Nevin John Cartwright v Queensland Police Service
[2024] QCA 178
•27 SEPTEMBER 2024
[2024] QCA 178
COURT OF APPEAL
BOND JA
Appeal No 10234 of 2024
DC No 9 of 2024
NEVIN JOHN CARTWRIGHT Applicant
v
QUEENSLAND POLICE SERVICE Respondent
BRISBANE
FRIDAY, 27 SEPTEMBER 2024
JUDGMENT
BOND JA: On 2 April 2024, Clarke DCJ dealt with two applications in relation to proceedings involving Nevin John Cartwright and gave ex tempore reasons for judgment.
The first application was an application for default judgment which Mr Cartwright had made in relation to claim 5 of 2024. That application had been referred to the judge by the Registrar pursuant to UCPR rule 455. The judge examined the claim and formed the view that it disclosed no cause of action and should have been refused for filing pursuant to Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 (Qld) (UCPR), r 982.
The second application was an originating application D9 of 2024. Mr Cartwright and some others were listed as applicants. The judge recorded the orders sought and formed the view that they made no sense. The respondents to the originating application argued that it should be set aside pursuant to UCPR, r 16 or struck out pursuant to r 171.
The judge formed the view that both the claim and the originating application were doomed to failure. He made an order dismissing claim 5 of 2024 and striking out originating application 9 of 2024.
Mr Cartwright wishes to overturn the orders made in relation to originating application D9 of 2024.
The document which is originating application 9 of 2024 is not before me, nor is the transcript of the hearing which must have led to the decision made by the District Court judge.
UCPR r 15 empowers the Registrar to refer originating process to the Court before issuing it if the Registrar considers the originating process appears to be an abuse of process to the Court, or to be frivolous or vexatious. The rule then empowers the Court either to direct the registrar to issue the originating process or to refuse to issue it without the leave of the Court.
In June 2024, Mr Cartwright attempted to file in the registry of the Court of Appeal what purported to be originating process in the Court of Appeal. The documents included:
(a) a notice of appeal;
(b) an application to the Court of Appeal;
(c) an affidavit of Mr Cartwright; and
(d)two documents entitled “Statement of Truth”, which expressed inadmissible opinion evidence from a Mr Evans and a Mr James concerning what I assume must have been the conduct of the hearing before the District Court Judge.
The documents which Mr Cartwright sought to file seem to be intended to advance an appeal from the orders made in the District Court on 2 April 2024. As I have mentioned, Mr Cartwright has clarified that he seeks only to overturn the orders made in relation to originating application 9 of 2024.
The registry referred the purported originating process to the Court under UCPR r 15. Dalton JA directed the registrar to refuse to issue the documents without the leave of the Court.
On 2 July 2024, the Acting Registrar wrote to Mr Cartwright, drew his attention to r 15 and advised him as follows:
“Your Application to Court of Appeal, Notice of Appeal, Affidavit, and Statements were referred to Justice Dalton of the Court of Appeal pursuant to rule 15 on 1 July 2024. Her Honour Justice Dalton directed the Registrar to refuse to issue the originating process without leave of the Court. Therefore, the Application to Court of Appeal, Notice of Appeal, Affidavit, and Statements remain unfiled.
Should you wish to apply for Leave of the Court, you may submit the below mentioned approved format Uniform Civil Procedure Rules 1999 forms, along with the prescribed filing fee:
• Form 69 - Application to Court of Appeal (for leave)
• Form 46 - Affidavit (which exhibits a copy of each originating process you seek leave to commence, as well as any other relevant material)”
The Acting Registrar’s letter also suggested to Mr Cartwright that he might consider seeking independent legal advice on how to proceed.
On 5 August 2024, Mr Cartwright who represents himself, filed certain further material in the registry of the Court of Appeal purporting to commence proceeding CA10234 of 2024. The documents filed on 5 August 2024 include:
(a)an application to the Court of Appeal in proceeding CA10234/24 signed by Mr Cartwright and dated 8 July 2024;
(b) a notice of appeal in proceeding CA10234/24;
(c) and affidavit of Mr Cartwright sworn 11 June 2024;
(d) an affidavit of Mr Cartwright sworn 18 July 2024.
The material appears to cover the same ground as the material which the registrar had been directed to refuse to issue. However, contrary to the instruction given to him by the Registrar, Mr Cartwright had not applied to the Court for leave to issue originating process. The registry should not have permitted the documents to be filed.
On 20 August 2024, I caused proceeding CA10234/24 to be listed for review before me without appearance being required of the respondents to the application. Mr Cartwright appeared before me on the review.
As I have mentioned, the application by which Mr Cartwright purported to commence proceeding CA10234/24 did not seek the Court’s leave to issue originating process as it should have. Instead, the application sought eight other orders. The first was, “Leave to appeal be granted to appeal the dismissal of the originating application”. Thereafter, the application identified seven other orders for primary relief, more suited to be sought in a trial court if – as to which I presently express no view – they had any intelligible basis in law or fact. The basis on which this Court might be invited to consider making such orders was not apparent.
