Howdy dear availees and welcome to TMGI for today *Wednesday 19th October 2022* (*this is when I actually started this post, then ground to a halt for several weeks, posted something else, and now we're back here Wednesday 30th November 2022*)...well that's what it reckons there in the bottom corner of the screen, but apart from that, I ain't got no idea...(could be the 9th Tuesday for the 4th Month of April for 202020 for all I can tell-Ed)...indeed, it's a bit like that...been totes knackered, not just due to the physical toll of multiple trips to Adelaide (450kms N/NW from Mt Gambier) and sleeping on someones floor, etc, but also the perpetually bludgeoning trauma of the St Martins Lutheran School Child Abuse Cover-up...(as covered yet again in the most recent post-Ed)...indeed, and doin' this 'ere blog, all leading directly to my rancidly corrupt 'ICAC Trial'...
And that's as far as I got on 19th Oct 22, and then we did that post about MLC Frank Pangallo using Parliamentary Privilege to call South Australia's ICAC (Independent Commission Against Corruption) "corrupt"...(oh yeah, and you emailed him that letter a coupla' weeks ago asking why there wasn't one word of your evidence-laden testimony to his ICAC 'Harm and Damage' Inquiry included in said Inquiry's Final Report?-Ed)...indeed, and asking that he re-use his PP to publicly expose the extraordinary corruption and collusion evident in the Parliament/ICAC/SAPol (police)/Courts persecution of moi...("re-use his PP" bahahaha, sounds a bit like...penis-Ed)...okay thankyou...anyhoos, yes I did write that letter and do that post, and at the time of writing this (30 Nov 22) I've still had no response...so today we're gunna' skip past the promised post about Mt Gambier City Council's Perpetual Cavalcade of Corruption, and get-up some more of my testimony, with explainers attached...so going directly on from where we left-off in Post One, here's some more of my testimony...
So I was just talking about when SAPol Anti-Corruption Branch have raided my house 7th/8th May 2014 and I've gone to the Community Legal Service for advise, etc, then we back-track a bit, and, well, y'all 'll figure it out...***
I
went through this with the lawyer at the time, and she was politely
half laughing at
me
until she read the legislation and then, as I say, felt that she
needed to write to the ICAC
commissioner,
Mr Lander at the time, to ask him to explain and provide definitions.
I will
come to
that.
Part
of what I got into trouble for was the ICAC investigation of the
council concluded
mid-January
2014, so the 15th
or 16th
I think
it was. I got a letter to that effect from Mr Lander: we
have
looked into this,
nothing to see, closing the file. I then, having not done anything on
the blog
about
it for that three months, went on the blog and said, 'I've just
received the notification saying
that
ICAC has investigated the council, and everything is fine.'
That
put me in a very tenuous position, because I had been making all
sorts of
reports,
allegations, accusations—again,
the language that you choose to use; I say reports. I would
go
to a council meeting. I would go home and go on my blog, 'You won't
believe what I just witnessed
at
Mount Gambier city council meeting.' So I have made all of these
claims, which have now
supposedly
been investigated by ICAC, and they have been exonerated of
effectively everything.
I
say 'allegedly investigated by ICAC' because, as I proved in court,
that ICAC
investigation
of an entire city council and multiple complaints, multiple tenders,
members, etc.,
involved
talking to me at a cafe for half an hour—nothing
written down, nothing recorded, within clear
earshot
of at least half a dozen other people. I can picture it in my mind
still, people sitting in the
other
booths around us and so on—nothing
written down, no recordings, nothing.
They
then came back to Adelaide, and a few weeks later spoke to the then
CEO of
the
council, Mark
McShane, in a hallway, I think it was, at the exhibition centre or
Convention Centre
and
the same thing—a
half-hour chat in a hallway, nothing recorded, nothing written
down.
3420
The
CHAIRPERSON: How
were you sure that they hadn't spoken
to anybody else
in
that—
Mr
FLETCHER: I
proved that in court. In cross-examining—because
I was forced to
self-represent
in court because I had no legal aid; you don't get legal aid when up
against ICAC—
the
ICAC witnesses, their evidence was that that was the extent. If I
may, I will table this document,
which
is their investigation in Mount Gambier.
