QUESTIONS HAMPSON QC SAID HE COULD NOT ANSWER
October 2021
A Brisbane barrister has questioned an allegation Cedric Hampson QC behaved corruptly in his role as counsel assisting the 1980 Williams Royal Commission Special Investigation into Allegations Against Senior Police Officers and Parliamentarians.
This was prompted by the recent publication of former senior narcotics agent John Shobbrook’s book Operation Jungle which includes details of the shonky investigation chaired by Judge Ned Williams
I demonstrated in The Most Dangerous Detective that instead of seeking to establish the facts as required by the role of counsel assisting, Hampson was clearly intent on minimising the role of major heroin importer John Milligan, clearing former corrupt detective Glen Hallahan of any involvement with Milligan and illegal drugs, and discrediting Shobbrook, a demonstrably meticulous detective, as bumbling.
I now provide further documentation - excerpts from a previously unpublished 11-page letter I wrote to Hampson in December 2011 which contained questions which he said he was unable to answer.
December 12 2011
Dear Mr Hampson,
When I first wrote to you on September 9 requesting an interview in connection with a manuscript I am in the process of completing about former detective Glendon Patrick Hallahan you rang me to ask me to provide details of the section of the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs in which I was interested.
I thank you for your initial response and can understand that events which occurred more than 30 years ago can be difficult to recall without recourse to the context in which they occurred.
I will endeavour to contextualise some of those events and pose some questions which arise from the events and from the transcript of the Commission.
On November 20, 1979, the secretary of the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs (commonly known as the Williams Commission) received a letter from the Premier of Queensland which asked that the Commission give the utmost priority to the consideration of allegations that certain members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly and officers of the Queensland Police Force had been involved in the illegal drug trade.
As a result, the Commission created a Special Investigation into Allegations Against Senior Police Officers and Parliamentarians which held its first public sitting on January 3, 1980, in court number two on the first floor of Brisbane’s Magistrates Court complex.
The allegations had been made by John Edward Milligan against (among others) Attorney-General Bill Lickiss, Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, Assistant Commissioner (Crime) Tony Murphy and former detective Glen Patrick Hallahan.
Milligan had made the allegations in a series of taped interviews with senior Narcotics Bureau officer John Shobbrook.
During the course of the inquiry, Shobbrook’s case against Milligan resulted in Milligan being sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment in Sydney for importing heroin.
On August 2, 1979, prior to the commission examining these matters, Mark Le Grand, the Royal Commission liaison officer on the joint task force created with the New South Wales Drug Commission, sent a memo to you and Sir Edward. In it he referred to his opposite number on the NSW Royal Commission, Mr Goldberger, and the fact that he had said Milligan was “a major figure in the importation of heroin into Australia”.
The Woodward Commission devoted an entire chapter to the Milligan Group and to Milligan’s activities as a major heroin importer, including the following:
"He has been involved with well-known criminals since at least the late 1960s and the organised importation of, and trafficking in, drugs since 1971."
"On the evidence before me I am satisfied that John Edward Milligan has been a professional criminal since the late 1960s and that since at least 1971 he has been actively trafficking in heroin, principally in NSW and Queensland but also in Victoria. Further, I am satisfied that since about 1974 he has been part of a number of groups of people who have imported substantial quantities of heroin into Australia by the use of couriers and light aircraft.
"I do not accept that Milligan played only a minor role in this activity; merely carrying out the instructions of others. Rather, I regard him as the instigator and principal of much of this activity. I do not believe that I have been able to uncover all of that in which he has been involved. But even the limited amount of activity dealt with by me discloses a pattern of continual and persistent drug importation and trafficking activity over the years."
When you were questioning Milligan you put to him questions such as:
“He (Shobbrook) “thought you were a real big wheel?”
"Yes, exactly.”
"And you were not."
"That is right. That is the whole story summarised."
"Exactly?"
"Exactly."
"He was sitting there open-mouthed waiting for this big man to tell him everything and you did not have much to tell him?"
Question: Why did you invite Milligan to deny that he was a ‘real big wheel’ and suggest to him that he did not have much to tell Shobbrook?
