Kassem v Minister for Immigration

This matter concerned an application for review before Judge Manousaridis of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The applicant sought to rely on an email sent on 2 October 2015 to their migration agent, along with two attached letters dated 7 October 2015, one addressed to the agent and the other to the applicant. The central dispute revolved around whether these documents, particularly the attached letters, could be admitted as evidence and considered by the Tribunal.

The primary legal issue before the Tribunal was the admissibility and evidentiary weight of the email and its purported attachments, specifically whether the presumption under section 161(1) of the *Evidence Act 1995* (Cth) could be satisfied in relation to the content and transmission of these documents. This involved determining whether the email and the attached letters were proven to have been sent, by whom, when, and to whom, as well as whether the attachments were indeed transmitted with the email.

Judge Manousaridis applied section 161(1) of the *Evidence Act 1995* (Cth), which presumes that an electronic communication document was sent, by whom, when, and to where it was received, unless evidence to the contrary is adduced. The Tribunal was satisfied that the email itself was sent to the agent's nominated email address at the stated time and date, and that it contained attachments related to the applicant's review application. However, the email's description of the attachments was limited to a file name. Despite the lack of explicit representation in the first letter that it was an attachment, and the fact that the first letter referred to "enclosed documents" without specifying them, the Tribunal was satisfied that both the first and second letters were attached to the email and therefore transmitted together.