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THE SOCIAL DILEMMA
The latest Netflix documentary, The Social Dilemma, serves up a thought-provoking critique of the unethical and largely unregulated tactics employed...
D’OH!!
Is it just me, or are we maybe making things just a little more complicated than they really need to be? In the context of litigation, lawyers...
COVID RENTAL RELIEF
Perhaps not surprisingly, I've been deluged recently with enquiries from small business operators and commercial space landlords about rental relief...
TO D OR NOT TO D
Last week was Privacy Awareness Week, which is a curious irony, given the current dilemma faced by millions of Australians – to download or not to...
SHORTLISTED FOR CRIMINAL LAW GONG
Nyst Legal Associate Jonathan Nyst was this week shortlisted as one of 10 finalists in the Criminal Law division of the national Lawyers Weekly 30...
COVID FLUX
With COVID-19 directives flying thick and fast from both federal and state institutions, many of us may be getting a little confused about precisely...
ADAPT OR PERISH
Biologist, historian and futurist H G Wells, author of the sci-fi classic The War of the Worlds - a tale of alien invasion and annihilation by...
NO ORDINARY TIME
It's sometimes said that one man's loss is another man's profit, and that's evidently true, even in these strange and troubled times. Just ask all...
A MILE IN THEIR SHOES
On 20 February 2020, the historical drama, “The Professor and the Madman”, starring Hollywood heavyweights, Sean Penn and Mel Gibson, was rolled out...
PEOPLE POWER
For the past couple of months, I have been receiving messages and calls from concerned relatives and friends back home in Malaysia wanting to know...
A RIGHT TO KNOW
Don’t you sometimes miss the good, old-fashioned Moral High Ground? As a post-war baby, the world I was born into seemed a brave and righteous one....
MALICE AFORETHOUGHT
Last week, a Queensland mother became the first person to be charged under the State’s new, expanded definition of murder laws, after allegedly...
YOUTHFUL EXUBERANCE
School’s out! So hold onto your hats, folks, it's on again. As thousands of school-leavers descend upon Surfers Paradise for the annual ritual...
THE MEANS TO THE END
About ten years before the birth of Christ the great Roman poet Publius Ovidius Naso, in his collection of epistolary poems known as The Heroides,...
DRIVER LOCK OUT LAWS
Over the next 24 months or so, the State government looks set to roll out various amendments to our traffic laws which will have a significant...
TEN GUILTY WITCHES
In February 1692, in a secluded village in the isolated British American colony of Massachusetts, 9-year-old Betty Parris and her 11-year-old cousin...
BEHAVING BADLY O.S.
Last week, Australian man Jock Palfreeman was released from a Bulgarian prison after being incarcerated for 8 years and 11 months for the murder of...
THE VIOLENCE THEY SUFFER
Four men made headlines recently for chasing down a knife-wielding man in a crowded Sydney street and, armed only with milk crates and chairs,...
TAKING IT TO THE STREETS
We've all heard the news of protesters demonstrating in the streets of Hong Kong, decrying the proposed amendments to that city's extradition laws...
THE SHAME GAME
China has yet again cemented its reputation as the great 21st-century innovator by coming up with a novel new way of convincing its citizens to...
NOT MUCH OF A BARGAIN
Once upon a time, if you did the crime you did the time. If not, you walked. Nowadays, it can be somewhat more complicated. The practice of...
PREDICTIVE POLICING
Robot judges in Estonia? American AI sentencing criminals to prison? Computers predicting crimes before they even happen? One may be forgiven for...
SECRET X FILES
This week Sky News aired the explosive documentary “Lawyer X: The Untold Story”, recounting the sorry tale of the now-notorious double-dealings of...
A TRUE GENTLEMAN
I was very saddened to hear this week of the passing of Rick Carter, the great Australian actor and comedian, with whom I worked on Gettin’ Square,...
IN DEFENCE OF THE DEFENCE
This week the Queensland opposition launched a robust attack on a centuries-old criminal law defence. The 'mistake of fact’ defence was encoded into...
HIGH TIME FOR REFORM?
A common submission by Queensland defence lawyers representing drug-driving offenders goes something like this: “My client had not in fact smoked...
HARD CASES
Lawyers have this thing they sometimes like to say. “Hard cases make bad law.” It’s true. About thirty years ago I got the job to represent a nice,...
JUSTICE DENIED
Between January 2013 and December 2017, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard evidence revealing that for...
MIGRATION BALANCE
Migration continues to feature as a red hot topic for debate on the Australian political landscape, particularly in the context of the looming...
MEA CULPA
They say confession is good for the soul. That may be so, but sometimes it seems there's a whole lot of things it's not nearly so good for. Just ask...