On March 19, 1980, while the Commission was still sitting, John Milligan composed a five page statement voluntarily and in his own handwriting recounting in some detail the involvement of Glendon Patrick Hallahan in the importation of heroin into Queensland. It was tendered to the Commission as confidential exhibit 471.
Question: Was there any cross-examination of Milligan in camera about this five-page handwritten statement – and, if so, what was the result, bearing in mind the fact that it was damning evidence that Hallahan had been intimately involved with Milligan in importing heroin?
It appears there was no cross-examination of Milligan about the statement during open session.
Question: Why was this?
You suggested it was likely that Shobbrook had been the first to mention Lewis, Murphy and Lickiss to Milligan and that Milligan had then invented a story to fit in with those names. Shobbrook said that if you listened to the master tapes it would be clear that this was not the case.
(Explanatory addendum: Milligan had told Shobbrook that the Rat Pack of Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, Detective Superintendent Toby Murphy and former detective Glen Hallahan comprised a board of directors running crime in Queensland.)
Question: Did you listen to the master tapes and, if so, what was your opinion of the way Milligan answered Shobbrook’s questions?
You suggested that the concept of a board of directors superintending crime in Queensland was “pretty ridiculous”. You said: “What about the board of directors, that was pretty ridiculous, was it not? The idea that the criminal activity had this corporate structure?”
Milligan replied: “It was a term that was used, as I said, by Ceruto first, and then by me in the NSW Royal Commission and then Shobbrook seized on the term and I used the term in relating information to Shobbrook because it was a handy term to use."
Milligan seemed to be admitting he had given evidence to the NSW Royal Commission into drugs and that the term was not his invention.
Question: Do you accept in retrospect that references to a board of directors may have had more substance than you thought at the time?
You summed up your line of questioning of Milligan by saying:
"A lot of this is speculation by Milligan, I suppose, but it was on the basis that the narcotics bureau had been disbanded and it would be good to throw stones at somebody else. To put it shortly, that is what Milligan sort of told him (Detective Phillips)."
The decision to disband the bureau was not made by the Federal Cabinet until November 6, nearly two months after Milligan had “thrown stones” by telling Shobbrook of the alleged involvement in organised crime of Hallahan, Lewis and Murphy.
Question: Can you recall what led you to make that summary?
Shobbrook’s timelines suggested a close link between the phone calls from Milligan to Hallahan and events in the heroin importation.
Question: Why was there no concerted questioning about these phone calls and the heroin smuggling events that they appeared to be associated with?
Part of Milligan's story to Shobbrook had been that if he or Hallahan was ever caught, Hallahan would tell police that the large sums of money from Milligan had come from the sale of land. No registration of such a sale had been found. It would seem logical that Milligan would be faced with probing questions designed to establish how, why and when he had paid money to Hallahan, seeking to establish links with Milligan's drug dealing. Instead, you asked: "With your land transactions, was he reliable?" This question was obviously asked on the basis that, indeed, any money that had changed hands between Milligan and Hallahan had been for land.
Question: What evidence did the commission have that there had been such a transaction?
On another occasion when you were questioning Milligan about money transfers, Milligan couldn't help pointing out: "There were transfers of money to Hallahan which were supposed to have been for the purchase of land," inviting a question of what the payments had actually been for.
Question: Do you regret not asking that question?
Witness Brumby says that he was asked by Milligan to phone a Queensland number (Hallahan’s) and say that Milligan was about to give evidence to the Woodward Royal Commission but that he would not be mentioning “Hallahan and his associates”.
Question: Was any attempt made to discover who Hallahan was referring to as his associates? Why was there no cross-examination on this evidence?
Milligan stated that he had given an 18 carat gold calculator to a member of Parliament.
Question: Were any inquiries made about whether Lickiss or Tenni had a gold calculator? Should they have been cross-examined about this? Was there any inquiry to discover if any member of parliament possessed an 18 carat calculator?
A man called Terence Lance Hadaway told the Woodward Royal Commission Milligan had brought in five pounds of heroin so pure he could turn it into 20 pounds. The report said:
“Hadaway said it was brought in by a diplomatic courier to John Milligan in Brisbane. He said that it was also paid for, to the best of his knowledge, by two Parliamentarians and 'we did three runs like this altogether and it went down pat each time'."