3421
The
CHAIRPERSON: Can
you just explain what that document is?
Mr
FLETCHER: That
is their handwritten notes saying that they have come to
Mount
Gambier.
They spoke with me at a cafe. I provided them no new evidence and
then they went.
3422
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
will move that be received and published.
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: That's
the entirety of the investigation
in Mount Gambier. In here I
have
umpteen folders I won't bother to get out and plonk on the table, but
they are the documents
that
go with the courts, the police investigation, the extraordinary
extent of what was done to—I
am
going
to use the term 'persecute', if you'll excuse me. That's how I feel
this has been handled: it's a
persecution.
Friday,
22 October 2021 Legislative
Council Page
477
DAMAGE,
HARM OR ADVERSE OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM ICAC INVESTIGATIONS
That's
the entirety of their investigation in Mount Gambier. There were no
public
hearings,
nothing, as I proved in court in cross-examining these ICAC
officers,
who, by the time we
were
in court, were back in Major Crimes as police officers. So they were
police seconded to ICAC
and
then back to police.
3423
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
just want to step back at this point, because I know you
have
a lot more
to tell us. The South
East Community Legal Service wrote
to Commissioner Lander
to
get that clarification on section 56.
Mr
FLETCHER: Yes.
3424
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: The
further part of your original submission, beyond trying
to
clarify
what 'tending to suggest' and 'publish' meant, was the quote, 'Are we
allowed to speak to
our
client, because section 56 seems to forbid Mr Fletcher even speaking
to a lawyer?' Have you got
a
copy of that correspondence?
Mr
FLETCHER: I
was just about to table them. Thank you for leading me into
that.
3425
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: Excellent.
Thank you, I was very interested to see that
correspondence,
so that answers my question.
Mr
FLETCHER: If
I may, I have the original letter that Community Legal Services
wrote
to Mr Lander, 2 July 2014, and I have highlighted the use of the
unclear expression 'tending to
suggest',
etc. That's the original letter, 2 July 2014. Shall I do these as a
series to hand over?
3426
The
CHAIRPERSON:
Yes. Can
somebody move that they be received?
3427
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
move they be received and published.
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: That's
the original letter, which then is followed by, 16 July 2014,
the
original response from Mr Lander saying he's not a lawyer it's not
for him to advise. It's for my
lawyer
to advise me, having written to him.
3428
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: Can
you read out what that says?
Mr
FLETCHER: It's
quite short.
Re:
Nick Fletcher, alleged
breach of
s56 of ICAC Act.
Thank
you for your letter of 2 July
2014 in relation to Mr Fletcher.
You
will appreciate that it is a matter of the South Australia
Police as
to whether or not Mr Fletcher
is
prosecuted for a breach of s56 of the Independent
Commissioner
Against
Corruption
Act
2012.
I
am not a prosecutorial authority and for that reason I cannot
instigate any prosecution myself.
Indeed,
if I identify and investigate corruption I must refer the matter to
the Director of Public
Prosecutions
for prosecution.
I
am also unable to give legal evidence and therefore cannot answer the
questions that
you
have
raised
in your letter.
I
think they are matters that
Mr Fletcher must consider upon advice given to him by you.
I
make two quick points on that. The original letter asks am I even
allowed to speak to Mr Fletcher,
because
I raised that off the back of the definition of the legislation. The
lawyer did politely—couldn't
stifle
a laugh—then
read it and looked at me and said, 'Oh, okay, I think I had better
write to him to
find
out exactly what's going on here, because that seems to be what it
says because it's just a
catchall:
nobody can talk to anybody.'
The
second part from that letter where he says, 'I must refer the matter
to the Director
of
Public Prosecutions for prosecution,' he didn't do that. He referred
me directly to the anticorruption
branch
of
SAPOL,
and
somewhere
in
that
process,
in
mid-February
2014,
they
instigated
Operation
Baritone.
That's about me. I have my own—
3429
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: At
this point, I am going to move that we receive and
publish
the letter from former Commissioner Lander.
