Piepkorn v Wallmans

[1993] HCATrans 313

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Office of the Registry

Adelaide No A28 of 1992

B e t w e e n -

HENRIETTE PIEPKORN

Applicant

and

WALLMANS (SOLICITORS &

CONSULTANTS)

Respondent

Application for special leave

to appeal

BRENNAN J
DEANE J

McHUGH J

Piepkorn 1 15/10/93

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS

AT MELBOURNE ON FRIDAY, 15 OCTOBER 1993, AT 12.47 PM

Copyright in the High Court of Australia

BRENNAN J:  Ms Piepkorn, you desire to appear on your own

application, is that so?

MS H. PIEPKORN:  I do, Your Honour, on the grounds of a very

difficult situation in our State.

BRENNAN J: Before you proceed, I should say that I have a

certificate from the Deputy Registrar that she has

been informed by Messrs Stratford & Co, solicitors

acting for the respondent in this matter, that

their client does not wish to be represented at the

hearing and will abide by the decision of the

Court, save as to costs.

MS PIEPKORN: That is correct, Your Honour. Your Honour, I

approached the High Court of Australia on the

grounds that a new application of a hearing,

contract 1613 of 1992 against Wallmans, was entered

into the supreme court as a completely new action

and it was to deal with a contract breaching of

2504/87 which was High Court Appeal A37 of 89.	The
Chief Justice of the Full Court, he denied me to
have that case reinstated on the grounds that he
could not argue the point of contract with me. That is as he stated it.

The problem was that the respondent in that

State, they had pressure over the Chief Justice and the Full Court of the Supreme Court on a political basis because of the Chief Justice's political conviction in which he was involved in '72 to '75.

Now, this matter involves a union and the

labour laws situation.

BRENNAN J: 

Ms Piepkorn, if you wish to address the question

of special leave to this Court, you will have to
address some questions of law which are of

importance for this Court to consider. You

understand that, I think. 

MS PIEPKORN: 

Yes, I do, Your Honour.

BRENNAN J: 

Now, that means that we will insist that you

limit yourself to that sort of submission and you

should be able to do that, I think, in a relatively

short space of time, having regard to the form of

the application book.

MS PIEPKORN:  Yes, Your Honour. The situation was when I

appealed to the Full Court of the Supreme Court, it

was on the basis that the Master of the Supreme

Court dismissed my appeal. The respondent

misrepresented the contract on the grounds of

acting on my behalf again which they did on all

different contracts, which is a misrepresentation

Piepkorn 2 15/10/93

because they claimed on Legal Practitioners Act 68

of the laws of Australia - I mean, the State

statutes, which puts me under a classification

under a Mental Health Act that I cannot represent

myself.

Now, they brought over a case from the

district court and I explained this to

Chief Justice King. As he stated, it was mainly a

conversation between himself and myself, and the

other two judges were excluded from this situation

in the Full Court. I said to him - I reminded him that he instructed me on a matter that if I was to

go against a firm I have to exclude the partner,

which I did in the district court matter. And then

I went back to the supreme court and I explained to

him it was a completely new action. I followed his

instructions. He still said he is going to dismiss

it. I said, "You haven't heard the case." I said,

"It's a completely new one." I said, "You haven't

heard it." He refused to hear it. And he said to

me, "I have to dismiss it, and you know why - under

what conditions I have to do this."

The main action here is it is in the laws of

Australia. They have got legal set-off in certain

sections where a person can counter claim against a

certain contract when you put it into court by

saying it is familiar with another action which

Wallmans did and stated it had something to do with

a medical action which had nothing to do with it. This was particularly with the respondent and the

Chief Justice would not accept that.	He said
that -

BRENNAN J:  You wanted to insist that this was a contract

action, is that right?

MS PIEPKORN:  It was a completely new contract action with

the supreme -

BRENNAN J: All right. Now, we understand that, that you

want to say this was a contract action. Now, you

have read the Full Court's judgment which is in the

application book, have you?

MS PIEPKORN: Yes, I have.

BRENNAN J: Well now, do you see the difficulties that the

Full Court had with the statement of claim?

MS PIEPKORN: Excuse me, Your Honour, I am just looking.

BRENNAN J:  You will find it on page 19 of the application

book.

Piepkorn PIEPKORN 15/10/93

MS PIEPKORN:  The Master, concerning this matter, he was

involved with the other contract, 2504/87, and it

will be explained when I have this case reinstated,

the whole matter will come out as to why it was a
fraudulent action from the respondent. This

Master, he heard me explain to him, it was completely new, that the respondent acted on my

behalf and entered a certain case in - which I

cannot explain from the appeal section because it

is involved with the case I want reinstated - and

he refused to listen to me and he said - he still

put me underneath the Legal Practitioners Act 68 of

1987. That is why I appealed against him.

Chief Justice King would not go against his ruling

and still dismissed it, even though he knew it was

a completely new action.

BRENNAN J:  Ms Piepkorn, would you look at page 19 of the

application book where the Chief Justice's judgment

appears.

MS PIEPKORN:  Yes.

BRENNAN J: At line 14 you will see that the Chief Justice

says that he has looked at your statement of claim

and he says:

I am unable to discover from it what legal

cause of action -

you might have. And a little further down, on

line 18, he says he has looked at the amended

grounds of appeal and he is:

unable to discern any legally valid basis for

the appeal.

Now, those are the two problems that you face.

If you want to address your application to this

Court, you will have to address those two

questions.

