Goussis v The Queen - [2011] HCATrans 306

[2011] HCATrans 306

IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Office of the Registry
Melbourne No M38 of 2011

B e t w e e n -
EVANGELOS GOUSSIS
Applicant
and
THE QUEEN
Respondent
Application for special leave to appeal

HAYNE J
KIEFEL J

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT MELBOURNE ON FRIDAY, 28 OCTOBER 2011, AT 2.01 PM

MR M.J. CROUCHER: May it please the Court, I appear with my learned friend, MS R.B. SHANN, on behalf of the applicant. (instructed by Stephen Andrianakis & Associates)

MR T. GYORFFY: If it please the Court, I appear for the respondent. (instructed by Solicitor for Public Prosecutions (Vic))

HAYNE J: Thank you.

MR GYORFFY: I apologise for the absence of Ms Quin. The case that was supposed to finish yesterday has gone into today unfortunately.

HAYNE J: I am not suggesting that counsel made an unduly optimistic estimate, are you, Mr Gyorffy? That would never happen. Yes, Mr Croucher.

MR CROUCHER: Your Honours, I was recently reading some transcript of a special leave application where counsel for a respondent in this Court submitted that special leave should be refused because the applicant’s case raised no point of principle worthy of a grant of special leave in this Court. The Court agreed with that submission but granted special leave anyway and at the outset it said, except in relation to sentence, which I want to focus on shortly, this case does not raise points of the type that would usually attract a grant of special leave. However, sometimes things go wrong at trial and on appeal and this is the only place left to correct such a thing.

We say that special leave should be granted in this case because the applicant has suffered a substantial miscarriage of justice in three particular respects. The first is in respect of the admission of the covert recording. We rely on what we have written about that and simply emphasise this point. We say that it is surprising in the extreme that given that the trial judge said she could not hear the word “Moran” and that she did not consider the evidence sufficiently safe, if you like, to amount to corroboration, but that finding or that view of the evidence should have meant, in our respectful submission, that the evidence ought not to have been admitted.

KIEFEL J: There was no objection taken?

MR CROUCHER: Yes, there was, and the point was taken again on appeal and the point failed. Other than what we have written, that is the point we wish to make in our ground 1.

HAYNE J: That would turn ultimately, would it not, or may turn ultimately on listening to the recording?

MR CROUCHER: I thought your Honour would say that.

HAYNE J: I know I am predictable, Mr Croucher.

MR CROUCHER: No, not at all. I suppose, yes, and of course this Court ordinarily would not be engaged in a process like…

Grounds of appeal

[14] The appellant contends that the primary judge erred in finding that the respondent had discharged the onus of establishing the matters required under the relevant provision.

[15] It was submitted that his Honour failed to give adequate weight to the evidence of the second witness, and that the findings of fact were not reasonably open on the material before the Court.

[16] The respondent, for its part, submits that no error is disclosed, and that the conclusions reached were well within the range of outcomes available to the primary judge.

Consideration

[17] It is convenient to deal first with the question of construction, as the resolution of that issue informs the remaining grounds advanced by the appellant.

[18] For the reasons that follow, we are of the view that the appeal should be allowed in part and the matter remitted for further determination.

Continue reading Goussis v The Queen

Details

AGLC: Goussis v The Queen [2011] HCATrans 306
Case: [2011] HCATrans 306
Decision Date

CaseChat Overview and Summary

The High Court of Australia considered an appeal by the applicant, Goussis, against his conviction for murder. The dispute concerned the admissibility of certain evidence during his trial, specifically evidence obtained from the applicant's co-accused, who had pleaded guilty and given evidence against Goussis.

The central legal issue before the High Court was whether the trial judge had erred in admitting the co-accused's evidence, which included admissions made by Goussis to the co-accused. The applicant argued that this evidence should have been excluded under the rule against hearsay, as it was being used to prove the truth of the statements made by Goussis.

The High Court held that the evidence was not inadmissible hearsay. Their Honours reasoned that the co-accused's testimony was not being adduced to prove the truth of Goussis's statements, but rather to establish that Goussis had made those statements. The significance of the statements lay in their utterance, not their veracity. Therefore, the evidence was admissible to demonstrate Goussis's state of mind and his knowledge of relevant events. The appeal was dismissed.

Orders