forgotten (or Not), had more than a passing interest in the topic.
Entertainment lawyer Karen Soich no doubt wishes folk would stop dredging up her much-publicised romantic adventures with 1970s Mr Asia drugs boss, the late Terrance John Clark.
And Guyon Foley represents folk caught up in the Kim Dotcom extradition affair, who probably wish they could be forgotten - or at least left alone - especially as the legal noose keeps tightening.
[Find out more in CaseLoad next time.]
Colourful hunter and occasional video-maker Dawson Anthony Bliss (56) wasn't actually seen hunting animals without permission on Ashworth Farm in Marlborough.
But despite saying he wasn't there, he left enough clues to warrant a conviction.
It was Easter 2012 when farm owner Tim Wadworth, out on his quad bike, spied two blue Honda quad bikes parked on the side of a track, under some scrub, on his property.
He took the keys from the bikes, disabled the spotlights (smashing one), went to higher ground and called the police.
Mr Wadworth heard the bikes start up, could not see who was on them, but saw two "pig dog type" dogs following the bikes along a steep track heading to next door Brancott Station.
By the time the law turned up hours later the pair were gone.
A police investigation pieced together a swag of circumstantial evidence to point to who was riding the quad bikes and whether or not the remains of a hunter's campsite on David Grigg's neighbouring Tempello Farm implicated Mr Bliss.
Were the quad bikes blue, or was one red and the other blue; were they Hondas or Yamahas; did the "pig dog types" Mr Wadworth saw fit a couple of "hunting type" dogs on the back of Mr Bliss's truck and did mouldy bread, dog food, unused food items and broken pieces of a quad bike tail light lens found at the Tempello campsite prove Mr Bliss and his mate Cameron Young were there over Easter???
Mr Bliss, who defended himself, was convicted last year in Blenheim court on two Wild Animal Control Act charges of hunting wild animals without the authority of the owner or occupier of the land - commonly known as poaching.
In his appeal to the High Court Mr Bliss argued that the district court judge made a lot of mistakes convicting him on circumstantial evidence which did not stack up.
He was partly successful.
In her decision just the other day Justice Jill Mallon found that while the circumstantial evidence of the Tempello campsite was consistent with Mr Bliss hunting at Tempello over Easter, there were other reasonable possibilities.
Quashing the charge of hunting on Tempello, Justice Mallon said it was reasonably possible someone else at some other time before the police checked the campsite was hunting in the area and broke a tail light.
But the judge upheld the conviction for hunting on Ashworth Farm, finding the chain of circumstances - including the use of the quad bikes, Mr Bliss's two pig hunting type dogs, and the fact no-one else had borrowed the quad bikes from their owner that weekend - was enough to prove that charge beyond reasonable doubt.
The conviction and fine of $400, and an order to pay $289.14 police expenses, were upheld.
Dawson Bliss, it will be remembered, was convicted and fined $2,000 in Greymouth court in 2007 after pleading not guilty to stealing a laptop from a computer shop.
A video of the theft posted on YouTube recorded more than 500,000 hits, one of them from a man who recognised Mr Bliss.
In 2008 he pleaded guilty in Hastings court to poaching a trophy stag which he featured in a hunting video and filming on conservation land without a concession.
Folk who consider themselves Honourable, no matter who disagrees, are welcome at the Ladies & Escorts Lounge, but...
"Bring money," said The Scunner.
Will this be Simon Dallow's swansong year as the 6pm newsreader?