Question: Was there any attempt to question Hadaway about the two parliamentarians?
At one stage, despite evidence that Milligan was a major player in heroin importation, you asked Milligan why he had not asked Shobbrook during his interrogation:
'Look, Mr Shobbrook, you've got this all wrong I am only a pretty little guy really?'
You (Milligan) wanted to impress him really so you did not correct his mistake or his wrong assumptions so you went along with him?"
Milligan: "No, I said 'No I am not Mr Big' but I said, you know, 'I'll tell you about Hallahan, he is'!"
The bureau had drawn up calendars showing how Milligan appeared to ring Hallahan only at crucial points when Milligan was involved with drug importations.
Question: Bearing in mind that Milligan had just volunteered that Hallahan was a Mr Big, why did you not ask him for full details of Hallahan being a Mr Big instead of asking: "But you are not saying that he has got anything to do with drugs, Hallahan?"
You asked "Do you know anything to Hallahan's discredit in relation to drugs?" Milligan replied: "Not really, not directly in relation to drugs."
Question: Why did you not follow this up? Would it have been better to have asked: 'What do you mean by 'not really'?' Or 'What do you mean by 'not directly'?'
There was another chance to explore Hallahan’s link to illegal drugs when Milligan answered: "I don't know now to what extent," giving a qualified yes. But instead of asking Milligan what that extent had been, you followed up with a negative question: "You are not saying he ever had anything to do with drugs are you?" Milligan: "Well, I don't wish to answer that question."
Question: Why did you not ask him: “Why don’t you wish to answer?”
On the tape-recorded interview by Shobbrook, Milligan says he rang Murphy at police headquarters to report a man had stolen his car and that Murphy had chastised him for ringing him at the wrong number. At the Commission Milligan said: "I don't know about that.”
Here was a crucial point. There had undoubtedly been an unusual contact between a drug importer and a top police officer. Just how and why had Milligan chosen to ring Murphy rather than anyone else, and how had he obtained the phone number? But the questioning switched.
Question: Do you regret not following up that point?
Shobbrook received many commendations during his career which appears to never have been tainted. His evidence was sufficient to persuade Milligan to plead guilty to a charge of importing heroin which resulted in him being sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment – one of the highest sentences then imposed for drug importing. He was so determined that Hallahan should be prosecuted that he sent his evidence to the Stewart Royal Commission and to Democrats leader Don Chipp.
(Explantory addendum: One of the leading commission of inquiry officers, seconded from the Queensland force, was Barrie Cornelius O’Brien, who maintained contact with corrupt Queensland Police Commissioner Terry Lewis during the inquiry.)
You mentioned that a major problem had been created because the interviews by Shobbrook for the Narcotics Bureau and by O’Brien/Phillips for the Commission had produced diametrically opposed answers. It was, presumably, important to examine evidence which supported one side or the other such as documentation to support the alleged sale of land by Hallahan to Milligan, phone calls between Milligan and Hallahan, bank deposits and so on.
I have searched public records for information about Barrie Cornelius O’Brien. A court found he had illegally taped a conversation between a suspect and his solicitor. A Supreme Court judge found that O’Brien had then fabricated evidence to justify his ‘reprehensible’ conduct. The judge rejected O’Brien’s sworn evidence.
In The Report By The Honourable W J Carter QC On His Inquiry Into The Selection Of The Jury For The Trial Of Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen the former judge talked of “my total dissatisfaction with O’Brien’s performance as a witness. He was, I am satisfied, intent on evasion and prevarication, and a significant body of his evidence was patently false”. And: “O’Brien’s responses to the obvious questions were pitiful and inadequate. I reject his evidence as untrue.” And on another point: “Once more O’Brien was untruthful…his denial of another important matter of fact …is disturbing.” And on another point: “I cannot accept this evidence.” O’Brien was guilty of “a fraudulent pretence”. He had made “false denials” on another point. Here was a second, overwhelming judgement that O’Brien was an inventor of false evidence and a perjurer. In this same inquiry, barrister Shane Herbert labelled O’Brien and a compatriot as “Keystone Kops” and “greedy, grubby people.” Counsel assisting that inquiry, Russell Hanson, said: “Anything that O’Brien says that is not corroborated by independent evidence should not be accepted.”
