Senior lawyers in Canberra have laid into Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury, accusing him of playing politics and being a "desperate politician". He was, one senior barrister said, "willing to sling mud in every direction except his own".
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The vitriolic attack on the ACT's legal affairs minister came after he commented on what he called "very serious and concerning" allegations against the territory's former top prosecutor, Anthony Williamson.
Mr Williamson was the ACT's acting director of public prosecutions from August 2023 until May this year, when he failed to be appointed permanently to the top job.
![Barrister Jack Pappas, left, Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury, centre, and former DPP Anthony Williamson. Pictures by Elesa Kurtz and Keegan Carroll Barrister Jack Pappas, left, Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury, centre, and former DPP Anthony Williamson. Pictures by Elesa Kurtz and Keegan Carroll](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/3BUUzmFAhrhLyX9rFCubPq5/5f13890d-cbf9-4665-910d-488971951202.jpg/r0_0_3840_2159_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
On Wednesday, Mr Rattenbury alleged there were "allegations of improper hiring processes" when Mr Williamson was in charge of the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.
The unspecified claims provoked angry retaliation. Mr Williamson said the allegations were groundless. He also felt they should have been put to him rather than aired in the media.
"The Attorney-General could have extended the courtesy of informing me that he was proposing to take this course," he said.
On Friday, Mr Rattenbury, who is a Greens member of the legislative assembly, stood by his remarks.
"I received serious allegations," he said, "and considered it imperative that they be appropriately examined by independent agencies. I cannot comment further on these processes."
He's a desperate politician fighting a rear-guard action, willing to sling mud in every direction except his own.
- Barrister Jack Pappas on Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury
Mr Williamson vehemently denied there had been any improper recruitment under his leadership of the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions,
"To the best of my knowledge, all recruitment processes conducted whilst I was the acting director were conducted in accordance with the Public Sector Management Act and associated government guidelines," he said.
He said he had since learned that the concerns of the Attorney-General were made at the beginning of the year but "no one has contacted me to discuss these concerns, and no investigative agencies have reached out to me.
"I can only infer any investigation has not progressed because there is no substance to these concerns," he said.
Mr Williamson confined his reaction to Mr Rattenbury's comments to a written statement, but other lawyers have been more vocal about the Attorney-General, accusing him of playing politics in an election year.
"In my estimation, he's a desperate politician fighting a rear-guard action, willing to sling mud in every direction except his own," Jack Pappas, one of the most senior barristers in the ACT said. He pointed out that an election was coming up.
"The fact is that if anyone's got questions to answer, it's him," Mr Pappas said. "Kids in the playground could do a better job."
![Jack Pappas. Picture by Elesa Kurtz Jack Pappas. Picture by Elesa Kurtz](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/steve.evans/c0320769-a40c-46bd-b53f-1c68f522f950.jpg/r0_245_3941_2469_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Mr Pappas said the ACT Bar Association, representing the territory's barristers, had presented a "draft protocol" to Mr Rattenbury designed to take the politics out of the appointment of legal officers from judges down.
"He buried it for good and for ever," Mr Pappas said.
In March, the president of the ACT Bar Association voiced his concern about political interference in the legal process.
"The ACT Bar Association trusts that the office of DPP remains an independent body, free from any influence from any external areas," barrister Brodie Buckland said.
Mr Williamson said that far from any abuse of recruitment when he was in charge, the office of the DPP had been starved of sufficient money by Mr Rattenbury.
"I repeatedly asked the government for more resources. I pointed out that there had been a dramatic increase in the amount of very serious matters being referred for prosecution, including an increase in homicide, sexual offence and serious personal violence matters. I argued that there needed to be a commensurate increase in funding, but those arguments fell on deaf ears."
There is a background to this acrimonious dispute.
Other lawyers told The Canberra Times that Mr Williamson dropped rape cases before they got to court because the office felt that there was little chance of a guilty verdict. The rationale, they felt, was that there was little point in putting alleged victims through a painful trial if the result was going to be "not guilty".
On the accounts of these lawyers, Mr Rattenbury was unhappy and put pressure on the prosecutors' department to take more cases to court.
One prominent ACT lawyer said that Mr Rattenbury was just pandering to his Greens base. It was, the barrister felt, important for people to be accused of crime on the basis of the evidence and not for political reasons.
In response, Mr Rattenbury said that it was "imperative" that "serious allegations" be examined.
He said that no decision had so far been taken on the ACT Bar Association's suggestions for how to improve recruitment of legal officers.
"No decision has been taken by the ACT government to introduce a new Judicial Appointment Protocol for the territory as consultation has been undertaken with key justice stakeholders," he said.
On funding, he said that the government had "provided a range of additional funding", including for a post suggested by Mr Williamson.
And he said: "I did not seek to influence the ODPP to prosecute more sexual assault cases, but did meet with the previous acting-DPP to canvas concerns that were raised with me by stakeholders, as is appropriate in my role as the Attorney-General."