Page
478
Legislative
Council Friday,
22 October 2021
DAMAGE,
HARM OR ADVERSE OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM ICAC
INVESTIGATIONS
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: That's
the letter from Commissioner Lander, 14 July. Having
received
that, the Community Legal Services felt that they needed to write
again to ask, 'Well, we
need
to have this defined.' Particularly, they were concerned there was no
definition of what 'to
publish'
meant. As they point out, if you're going by what's used in
defamation that means merely to
make
known to another person. I was not being accused of defamation or
even corruption, for that
matter.
I was being accused of having published on my blog information about
an ICAC investigation,
in
its broadest terms.
3430
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: Or
information that you had heard at a council meeting; is
that
the case, or am I misconstruing that?
Mr
FLETCHER: No,
what I have been prosecuted for and
convicted of is blogging
about
the ICAC investigation, the fact that there was an
investigation.
3431
The
CHAIRPERSON: You
received the letter. That was on your blog after you
received
the letter that said—
Mr
FLETCHER: Yes,
that they had closed their file.
3432
The Hon.
R.P. WORTLEY: This
blog that you put on there, telling everyone that
ICAC
have closed their files on this, did it say that there was nothing to
be seen or that you were
suspicious
about the result? Was there anything
else to it?
Mr
FLETCHER: I
can't remember specifically but, knowing my own style, to call
it
loosely,
I would have been extremely sceptical, if not outright critical, of
the fact and said, 'I can't
believe'—at
that stage, I thought I knew that the only investigation in Mount
Gambier had been talking
to
me in the café. There had certainly been no public hearings or
anything like that, and I was
probably
not terribly happy that I had gone through all of that to be told,
'Yep, close the file.'
3433
The Hon.
R.P. WORTLEY: Did
you think that they may have spoken personally with
the
CEO of the council or the finance officer, anything like that?
Mr
FLETCHER: I
didn't know. All I knew at that stage, as I say, was that they
had
spoken
to me in
a cafe and there had been no hearings whatsoever in Mount Gambier.
Certainly no
councillors
had been interviewed or anything like that.
3434
The
Hon.
R.P.
WORTLEY:
Did
you
understand
that
probably
during
the
investigation
they wouldn't have a hearing?
They investigate these things very confidentially.
Mr
FLETCHER: That's
what I am saying. He is writing to me, Bruce Lander is writing
to
me, saying, 'We have investigated this,' and I am going, 'What
investigation?' As far as I am aware,
as
has proved to be the case, 'You spoke to me in a cafe for half an
hour. What investigation is that?'
3435
The
CHAIRPERSON: You
wouldn't have been aware, because they wouldn't have
told
you, if they had spoken to others.
Mr
FLETCHER: No.
3436
The
CHAIRPERSON: Because
they would have kept it secret.
Mr
FLETCHER: As
I say, that was my belief at the time and then I proved that
in
court—
3437
The
CHAIRPERSON: In
court; that's all they had.
Mr
FLETCHER: —further
down the track.
Yes—cross-examining
the two ICAC
people
who interviewed me. I am sorry I don't have copies of the blog or
anything with me, so I
can't—
3438
The
CHAIRPERSON: That's
okay. But anyway, suddenly you are involved in
Operation
Baritone.
Mr
FLETCHER: I
am Operation Baritone, yes; me and my blog.
3439
The
CHAIRPERSON: You
are the centre of it.
Friday,
22 October 2021 Legislative
Council Page
479
DAMAGE,
HARM OR ADVERSE OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM ICAC INVESTIGATIONS
Mr
FLETCHER: Yes.
Well, I am it. There is nobody else. I am not the centre, I am
just
it. Just to get back to it, the community legal service
then wrote back to the ICAC commissioner
again
asking about the definition of 'to publish' and so on. He has then
provided on 28 July a written
authorisation—so
I could table both of those as well please.
3440
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
will
move that they be received and published.
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: I
or a lawyer on my behalf is allowed to 'publish or cause to
be
published
information to a member of my family'—so
I have written authorisation to be able to speak
to
my own family—'a
friend or a medical practitioner who is providing care to Mr
Fletcher.'