Bagman Jack Herbert told the Fitzgerald Inquiry into Queensland corruption that O’Brien was a member of a Lewis and Murphy clique of officers who regularly drank at the home of a publican.
Evidence was given at the Fitzgerald Inquiry that detective Pat Glancy had been given corrupt money to pass on to Barrie O’Brien. O’Brien denied this in a statement to the commission.
One of your questions to Shobbrook at the inquiry was: “The problem is that he (Milligan) has very seriously told you one story and he very seriously told the commission investigator a completely opposite story.”
Question: In retrospect, whose word would you prefer to trust – that of Shobbrook or of O’Brien?
Your questioning of Shobbrook and Milligan seemed to rely very much on the interviews carried out by O’Brien and Phillips.
Question: Do you recall how you viewed the evidence presented by Shobbrook and Milligan at the time (in terms of reliability and truthfulness)?
Question: Do you recall when and how O’Brien was seconded to the Commission?
Question: How influential was O’Brien behind the scenes? Was he proactive and to the fore in making suggestions or was he a quiet man in the background who largely waited for orders?
Lewis and Murphy
At the time of the special investigation Lewis had been receiving large amounts of corrupt money for two years.
Question: Was there any examination of his financial records?
In 1976 there had been much media coverage of allegations that Lewis had been one of Bischof’s bagmen. Then came Milligan’s allegations against Lewis.
Question: Apart from a few questions from Mr Derrington why was there no cross-examination of Lewis on questions posed by the Milligan tapes?
Question: Why was there no cross-examination about his relationship with Hallahan.
Murphy came under adverse notice in Operation Buckshot, a highly sensitive Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence probe into the importation and distribution of heroin in Australia involving organised crime figures. The Fitzgerald Report said of Murphy that: “There was undisputed evidence before this Inquiry from a former SP bookmaker that Murphy was paid bribes.” Two police officers, Fancourt and Campbell, produced evidence in 1982 implicating Lewis and Murphy in corrupt activities.
My research suggests that Hallahan was undoubtedly guilty of many criminal and corrupt activities, was a serial liar and inventor of confessions and was a perjuror. In the 60s and 70s Col Bennett alleged that Hallahan and Murphy were corrupt.
Question: In retrospect, are you satisfied with the way in which the Williams Royal Commission Special Investigation went about investigating Hallahan, Lewis, Murphy and the politicians?
The Lucas Commission found that detectives who regularly invented evidence were generally fairly well known not only by other police but by judges, magistrates and the legal profession. In Parliament Col Bennett had identified Hallahan and Murphy as corrupt police and had repeatedly warned that Hallahan had been found by three judges to have committed a fraud on the court.
Question: Were you aware of the reputations of Hallahan and Murphy before the start of the special investigation?
Question: Was there any examination of Murphy’s financial records?
Question: Who was mainly responsible for writing the report?
Lewis recorded in his diary that on the day before the report was released he had lunch with O’Brien and Murphy.
Question: If the diary entry is correct, would it have been proper for O’Brien to dine with Lewis and Murphy?
Thanks for reading this lengthy document.
I look forward to hearing from you,
Sincerely,
Steve Bishop.
Hampson rang me at 10.01 on December 14, 2011, and left a message saying: “I am ringing really to say I am sure I can’t help you with your questions.”
I rang him back in the afternoon. He said: “It’s quite impossible. I can’t remember anything about it to be honest.”
He had received my third letter and apologised for not replying earlier but he had mislaid my phone number.
He said he had not kept any aide memoir and had burned all documents from the inquiry soon after the end of the inquiry.
He referred to my question about why he hadn’t cross-examined on a certain line and said he had a very hazy memory that “they” had thought Milligan’s story was an invention.
The commission report was a travesty of evidence, logic and justice which the media failed to analyse. It was demonstrably a fix.
Mark Le Grand, who had been the liaison officer between the Williams and Woodward drug commissions, in a eulogy he wrote for Cedric Hampson’s funeral, made it clear Hampson was to blame for the fiasco:
“Cedric methodically put the Inquiry organisation and structure in place. From the first day of the first hearing in a two year inquiry, Cedric was shaping the final report – with issues identified and chapter headings assigned – to be progressively modified as the evidence was received and analysed.”
