Gomez, In the matter of an application for leave to issue or file

The applicant, Irwin Gomez, sought leave from the High Court of Australia to issue or file a writ of summons. This application followed a series of previous unsuccessful attempts by Mr. Gomez to challenge a sequestration order made against his wife's estate in 2014, and subsequent Federal Court and Federal Circuit Court orders declaring certain property transfers void and ordering payment to the trustee in bankruptcy. These earlier challenges had been dismissed by various Justices of the High Court, including on grounds of abuse of process and lack of prospects of success.

The central legal issue before the Court was whether to grant Mr. Gomez leave to file a ninth application, which sought to refer questions to the Full Court concerning alleged jurisdictional errors in prior judgments. Mr. Gomez contended that these jurisdictional errors had not been addressed and that the Court would err if it failed to consider them, arguing that the prior refusal of special leave to appeal did not resolve these underlying issues. He also asserted that enforcing the existing orders was unlawful.

The Court dismissed the application under rule 13.03.1 of the High Court Rules 2004 (Cth). The reasoning applied was that there is no right to bring proceedings for jurisdictional error subsequent to an unsuccessful application for special leave to appeal. The Court found that Mr. Gomez's submissions were without merit, that the proposed summons had no arguable basis, and that the application constituted a vexatious abuse of process, mirroring the conclusions reached in previous dismissals of his numerous applications. The Court therefore refused to refer the matter to a Full Court.