Lawyer and former Vic Uni lecturer Caroline Sawyer struck off and fined $31k for 'unacceptable conduct'

Dr Caroline Sawyer was a senior lecturer at Victoria University until 2015. Photo / Supplied

A former senior law lecturer at Victoria University has been struck from the bar and fined $31,000 for abusing the court process and accusing rival lawyers who won against her of corruption.

Caroline Sawyer didn't engage in the Lawyers and Conveyancers Tribunal hearing this month, instead sending an email to the panel members claiming that the court system was corrupt and enabled "the drug trade and child pornography".

"Although Dr Sawyer has had no prior disciplinary history, the Standards Committee argues that the relentless pattern of her misconduct, her lack of engagement with these proceedings, and the associated lack of any sign of insight or remorse, require the severe penalty of strike-off," the tribunal said in its decision released today.

The tribunal found Sawyer was not a fit or proper person to practise law in New Zealand and "had lost any sense of judgment or perspective".

At this month's hearing, counsel for the New Zealand Law Society, Nikki Pender, told the panel: "There appears to be a tendency from Dr Sawyer that anyone who disagrees with her, be it the court a judge, or another lawyer, seem to be a part of some sort of conspiracy".

Sawyer's problems with conduct stem back to 2015 when she made a complaint about two colleagues at Victoria University before signing a confidential employment settlement.

She spent nearly eight years breaking the terms of that confidential agreement and racking up a string of fines at the Employment Relations Authority, Court of Appeal and even the High Court in an attempt to have it overturned.

All were unsuccessful and in a last-ditch attempt at the Court of Appeal, it labelled her efforts a "collateral attack" on the justice system.

It was this behaviour and her conduct as an employment lawyer when she left the university that had the New Zealand Law Society level charges against her.

The Law Society said Sawyer had used the law "for the purpose of causing unnecessary embarrassment, distress, or inconvenience to another person's reputation, interests or occupation."

After her client lost a case, she accused the opposing lawyer of receiving a "kickback" from the court that ruled in his favour.

Sawyer also accused a large number of senior lawyers - some of whom are now judges - of enforcing illegal contracts, a former Law Society president of "serious" contract crimes and that the Law Society as a whole was involved in a destructive and embarrassing scam and had taken steps to crush people who resisted it.

Some of the charges relate to accusations Sawyer made in 2020 against another rival lawyer and a member of the Employment Relations Authority of "misconduct" and "unlawful acts" without providing any evidence.

Today the Lawyers and Conveyancers Tribunal ruled that Sawyer should be struck from the bar and can no longer practice law in New Zealand. She must also pay the Law Society a $31,000 fine.

"The issue here is not that Dr Sawyer disagreed with positions advanced by opposing counsel nor that she sought to challenge orders and decisions made by the authority: it is the way she went about it," the tribunal found.

"Dr Sawyer's behaviour has been disruptive and scandalous. Her attacks on fellow practitioners and members of the judiciary are well outside what can be tolerated."