A Brisbane barrister has questioned an allegation Cedric Hampson QC behaved corruptly in his role as counsel assisting the 1980 Williams Royal Commission Special Investigation into Allegations Against Senior Police Officers and Parliamentarians.
This was prompted by the recent publication of former senior narcotics agent John Shobbrook’s book Operation Jungle which includes details of the shonky investigation chaired by Judge Ned Williams
I demonstrated in The Most Dangerous Detective that instead of seeking to establish the facts as required by the role of counsel assisting, Hampson was clearly intent on minimising the role of major heroin importer John Milligan, clearing former corrupt detective Glen Hallahan of any involvement with Milligan and illegal drugs, and discrediting Shobbrook, a demonstrably meticulous detective, as bumbling.
I now provide further documentation - excerpts from a previously unpublished 11-page letter I wrote to Hampson in December 2011 which contained questions which he said he was unable to answer.
December 12 2011
Dear Mr Hampson,
When I first wrote to you on September 9 requesting an interview in connection with a manuscript I am in the process of completing about former detective Glendon Patrick Hallahan you rang me to ask me to provide details of the section of the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs in which I was interested.
I thank you for your initial response and can understand that events which occurred more than 30 years ago can be difficult to recall without recourse to the context in which they occurred.
I will endeavour to contextualise some of those events and pose some questions which arise from the events and from the transcript of the Commission.
On November 20, 1979, the secretary of the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs (commonly known as the Williams Commission) received a letter from the Premier of Queensland which asked that the Commission give the utmost priority to the consideration of allegations that certain members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly and officers of the Queensland Police Force had been involved in the illegal drug trade.
As a result, the Commission created a Special Investigation into Allegations Against Senior Police Officers and Parliamentarians which held its first public sitting on January 3, 1980, in court number two on the first floor of Brisbane’s Magistrates Court complex.
The allegations had been made by John Edward Milligan against (among others) Attorney-General Bill Lickiss, Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, Assistant Commissioner (Crime) Tony Murphy and former detective Glen Patrick Hallahan.
Milligan had made the allegations in a series of taped interviews with senior Narcotics Bureau officer John Shobbrook.
During the course of the inquiry, Shobbrook’s case against Milligan resulted in Milligan being sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment in Sydney for importing heroin.
On August 2, 1979, prior to the commission examining these matters, Mark Le Grand, the Royal Commission liaison officer on the joint task force created with the New South Wales Drug Commission, sent a memo to you and Sir Edward. In it he referred to his opposite number on the NSW Royal Commission, Mr Goldberger, and the fact that he had said Milligan was “a major figure in the importation of heroin into Australia”.
The Woodward Commission devoted an entire chapter to the Milligan Group and to Milligan’s activities as a major heroin importer, including the following:
"He has been involved with well-known criminals since at least the late 1960s and the organised importation of, and trafficking in, drugs since 1971."
"On the evidence before me I am satisfied that John Edward Milligan has been a professional criminal since the late 1960s and that since at least 1971 he has been actively trafficking in heroin, principally in NSW and Queensland but also in Victoria. Further, I am satisfied that since about 1974 he has been part of a number of groups of people who have imported substantial quantities of heroin into Australia by the use of couriers and light aircraft.
"I do not accept that Milligan played only a minor role in this activity; merely carrying out the instructions of others. Rather, I regard him as the instigator and principal of much of this activity. I do not believe that I have been able to uncover all of that in which he has been involved. But even the limited amount of activity dealt with by me discloses a pattern of continual and persistent drug importation and trafficking activity over the years."
When you were questioning Milligan you put to him questions such as:
“He (Shobbrook) “thought you were a real big wheel?”
"Yes, exactly.”
"And you were not."
"That is right. That is the whole story summarised."
"Exactly?"
"Exactly."
"He was sitting there open-mouthed waiting for this big man to tell him everything and you did not have much to tell him?"
Question: Why did you invite Milligan to deny that he was a ‘real big wheel’ and suggest to him that he did not have much to tell Shobbrook?
On March 19, 1980, while the Commission was still sitting, John Milligan composed a five page statement voluntarily and in his own handwriting recounting in some detail the involvement of Glendon Patrick Hallahan in the importation of heroin into Queensland. It was tendered to the Commission as confidential exhibit 471.