For present purposes, it is appropriate to focus on the first order sought. As to that, I make the following observations:
(a)the originating application to which reference was made seems to be application D9 dealt with in the judgment of Clarke DCJ on 2 April 2024.
(b)Mr Cartwright’s first affidavit complained that his application was prejudged and unfairly dismissed, but he has not provided any admissible material by which the validity or invalidity of those complaints might be assessed.
(c)Mr Cartwright’s second affidavit contains various irrelevant statements of pseudo law somehow founded on the notion that he:
““Nevin John” is the “lawful and rightful owner of the duty bearing entity Nevin John Cartwright sign and all it’s debentures, Bonds, CUSIP numbers, trusts and financial assets created, and we are entitled to a hearing in a chapter 3 court [Forge v ASIC] as equity will not allow a statute to be a cover for fraud.”
(d)Other irrelevant material was annexed.
(e)The notice of appeal might be the document which one would expect some clarity about the basis on which Mr Cartwright sought leave to appeal from the judgment below. Unfortunately, the notice of appeal did not state the grounds “briefly and specifically” as required by r 747(1)(b). But instead, the so-called “grounds” contained substantive, often unintelligible pseudo-legal argument. How that argument bore on showing error by Clarke DCJ was not apparent. It would be unreasonable, in my view, to expect any respondent to consider such a document as a commencing document for appeal or leave to appeal from the decision of Clarke DCJ to summarily dismiss originating application D9 of 2024.
At the review on 20 August 2024:
(a)I explained to Mr Cartwright the matters I have recapitulated culminating in the Acting Registrar’s letter to him;
(b)I explained to him that the documents he had thereafter filed were, apart from minor changes, the same as those which had been the subject of that matter and that he should have sought and obtained the leave of the Court before trying to commence the proceeding;
(c)He confirmed to me that despite the form of the application, he did seek the leave of the Court to issue the application as an originating process in the Court of Appeal. He confirmed to me that he wanted to approach the Court of Appeal to overturn the outcome that he obtained in the District Court. He was not in a position then to advance an argument addressing those matters, and he sought and obtained an adjournment from me to 23 September 2024 to enable him to prepare.
During the course of the review on 20 August 2024, I also explained to Mr Cartwright:
(a)The application was not merely a formality and that he would need to address whether the documents which he wanted leave to issue were an abuse of process or frivolous or vexatious;
(b)He needed to think clearly about what his argument was as to why the District Court erred, that he needed to prepare documents that sensibly advanced the argument he wanted to advance, and that the question whether or not they were arguments that the law recognised was something that he might have to address before me on the next occasion;
(c)That, effectively, what had happened was that he had been told that he could not start in the Court of Appeal without bringing an application for leave to be able to start;
(d)He had to come along to the court and say specifically, “This is how I want to start the Court of Appeal process, this is the document I want to file, and I want to be able to run these arguments.”;
(e)If there was a problem with the form of the documents, if there was a problem with the substance of the documents, that is, they did not advance arguments which were known to the law or intelligible to the law, then he might find there was a difficulty for him in obtaining leave.
The adjournment to 23 September 2024 was later extended administratively to 27 September 2024.
The matter then came back before me today, 27 September 2024. I make the following observations:
(a)On 25 September 2024 Mr Cartwright filed a third affidavit of his, sworn 12 September 2024.
(b)Like his second affidavit, it started with the same irrelevant proposition of pseudo law earlier quoted. It exhibited a number of documents which were inadmissible to prove the truth of the facts and opinions there asserted, and, in any event, not relevant to the issues before me.
(c)Exhibit A contained the same two statements from Mr Evans and Mr James which expressed inadmissible opinion evidence concerning what I assume must have been the conduct of the hearing before the District Court Judge.
(d)Exhibit B contained a June 2023 media report concerning political steps taken in the United States of America concerning COVID vaccine, and also what appeared to be a copy of a petition filed in a Kansas District Court about the conduct of the drug manufacturer, Pfizer, in relation to a COVID vaccine.
(e)Exhibit C contained irrelevant information containing Mr Cartwright’s birth certificate number and “social security” number.
(f)Exhibit D contained extracts from the Magistrates Court annual report for 2020/2021 said by Mr Cartwright’s affidavit to show “that much of the hearings heard in a Magistrates Court is that of Quasi law”. They showed no such thing.
(g)Exhibit E was said to be the “life event registration patent which demonstrate in it’s pictograph that life event registration creates a duty bearing insurance bond which the lawyer represents being the person or the ancients referred to as nomen and not the man or woman.” The proposition is unintelligible and the contents of the documents incapable of bearing any meaning in relation to the issue before me.
