Young v Crime and Corruption Commission - [2018] QCA 264

[2018] QCA 264

COURT OF APPEAL

GOTTERSON JA
McMURDO JA
BOWSKILL J

Appeal No 1461 of 2018
SC No 12210 of 2017

GREGORY RAYMOND YOUNG Applicant

CRIME AND CORRUPTION COMMISSION Respondent

BRISBANE

WEDNESDAY, 10 OCTOBER 2018

JUDGMENT

GOTTERSON JA: The applicant, Gregory Raymond Young, has filed seven applications returnable before the Court today. The circumstances preceding the filing of them are as follows:

Mr Young instituted civil proceedings against the respondent, the Crime and Corruption Commission. On the 9th of February 2018, the claim and amended statement of claim that he had filed was struck out by Justice Martin in the trial division. Mr Young appealed to this Court on the 28th of March 2018.

A further amended notice of appeal filed by him was struck out by President Sofronoff, who at the time observed r 747(1(b)) of the UCPR requires that a notice of appeal must state briefly and specifically the grounds of appeal. This notice does not comply with that rule. Worse, its contents are entirely irrational and incomprehensible and demonstrate that the proposed appeal, at least in its current form, would be vexatious. His Honour directed that Mr Young be entitled to file another amended notice of appeal, provided that he first have leave of the Court to do so.

On the 30th of April 2018, Mr Young filed an application for such leave. The application was heard by Justice Morrison on the 3rd of May 2018. In reasons published on the 17th of August 2018, his Honour recorded that, in the course of the hearing, Mr Young agreed that a sensible way to proceed was to take his latest draft notice of appeal and subject it to some analysis to see whether any points could be articulated in a way that would allow the appeal to progress.

The hearing before Justice Morrison proceeded over some 45 minutes, in which Mr Young made lengthy oral submissions, supplementing his 10 page written submissions. The course of debate over the draft notice of appeal resulted in four discrete grounds being identified as ones which Mr Young would seek to advance in his notice of appeal if leave were granted. They were that the learned primary judge (1) denied the appellant natural justice or procedural fairness by the refusal of his request for an adjournment, (2) gave inadequate reason for not granting the adjournment, (3) erred by striking out the claim and amended statement of claim as the pleading complied with the new UCPR and (4) gave inadequate reasons for concluding that the pleading did not comply with the UCPR and should be struck out.

Justice Morrison gave leave to file a further notice of appeal limited to those grounds. He also ordered Mr Young to pay the costs of the application. Of the seven applications now before the Court, Mr Young concedes that three of them are redundant and may be struck out. They are an application filed on the 23rd of August 2018 seeking a stay of…

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.

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Details

Case: [2018] QCA 264
Decision Date: 10 OCTOBER 2018

CaseChat Overview and Summary

In the case of Young v Crime and Corruption Commission, Gregory Raymond Young, the applicant, filed seven applications before the Court of Appeal against the Crime and Corruption Commission, the respondent. Mr Young had initiated civil proceedings against the Commission, which were subsequently struck out by Justice Martin in the trial division. An appeal against this decision was dismissed by President Sofronoff, who found that the notice of appeal did not comply with the relevant rules and was irrational and incomprehensible. Mr Young then sought leave to file an amended notice of appeal, which was granted by Justice Morrison, who identified four grounds of appeal for Mr Young to pursue. The current applications before the Court seek to set aside the judgment of Justice Morrison and grant leave to file a further notice of appeal based on additional grounds, as well as seeking to amend earlier applications.
The legal issues before the Court were whether the judgment of Justice Morrison should be discharged or varied and whether the four extant applications filed by Mr Young should be granted or refused. The Court considered Mr Young's eight grounds of appeal, which included allegations of a denial of natural justice, procedural fairness, judicial corruption, fraud, and breaches of internal court orders and undertakings. The Court found that none of the grounds of appeal were capable of justifying a discharge of the judgment given by Justice Morrison, as they did not demonstrate any error of law, material error of fact, or unreasonableness on the part of the judge of appeal.
The Court held that the four extant applications filed by Mr Young should be refused, except for a variation to orders 1-(3) and (4), which involved deleting certain words to avoid unnecessary confinement of the ambit of those orders. The Court ordered that the costs of the applications be costs in the appeal, given the limited success Mr Young had in his applications.
The orders of the Court were that order 1 made on the 17th of August 2018 be varied by deleting the words "as the pleading complied with the UCPR" from order 3 and the words "did not comply with the UCPR" from order 4. The applications filed by the applicant on the 23rd of August, 5th, 11th, and 12th of September and 3rd of October 2018 were otherwise refused, and the costs of the applications were to be costs in the appeal.

Orders