MS PIEPKORN:  Your Honour, on page 19, as he states from

this, he cannot see anything on the grounds - or

legally that makes me valid for an appeal. The

ground is that the respondent made me liable for

the action they delivered under my name on the

other action against their own client and laid an

action against him which will be discussed because,

I mean, I did not lay any action against a certain

person but they claim I did, that I gave them

permission, or they claimed it under legal action

68. Chief Justice King would not accept this

because, I mean, with this political involvement in

the situation, he had to kind of cover it up.

Piepkorn PIEPKORN 15/10/93

BRENNAN J:  I do not think that this Court sits here to

listen to people making allegations of that kind

which are completely unsupported.

MS PIEPKORN:  Your Honour, the thing is the situation here

is that I want to discuss this because, I mean -

because of the union situation involved. But - - -

BRENNAN J:  You will have to discuss those two points that I

drew to your attention or we will draw these

proceedings to a close.

MS PIEPKORN:  When I spoke to Chief Justice King about my

legality of getting damages from the respondent for
entering on my contract and delivering an action,
he said he did not understand that part of contract
law and if I succeeded in getting damage for it

against it he said he would like to learn it. That

was the Chief Justice's comments to me. I mean, I

do not like to disregard him or anything like this

but it is just that he had a vexatious attitude to

me at that time.	But he said he could not
understand that.	And I said, "Well, under contract

law, it states if you put a contract in, meaning

one thing and somebody comes in and trespasses on

your contract and puts an action in under your name

and takes your power of attorney over, delivers

their action, has their action dealt with and

dismissed and then makes that person who they took

it over from liable for their action", I said,

"That's damages, because I never did that.	I never
gave them permission."	I said, "They only claimed

the permission from the Legal Practitioners Act

68", and he said he does not understand it. He

said, "You have to go to a court that understands

what you are talking about."

I did not argue the point with him any more

because, I mean - because he said he would not do

it. When I explained to him that it was not fair

me having to see that other master again because he

was involved with the respondent's other action

with the other contract, he said he is just going

to rule to him even though he ruled me underneath
that Act. I said, "If they are claiming in that

Act, then where are the documents to prove their

accusation against me? They are making a criminal accusation against my mental health and against my character and discrediting it. I want to see some

papers on it", and he would not do it.

BRENNAN J:  Ms Piepkorn, we have heard that you wish to

complain against the judgment of the Full Court.

We have not thus far heard any argument which would

justify the grant of special leave from those two

points that I have drawn your attention to. I

think perhaps we can give you another, say, three

Piepkorn 15/10/93

minutes and then if you cannot make a point in that
time I think we would be wasting your time and

ours, if we continued. So, perhaps you can tell us

what your best point is to get special leave.

MS PIEPKORN:  The reason is I want my action to be heard and

I do not want it to be dismissed. Like it says,

"legally valid basis for the appeal". Now, they

put me under a certain ruling. They put me under a

defamatory ruling against their client, and when I

appealed to Chief Justice King, I said I followed

his instructions and everything like this and he

still dismissed it. It was a completely new

action. They thought I was involving another

matter into this. There was no other matter. It

was just against the respondent who - which I am

legally valid to, because, I mean, they defrauded

me of moneys that the court says I have to pay for

their action.

Now, like I explained to Chief Justice King,

if you look in his - page 1 - sorry about that, I

am looking for the reasons for judgment. It is

page 5 - - -

DEANE J: Is it page 19, Chief Justice King's reasons?

MS PIEPKORN: I am sorry about that, I really am. Yes, I

think it is. When I stated to Chief Justice King

that I was not going to - - -

DEANE J:	And then page 20 there is a bit more.
MS PIEPKORN:	Yes, from page 17, 18, 19 to 20, when I stated

to him I was not going to pay for the respondent's

actions on my contracts, he said to me, "You

haven't learnt bankruptcy court yet. I want to

send you to bankruptcy." He made me bankrupt. He

had me made bankrupt in the Federal Court, and it

was backed up by the Federal Court judge there,

Justice O'Loughlin.

Justice O'Loughlin about Chief Justice King's When I brought forward to

political conviction, he said, "You know it's very
big and he got us to make you bankrupt." Now, the

reason is why I am really appealing against this, I

do not see why I have to become bankrupt for

another person's corrupt perjury that had to be

committed. When I said this all to

Chief Justice King, he said to me, "You go ahead

and you prove it." And as he made me bankrupt, he

is causing a lot of personal harm to my aged mother

and my invalid brother and the nephew that is in my

guardianship because, I mean, everything that we

have worked for, they are going to strip us away

from it because of the supreme court's illegal

ruling.

Piepkorn 6 15/10/93

Now, I mean, if he was in for law, which I

have all read in the contract laws from different

High Court Judges and things like this, if a

contract is changed, even a date or a notation of

who is acting for somebody or other, that is

defrauding too; like in the statutes, it states

that if somebody changes a name or a statement on a

document from a court or something, that is fraud.

Now, the respondent done that in the supreme court

too. They have - and the Chief Justice just does

not listen to that. And when I told him that they

brought over a district court matter and slipped it

under as my new action which had nothing to do with

the supreme court action whatsoever, he would not accept that. He just dismissed it. He would not

listen to it.

Now, I mean, legally, I am entitled to have my

case heard in which way it was meant.	Because, I
mean, it is just not just.

BRENNAN J:  Thank you, Ms Piepkorn.

Having perused the statement of claim in this

matter, there is no doubt but that the decision of

the Full Court of the Supreme Court of South

Australia was right. The application for special

leave to appeal from that decision is refused.

AT 1.04 PM THE MATTER WAS ADJOURNED SINE DIE

Piepkorn 7 15/10/93