FOOL ME ONCE
There is a Japanese proverb that goes along the lines of “We’re fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance” and as history has shown...
OLD SCHOOL INJUSTICE
A generation ago, corporal punishment at school was commonplace. Canings and strappings that would now turn school mums like me apoplectic were once...
POLITICS, SEX AND RELIGION
It’s often said one should never discuss politics, sex or religion at a dinner party. The latest news out of the Wonderful World of the Public...
TRIAL BY FYRE
A brand new Netflix documentary doing the rounds right now has sparked a maelstrom of controversy around the ethical and legal culpability of...
A CURE FOR THE COMMON SCOLD
The wheels of Justice turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine. One of the biggest movies of 1967 was Franco Zeffirelli’s rollicking cinematic...
PRE-NUPTIAL BLISS
The latest news about Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon and Forbes Rich List’s wealthiest person in the world, could have a lot of people...
ENTERTAINMENT -v- EVIDENCE
The concept of an impartial jury is central to the operation of our criminal justice system. For hundreds of years we have put our faith in those...
A TOUGH JOB
Before you can become a plumber or a carpenter you have to undertake years of technical training, work under close and exacting supervision, sit for...
A VERY GOOD START
The late great Nelson Mandela served 27 years in prison for his opposition to the apartheid system of racial segregation in South Africa. When he...
IN THE COMPANY OF HEROES
On 11 November 1918, at the French town of Compiegne, high-ranking officers of the Entente, the coalition that opposed the Central Powers of...
A MEAL EATEN COLD
The Italians say Revenge is a meal that’s best eaten cold. I guess Jimmy Bulger would have agreed. James Joseph Bulger Junior grew up in abject...
THE PHANTOM OF YOUTH
They say youth is wasted on the young. But it may not always be so. Around one hundred years ago, a young, little-known American writer by the name...
THE IRE OF THE BEHOLDER
Like beauty itself, art is undoubtedly very much in the eye of the beholder. A couple of years back, a world-renowned Brisbane-born street artist,...
LEAVE STRESS
Recent legislative changes in New Zealand introducing 10 days paid leave for victims of domestic violence, are likely to throw up some thorny issues...
BIG BUCKS -v- THE DREADED SELF-LITIGANT
Those more cynical than I have been sometimes known to quip that "Justice favours the well-heeled". It is undoubtedly true. Whilst money may not buy...
A CERTAIN UNCERTAINTY
It has long been accepted that the element of certainty is essential to the rule of law. Long-standing legal principle dictates that the law should...
THE THIN BLUE LINE
Everyone who’s ever punt-kicked a Sherrin has chimed in to have their say on the recent brew-ha-ha between the West Coast Eagles and the Fremantle...
THE ROAD AHEAD
By the time the ambulance arrived the young man in the front passenger seat was already dangerously close to death. His once fit, handsome best mate...
RESTING PEACEFULLY
Unfortunately, sooner or later we all have to turn our minds to the prospect of shuffling off this mortal coil. For most of us, when we do the...
DEPUTY DOG
With the festival season back in full swing, plenty of music lovers are sure to find themselves once more confronted by the canine constabulary. The...
SPERM AND EGGS
The Six Degrees of Separation being what they are, you almost certainly know someone, or someone who knows someone, who’s currently undergoing...
RAT RACERS
Remember the old joke about lawyers and rats? In case you don't, here's how it goes – “The National Institute of Health announced this week it would...
ONE SIZE FITS ALL?
Somebody please tell me - when are the politicians going to learn? Justice just isn't a one-size-fits-all proposition. When the Victorian government...
WHO’S PAYING FOR MY BUS FARE?
Society's more forgettable characters sometimes prove to be life's most memorable ones. About twenty years ago I appeared for a hapless heroin...
FOR THE LOVE OF MONEY
We all like to be kept in the manner to which we are accustomed. Under the Family Law Act 1975, when a married couple breaks up, each is expected to...
STORMY CLOUDS
Anyone who has been following US domestic politics over the past 12 months will be aware of the fascinating legal storm clouds brewing over the...
THE BEST AND WORST
The 19th century French novelist Gustave Flaubert was a stickler for style. His scrupulous devotion to literary aesthetics and painstaking attention...
SO FAR, SO GOOD
The sad reality of the uncertain times in which we live is that any major public event will inevitably carry an increased security threat, and a...
AN UNCOMMON COMMODITY
Without doubt, self-preservation is the most powerful and compelling of all human instincts. The will to survive - physically, emotionally,...
ME TRUE
They say the truth will set you free. But when it comes to defamation, I wouldn't count on it. The recent rush of "Me Too" revelations has set up...
BOOM BUSINESS FOR LAWYERS
A lot of criminal and family lawyers are these days complaining that a big chunk of their practice is now being spent dealing with civil protection...