Question: Was there any cross-examination of Milligan in camera about this five-page handwritten statement – and, if so, what was the result, bearing in mind the fact that it was damning evidence that Hallahan had been intimately involved with Milligan in importing heroin?
It appears there was no cross-examination of Milligan about the statement during open session.
Question: Why was this?
You suggested it was likely that Shobbrook had been the first to mention Lewis, Murphy and Lickiss to Milligan and that Milligan had then invented a story to fit in with those names. Shobbrook said that if you listened to the master tapes it would be clear that this was not the case.
(Explanatory addendum: Milligan had told Shobbrook that the Rat Pack of Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, Detective Superintendent Toby Murphy and former detective Glen Hallahan comprised a board of directors running crime in Queensland.)
Question: Did you listen to the master tapes and, if so, what was your opinion of the way Milligan answered Shobbrook’s questions?
You suggested that the concept of a board of directors superintending crime in Queensland was “pretty ridiculous”. You said: “What about the board of directors, that was pretty ridiculous, was it not? The idea that the criminal activity had this corporate structure?”
Milligan replied: “It was a term that was used, as I said, by Ceruto first, and then by me in the NSW Royal Commission and then Shobbrook seized on the term and I used the term in relating information to Shobbrook because it was a handy term to use."
Milligan seemed to be admitting he had given evidence to the NSW Royal Commission into drugs and that the term was not his invention.
Question: Do you accept in retrospect that references to a board of directors may have had more substance than you thought at the time?
You summed up your line of questioning of Milligan by saying:
"A lot of this is speculation by Milligan, I suppose, but it was on the basis that the narcotics bureau had been disbanded and it would be good to throw stones at somebody else. To put it shortly, that is what Milligan sort of told him (Detective Phillips)."
The decision to disband the bureau was not made by the Federal Cabinet until November 6, nearly two months after Milligan had “thrown stones” by telling Shobbrook of the alleged involvement in organised crime of Hallahan, Lewis and Murphy.
Question: Can you recall what led you to make that summary?
Shobbrook’s timelines suggested a close link between the phone calls from Milligan to Hallahan and events in the heroin importation.
Question: Why was there no concerted questioning about these phone calls and the heroin smuggling events that they appeared to be associated with?
Part of Milligan's story to Shobbrook had been that if he or Hallahan was ever caught, Hallahan would tell police that the large sums of money from Milligan had come from the sale of land. No registration of such a sale had been found. It would seem logical that Milligan would be faced with probing questions designed to establish how, why and when he had paid money to Hallahan, seeking to establish links with Milligan's drug dealing. Instead, you asked: "With your land transactions, was he reliable?" This question was obviously asked on the basis that, indeed, any money that had changed hands between Milligan and Hallahan had been for land.
Question: What evidence did the commission have that there had been such a transaction?
On another occasion when you were questioning Milligan about money transfers, Milligan couldn't help pointing out: "There were transfers of money to Hallahan which were supposed to have been for the purchase of land," inviting a question of what the payments had actually been for.
Question: Do you regret not asking that question?
Witness Brumby says that he was asked by Milligan to phone a Queensland number (Hallahan’s) and say that Milligan was about to give evidence to the Woodward Royal Commission but that he would not be mentioning “Hallahan and his associates”.
Question: Was any attempt made to discover who Hallahan was referring to as his associates? Why was there no cross-examination on this evidence?
Milligan stated that he had given an 18 carat gold calculator to a member of Parliament.
Question: Were any inquiries made about whether Lickiss or Tenni had a gold calculator? Should they have been cross-examined about this? Was there any inquiry to discover if any member of parliament possessed an 18 carat calculator?
A man called Terence Lance Hadaway told the Woodward Royal Commission Milligan had brought in five pounds of heroin so pure he could turn it into 20 pounds. The report said:
“Hadaway said it was brought in by a diplomatic courier to John Milligan in Brisbane. He said that it was also paid for, to the best of his knowledge, by two Parliamentarians and 'we did three runs like this altogether and it went down pat each time'."
Question: Was there any attempt to question Hadaway about the two parliamentarians?