(h)Exhibit F contained an extract from a government web writing and style guide manual, and also a partial extract from the case of Sydney City Council v Reid (1994) 34 NSWLR 506. Those documents, too, were incapable of bearing any meaning in relation to the issue before me.
Exhibit G was an extract from some form of report of a decision by the Lisbon Court of Appeal in Portugal which recorded some expression of opinions recording COVID tests and their significance. That document, too, was incapable of bearing any meaning in relation to the issue before me.
(j)Having exhibited the documents to which I have referred, the affidavit then proceeded to express two paragraphs of legally incoherent argumentative statements concerning the process adopted by Clarke DCJ, and four paragraphs of legally incoherent argumentative statements addressing something to do with Mr Cartwright’s complaints about how the Government handled the COVID epidemic.
(k)Exhibit H was a copy of what purported to be the dissenting report of Senator Babet to a Senate standing committee which had been established to understand “excess mortality in 2021, 2022 and 2023”.
(l)The affidavit ended with the pseudo law assertion:
“This is official notice that under a Admiralty Rules 1995 (Cth) we will be applying to the special magistrate of HMAS Creswell for an order for a fair trial to be enforced by the military which will be done this week. Declaring a court of law abolished is a crime against humanity and an international law USC, laws of belligerent occupation and Commonwealth law. If you oppose a fair trial, we suggest you retire like Magistrate Guttridge did.”
(m)Mr Cartwright did not file an application for leave to issue his application as an originating process in the Court of Appeal. However, it is plain that he intended to and he confirmed this orally to me. At the end of his affidavit and apparently attached to it, was a signed document which took the form of an application which sought:
“1.leave to be granted to file, serve an appeal which being granted a fair trial on the trespass that has occurred;”
2. all applications encased to be heard independently;”
3.nature law to be afforded to the plaintiff under section 503(2) of the UCPR, ‘in conducting an inquiry, the referee must observe the rules of natural justice, and under 515(1) of the UCPR (d)(d), the court (i) is not bound by laws of evidence or procedure applying to a proceeding in the court; and (ii) may inform itself of the facts in any way it considers it appropriate; and (iii) must observe the rules of natural justice; (iv) must record the reasons for decision;’”
4. to be supplied directions if necessary;”
I told Mr Cartwright that because his intention was clear, I would treat him as having applied for the leave identified in that document, and that we would deal today only with it as an application for leave to issue a proceeding as an originating process in this court. He told me that the process he wished to advance was that which he had filed as proceeding CA10234/24, and that he had identified in the notice of appeal which he had filed in that proceeding and to which I have earlier referred. I invited him then to advance orally his submissions as to why that leave should be given. I told him that in doing so, he would have to address the question whether that proceeding should be regarded as an abuse of the process of the Court and to be frivolous or vexatious.
His oral argument complained about defamation and procedural fairness but failed to address the question whether the material that he had filed, and in respect of which he sought leave, should be regarded as an abuse or as frivolous or vexatious in the way that I had flagged. It is apparent to me that Mr Cartwright really wants to complain about procedural fairness below, and that he may also want also want to complain that there was something legally wrong in the conclusion that Judge Clarke formed about originating process D9, and that that decision should be overturned. Unfortunately, he has not sought to do so in a way that accords with what this Court expects of the coherence of documents filed by way of commencement of originating process.
In my view, he should not obtain the leave that he has sought, and the process that has been filed without a grant of leave should be struck out as an abuse of process. I have said to Mr Cartwright that it seems to me that if he is able to formulate a document or documents that complies with the suggestion made in the acting registrar’s letter, and that does express a proper basis for challenging the decision made by the District Court Judge, he may seek leave to commence an originating process on another occasion and by reference to documents differently formulated. Whether he seeks to do so, of course, is a matter for him.
For today, the orders I make are as follows:
(1)To the extent that leave has been sought to issue the application filed in proceeding CA 10234/24 as an originating process, leave is refused.
(2)Proceeding CA 10234/24 is struck out as an abuse of process.
Now, Mr Cartwright, those are my reasons for making the orders that I have pronounced. I have tried to make them as comprehensible to you as I possibly can. And I have indicated to you some possibilities as to how you might wish to proceed in the future.
APPLICANT: Yeah. Yeah. So – so – so that would mean that the extension for time – extension of time to appeal is still enforced and I can still go ahead with an appeal.
BOND JA: No. I have not given any extension of time. I have struck out what you have sought to do. If you do need an extension of time in relation to a correctly formulated document, you will have to address that by whichever Judge you need to address that before. But I have made the orders that I have made today which dispose of proceeding CA10234/24. The result is, presently, there is no live proceeding in this Court. If you want to commence a proceeding in this Court, you will have to take some further step. That is all I can do for you today, Mr Cartwright.
Adjourn the court.
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