<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> <docID>341584</docID> <postdate>2025-04-01 14:53:27</postdate> <headline>Former judge’s corrupt conduct appeal hits snag</headline> <body><p><img class=" wp-image-341585" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/20221213001741975999-original-1-1-scaled.jpg" alt="" width="1109" height="739" /></p> <caption>Walter Sofronoff's bid to overturn a corruption finding could fail to get off the ground. (Jono Searle/AAP PHOTOS)</caption> <p><span class="kicker-line">By <b>Jack Gramenz</b></span></p> <p><strong>The former judge who scrutinised Bruce Lehrmann's criminal prosecution may be legally thwarted from overturning a finding he engaged in "serious corrupt conduct" during the inquiry.</strong></p> <p>Walter Sofronoff KC has asked the Federal Court to toss out the ACT corruption watchdog's findings delivered in March, stemming from leaks to a journalist.</p> <p>But the watchdog on Tuesday said its report may be protected by parliamentary privilege.</p> <p>"It raises the question of whether these proceedings should take place at all," Scott Robertson SC, for the ACT Integrity Commission, told the court.</p> <p>Parliamentary privilege is designed to allow parliament to go about its business without outside interference, such as from the courts.</p> <p>The commission is overseen by a parliamentary committee but its report has also been published online.</p> <p>The speaker of the ACT parliament, Liberal Mark Parton, was also seeking to be involved in the case.</p> <p>But Adam Pomerenke KC, for Mr Sofronoff, suggested that would only duplicate what the commission would say.</p> <p>The case is due to return to court in July.</p> <p>Mr Sofronoff, a former Queensland Supreme Court judge, chaired a board of inquiry into the ACT's criminal justice system after controversy plagued the prosecution of Lehrmann, accused of raping his then-colleague Brittany Higgins in the ministerial office of Senator Linda Reynolds at Parliament House in 2019.</p> <p>A 2022 criminal trial was abandoned with no verdict because of juror misconduct.</p> <p>While prosecutors opted not to hold a re-trial, their public statements and treatment of witnesses was put under the microscope by the Sofronoff inquiry.</p> <p>It found the territory's top prosecutor Shane Drumgold had lost objectivity over the case and had knowingly lied about a note of his meeting with broadcaster Lisa Wilkinson.</p> <p>Mr Drumgold resigned and launched a legal challenge, which upheld the majority of the inquiry's findings.</p> <p>But the ACT Supreme Court struck out an adverse finding about how Mr Drumgold cross-examined Liberal Senator Linda Reynolds during the Lehrmann trial.</p> <p>It also ruled Mr Sofronoff's behaviour during the inquiry gave rise to a reasonable apprehension of bias and he might have been influenced by the publicly expressed views of a journalist.</p> <p>Mr Sofronoff repeatedly messaged with the News Corp journalist and eventually leaked her an advance copy of his probe's final report.</p> <p>That leak led to the integrity commission's "serious corrupt conduct finding" in March.<br /> 1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)<br /> National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028</p> </body>