At one stage, despite evidence that Milligan was a major player in heroin importation, you asked Milligan why he had not asked Shobbrook during his interrogation:
'Look, Mr Shobbrook, you've got this all wrong I am only a pretty little guy really?'
You (Milligan) wanted to impress him really so you did not correct his mistake or his wrong assumptions so you went along with him?"
Milligan: "No, I said 'No I am not Mr Big' but I said, you know, 'I'll tell you about Hallahan, he is'!"
The bureau had drawn up calendars showing how Milligan appeared to ring Hallahan only at crucial points when Milligan was involved with drug importations.
Question: Bearing in mind that Milligan had just volunteered that Hallahan was a Mr Big, why did you not ask him for full details of Hallahan being a Mr Big instead of asking: "But you are not saying that he has got anything to do with drugs, Hallahan?"
You asked "Do you know anything to Hallahan's discredit in relation to drugs?" Milligan replied: "Not really, not directly in relation to drugs."
Question: Why did you not follow this up? Would it have been better to have asked: 'What do you mean by 'not really'?' Or 'What do you mean by 'not directly'?'
There was another chance to explore Hallahan’s link to illegal drugs when Milligan answered: "I don't know now to what extent," giving a qualified yes. But instead of asking Milligan what that extent had been, you followed up with a negative question: "You are not saying he ever had anything to do with drugs are you?" Milligan: "Well, I don't wish to answer that question."
Question: Why did you not ask him: “Why don’t you wish to answer?”
On the tape-recorded interview by Shobbrook, Milligan says he rang Murphy at police headquarters to report a man had stolen his car and that Murphy had chastised him for ringing him at the wrong number. At the Commission Milligan said: "I don't know about that.”
Here was a crucial point. There had undoubtedly been an unusual contact between a drug importer and a top police officer. Just how and why had Milligan chosen to ring Murphy rather than anyone else, and how had he obtained the phone number? But the questioning switched.
Question: Do you regret not following up that point?
Shobbrook received many commendations during his career which appears to never have been tainted. His evidence was sufficient to persuade Milligan to plead guilty to a charge of importing heroin which resulted in him being sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment – one of the highest sentences then imposed for drug importing. He was so determined that Hallahan should be prosecuted that he sent his evidence to the Stewart Royal Commission and to Democrats leader Don Chipp.
(Explantory addendum: One of the leading commission of inquiry officers, seconded from the Queensland force, was Barrie Cornelius O’Brien, who maintained contact with corrupt Queensland Police Commissioner Terry Lewis during the inquiry.)
You mentioned that a major problem had been created because the interviews by Shobbrook for the Narcotics Bureau and by O’Brien/Phillips for the Commission had produced diametrically opposed answers. It was, presumably, important to examine evidence which supported one side or the other such as documentation to support the alleged sale of land by Hallahan to Milligan, phone calls between Milligan and Hallahan, bank deposits and so on.
I have searched public records for information about Barrie Cornelius O’Brien. A court found he had illegally taped a conversation between a suspect and his solicitor. A Supreme Court judge found that O’Brien had then fabricated evidence to justify his ‘reprehensible’ conduct. The judge rejected O’Brien’s sworn evidence.
In The Report By The Honourable W J Carter QC On His Inquiry Into The Selection Of The Jury For The Trial Of Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen the former judge talked of “my total dissatisfaction with O’Brien’s performance as a witness. He was, I am satisfied, intent on evasion and prevarication, and a significant body of his evidence was patently false”. And: “O’Brien’s responses to the obvious questions were pitiful and inadequate. I reject his evidence as untrue.” And on another point: “Once more O’Brien was untruthful…his denial of another important matter of fact …is disturbing.” And on another point: “I cannot accept this evidence.” O’Brien was guilty of “a fraudulent pretence”. He had made “false denials” on another point. Here was a second, overwhelming judgement that O’Brien was an inventor of false evidence and a perjurer. In this same inquiry, barrister Shane Herbert labelled O’Brien and a compatriot as “Keystone Kops” and “greedy, grubby people.” Counsel assisting that inquiry, Russell Hanson, said: “Anything that O’Brien says that is not corroborated by independent evidence should not be accepted.”