This
is a critical thing, as far as I am concerned, because I have not yet
been charged
with
anything. I haven't been charged. I have had the police raid my house
in May, which led
me
going
to a community legal service. I have been told, 'You have done this,'
and when I asked them
to
explain they said, 'We don't know what that means. We are just here
to gather information.'
Technically,
I wasn't ever charged before winding up in court,
but at this point in time as of 28 July I
need
written permission to talk to my family, friend or a doctor. I
haven't been charged with anything
yet.
I would like to table those two please.
3441
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
will move that they be received
and published.
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: That's
his response which is official authorisation. Further to that,
I
would
also like to table an email from Mr Andrew Paech, who was head of
police prosecutions branch
at
the time, and that's dated 12 August 2014. He is writing to the
community legal service who were
still
acting on my behalf at that stage: 'I can confirm receipt of your
letter. I can confirm I am
adjudicating
the file. I will advise when and if charges are to be laid or a
determination that charges
will
not be laid,' confirming what I am saying about the fact that I
needed written permission to speak
to
my own family or a doctor or whatever and I haven't even been charged
with anything yet. So that
chronology
is critical to it is what I am saying.
3442
The Hon.
T.A. FRANKS: I
will move
that that be received and published.
Carried.
Mr
FLETCHER: I
have skipped one document I have here, so I will just go to
this
because
it's in the—
3443
The
CHAIRPERSON: Yes,
if you can.
Mr
FLETCHER: I
had my house raided by Anti-Corruption Branch on 7 and 8 May
in
2014. So from the end of the ICAC inquiry and me starting blogging
about it, I heard nothing from
January
through to May. They had, however, started Operation Baritone some
time in mid-February
and,
even under cross-examination in court, the police witnesses couldn't
tell me when that started
or
who instigated it. It just appeared on somebody's desk, literally.
So
I have had the police at my house. Two weeks after that, council at
their next
meeting
has put on the record a
motion without notice, and if I may quickly read this: 'The City
of
Mount
Gambier is aware of complaints relating to council that have been
repeatedly published online.
Council
confirms that a number of allegations and complaints have been made
in relation to
the
conduct
of the City of Mount Gambier in relation to
the demolition of the old Mount Gambier Hospital
and
the tender and subsequent development of the main corner project.
Those complaints were
found
not
to
have
been
substantiated
after
an
Independent
Commission
Against
Corruption
investigation.
Council has sought and gained authorisation from the Independent
Commission
Against
Corruption to
make this statement through a council report.'
Again,
that's after the event, so I have blogged obviously
that I
have had the cops at
my
house, raiding me, taking my laptop, still not charged or anything,
but this is what has happened.
They
have put that in their minutes, etc. and put it on their
website.
When
Mr Troy Bell had his initial hearing in Mount Gambier for the charges
he is
facing
under ICAC, I went down there with multiple copies of this and handed
it out to all the TV news
Page
480
Legislative
Council Friday,
22 October 2021
DAMAGE,
HARM OR ADVERSE OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM ICAC INVESTIGATIONS
crews
and reporters who were there at the time and said to them, 'Are you
not surprised that there
has
been an ICAC investigation of an entire council and none of you have
ever heard about it?' They
all
nodded their heads and said, 'Oh, crikey! What is going on?' Nothing
happened. It wasn't reported,
which
is the next point I would
like to make.
As
recently as two weeks ago, I went right through the ICAC website ever
since its
instigation,
etc. There is no mention anywhere of the Mount Gambier city council
ever being
investigated.
There is not one word about me and what has happened to me and the
precedent
prosecution
of section 56 and the fact that I was fined $540,000, etc. There was
not one word
anywhere
on the entire ICAC website.
3444
The Hon.
R.P. WORTLEY: So
you were fined $540,000?
Mr
FLETCHER: I was found guilty on 18 counts and fined the maximum of
$30,000
per
count. I was fined $540,000, which was then commuted entirely to
community service because I
don't
have any money; that was the magistrate's explanation.
3445
The Hon.
R.P. WORTLEY: So
you have 100
years of community service?
Mr
FLETCHER: I have 260 hours. We will get to that, thank you, because
last year
Corrections
tried to have me gaoled for not doing it. Having excused me from
doing it for health
reasons,
they then turned around 18 months later
and tried to have me gaoled—another
aspect of
the
harm and adverse outcome of my ICAC involvement.