Bagman Jack Herbert told the Fitzgerald Inquiry into Queensland corruption that O’Brien was a member of a Lewis and Murphy clique of officers who regularly drank at the home of a publican.
Evidence was given at the Fitzgerald Inquiry that detective Pat Glancy had been given corrupt money to pass on to Barrie O’Brien. O’Brien denied this in a statement to the commission.
One of your questions to Shobbrook at the inquiry was: “The problem is that he (Milligan) has very seriously told you one story and he very seriously told the commission investigator a completely opposite story.”
Question: In retrospect, whose word would you prefer to trust – that of Shobbrook or of O’Brien?
Your questioning of Shobbrook and Milligan seemed to rely very much on the interviews carried out by O’Brien and Phillips.
Question: Do you recall how you viewed the evidence presented by Shobbrook and Milligan at the time (in terms of reliability and truthfulness)?
Question: Do you recall when and how O’Brien was seconded to the Commission?
Question: How influential was O’Brien behind the scenes? Was he proactive and to the fore in making suggestions or was he a quiet man in the background who largely waited for orders?
Lewis and Murphy
At the time of the special investigation Lewis had been receiving large amounts of corrupt money for two years.
Question: Was there any examination of his financial records?
In 1976 there had been much media coverage of allegations that Lewis had been one of Bischof’s bagmen. Then came Milligan’s allegations against Lewis.
Question: Apart from a few questions from Mr Derrington why was there no cross-examination of Lewis on questions posed by the Milligan tapes?
Question: Why was there no cross-examination about his relationship with Hallahan.
Murphy came under adverse notice in Operation Buckshot, a highly sensitive Australian Bureau of Criminal Intelligence probe into the importation and distribution of heroin in Australia involving organised crime figures. The Fitzgerald Report said of Murphy that: “There was undisputed evidence before this Inquiry from a former SP bookmaker that Murphy was paid bribes.” Two police officers, Fancourt and Campbell, produced evidence in 1982 implicating Lewis and Murphy in corrupt activities.
My research suggests that Hallahan was undoubtedly guilty of many criminal and corrupt activities, was a serial liar and inventor of confessions and was a perjuror. In the 60s and 70s Col Bennett alleged that Hallahan and Murphy were corrupt.
Question: In retrospect, are you satisfied with the way in which the Williams Royal Commission Special Investigation went about investigating Hallahan, Lewis, Murphy and the politicians?
The Lucas Commission found that detectives who regularly invented evidence were generally fairly well known not only by other police but by judges, magistrates and the legal profession. In Parliament Col Bennett had identified Hallahan and Murphy as corrupt police and had repeatedly warned that Hallahan had been found by three judges to have committed a fraud on the court.
Question: Were you aware of the reputations of Hallahan and Murphy before the start of the special investigation?
Question: Was there any examination of Murphy’s financial records?
Question: Who was mainly responsible for writing the report?
Lewis recorded in his diary that on the day before the report was released he had lunch with O’Brien and Murphy.
Question: If the diary entry is correct, would it have been proper for O’Brien to dine with Lewis and Murphy?
Thanks for reading this lengthy document.
I look forward to hearing from you,
Sincerely,
Steve Bishop.
Hampson rang me at 10.01 on December 14, 2011, and left a message saying: “I am ringing really to say I am sure I can’t help you with your questions.”
I rang him back in the afternoon. He said: “It’s quite impossible. I can’t remember anything about it to be honest.”
He had received my third letter and apologised for not replying earlier but he had mislaid my phone number.
He said he had not kept any aide memoir and had burned all documents from the inquiry soon after the end of the inquiry.
He referred to my question about why he hadn’t cross-examined on a certain line and said he had a very hazy memory that “they” had thought Milligan’s story was an invention.
The commission report was a travesty of evidence, logic and justice which the media failed to analyse. It was demonstrably a fix.
Mark Le Grand, who had been the liaison officer between the Williams and Woodward drug commissions, in a eulogy he wrote for Cedric Hampson’s funeral, made it clear Hampson was to blame for the fiasco:
“Cedric methodically put the Inquiry organisation and structure in place. From the first day of the first hearing in a two year inquiry, Cedric was shaping the final report – with issues identified and chapter headings assigned – to be progressively modified as the evidence was received and analysed.”