I
will make this as a general statement now: with all the stuff I have
seen go on, all
the
stuff I have been involved with, I am the one who ended up
facing
charges and with a criminal
conviction.
I don't necessarily like the term 'whistleblower'. I don't refer to
myself that much in that
way,
but as a general term that's what I am and that's what I have done.
With my experience of it,
it's
a textbook prosecution
of a whistleblower. That is my experience of ICAC across the board
from
the
way it was instigated to the way it was handled through the courts,
etc.
***That's a fair chunk so I might pause there...it's all fairly self-explanatory but I'll make a coupla' quick points...first part is really critical and I made it umpteen times through-out my trial, namely, how could I be prosecuted for breaching 'Secrecy Provisions' relating to an alleged investigation that was conducted in a cafe in clear earshot of at least 6 other people...(and following on from that, and as you identify here that you later proved in Court, that and one other 'chat' was the entirety of ICAC's investigations into MGCC-Ed)...exactly...and as proven with ICAC's own 'document'...then we move onto the exchange of correspondence between my lawyer and (then) ICAC Comm Bruce 'Brews Slander' Lander...(proving the two points about 1) how vague and unworkable the ICAC Act Sec56 was/still is, and that 2) you were trying to sort it out properly with legal advice, etc-Ed)...indeed, so confused is the wording of the SA ICAC Act 2012 Sec56 that a lawyer needed to ask if they were even allowed to speak to their as yet 'Not Charged' client...
And that's the second huge point being evidenced here, quite literally actually, is I showed the ICAC Inquiry that Sec56 is so convoluted yet all-powerful that even though SAPol was stating that I had not yet been 'Charged' with anything, I still needed official written ICAC "Authorisation" to be allowed to speak to 1) my lawyer, 2) my family and friends, 3) any medical practitioner...(and in the context where "tending to suggest...someone is subject of a report, complaint, investigation (etc)" is the legal parameters of breaching Sec56, saying anything even vaguely about being the subject of some sort of as yet undefined ICAC-related investigation, that in itself could likely be yet another breach?-Ed)...exactly, absolutely spot on, and exactly why my lawyer felt they needed written clarification, that turned-out to be a written "Authorisation"...oh, and then of course, 'Operation Baritone', but that's self-explained above...
In closing, a quick nod to the not-at-all rabidly corrupt champs at CorrectionsSA for your half-witted, half-arsed attempt to have me gaoled for not doing the Community Service that you had originally excused me from doing...(and not least of all, for admitting that 'Excusing' in their Affidavit statement about wanting you gaoled-Ed)...mate, if it weren't so mind-numbingly incompetent and blatantly corrupt, it'd be 'Keystone Cops' level hilarious...all scathing sarcasm and well-deserved ridicule aside, I sincerely hope that CorrectionsSA handles actual criminals who've committed actual crimes a little better than their bizarre go at me...
Tomorrow: That MGCC Corruption Stuff
And of course that's gunna' include the $80+m FARC (Farcical Aquatic Recreation Centre) and several other issues...(what about the sudden rush of renovation activity at the Old Rail Station building?-Ed)...yep, we'll cover that...(and the rank bastardry of shutting-down the iconic Aquifer Tours and Cafe?-Ed)...well as I understand it the Tours are happening again, a bit, just the Turners are not allowed to use the ticket office/cafe building to do so...(yeah but still-Ed)...no no you're right, and still no cafe...it's a ludicrous act of petty thuggery by MGCC to try and force the Turners out of business and it only serves to further embarrass Mt Gambier as a supposedly Tourism-focused and friendly destination...(hey, do you remember "Jazz Capital of the Southern Hemisphere"?-Ed)...yes well that's another issue but it was ludicrous to say it at all and now it's dead and gone...(and with a wheezy whimper not a bang-Ed)...indeed, but James 'Jimmy Trumpets' Morrison bailing-out of Mt Gambier to avoid scrutiny/accountability for the pro-Rapist culture he cultivated and supported, that's all worthy of it's own posts, and we will go there again, soon...
I am Nick Fletcher and this is my blog...cheers and laters...