UBER CRITICAL
As the bartender gave me the nod for last drinks, I reached for my mobile. It was well and truly time to call it a night, and I was in no state to...
CELEBRATION
On the weekend our parks were full of Australia Day revellers. Most, I expect, were celebrating their deep affection and appreciation of their...
THE FAME GAME
Way back in 1968, Andrew Warhola, better known as the iconic American artist, director and film producer Andy Warhol, the celebrated pinup boy of...
MASSIVE FEET
As usual, this week the big news is breaking first right here on the Nyst Legal blog. And it doesn't get much bigger than this. Australia may boast...
TWENTIETH CENTURY HERO
The 1953 Morris Minor utility was small by any standard. Its cabin was barely big enough for one mum and one dad, so all the kids got bundled into...
INTOXICATED PEOPLE
This week I learned some stuff about intoxicated people. Given the popular national penchant for a cold beer on a hot day, perhaps it’s unsurprising...
HARVEY-WORLD TROUBLES
The nasty news, gossip and scandal that started with Hollywood heavyweight Harvey Weinstein has grown into a tsunami of distasteful allegations of...
THE MAN IN THE ARENA
When I first started doing trial work as a young lawyer I was constantly surprised and intrigued by the persistent inconsistency between different...
THE BEST-LAID PLANS
The weather’s already started to heat up, and summer’s on its way. Woo-hoo! That means cocktails, beers and BBQ’s by the pool, long days at the...
SEPARATION AND AN IKEA FUTURE
Marriage breakdown can be tough. Even when separating parties are more than pleased to wave their erstwhile better half goodbye, they are still...
JUDGEMENT DAY
The other night I had the craziest dream. Remember Haley Joel Osment? He's that cute-but-oh-so-creepy little weird kid with the Sad Sack face who...
THE GREAT DISSENTER
“I am the result of a loving upbringing in a peaceful country, with wonderful parents and siblings, a very long-term relationship, stability,...
REDEMPTION ROAD
There is no more powerful human narrative than the story of redemption, the assurance that no matter what evil we have done we can atone, strive to...
THE EXECUTOR AND THE PRODIGAL SON
By all accounts the recently deceased was a pretty cranky old dude. Even his life-long best friend, my client, the sole beneficiary and executor of...
HOW SWEET IT IS
As a longtime lover of the ‘Sweet Science’, I felt a secret sense of satisfaction in watching the measured way in which Floyd “Money" Mayweather...
SWINGS AND ROUNDABOUTS
It's funny the way things seem to go on swings and roundabouts. In 1945 the troops returned from World War II celebrating victory over fascism and...
THE RULE OF LAW
In a time of increasingly vigorous criticism of some of our court processes, many were taken aback when Victoria’s Supreme Court recently hit back...
WINNERS AND LOSERS
The thrill of the punt is not for everyone. It can be a tough game. To the victor goes the spoils, but to the rest only heartache....
REASONABLE CONDUCT
The threat last week by One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts to report Fairfax Media journalists to police for stalking, raises some interesting...
SIFTING THROUGH THE DROSS
The Roman Catholic Cardinal George Pell has retained a brilliant USSR-born, Jewish lawyer to defend him. Melbourne-based barrister Robert Richter...
DOLI INCAPAX
Youngest offender ever charged with murder In the early hours of the morning following Australia Day last year, 26 year old Patrick Slater was found...
THE BIRDS IS COMING
I read a news story just the other day about a self-declared “grammar vigilante” who reportedly prowls the streets of Bristol, in south-west...
FEUD
Some court cases concern life and liberty, some are about money and manipulation, and others grubby politics and power. But in defamation cases...
A FOREIGN LAND
The sentencing this week in China of three Australian employees of James Packer’s Crown Resorts brings into sharp focus the scary reality of...
ON THE EDGE
I was contemplating suicide this week. Not personally contemplating the actual deed mind you - in fact, it may be more accurate to say that suicide...
CITIZEN JOHN AND THE GENIE
There’s a common misconception in some circles that only criminals, miscreants and ne’er-do-wells attract the attention of investigators like...
PAROLE ON TRIAL
The Prime Minister’s call for an overhaul of state parole laws in the wake of this week's terrorist attack in Melbourne has the sniff of political...
FIXATED FOLK
This week I learned something kind of crazy that I never knew before.A gentleman came to my office complaining that five police officers had...
Nyst Legal Establishes a Brisbane Presence
Nyst Legal is recognised as one of Queensland’s leading criminal and regulatory law firms.Whilst we have been based on the Gold Coast for the past...
THE BETTER PART OF US
The 1959 German film Die Bruecke by director Bernhard Wiki is set in the final days of World War 2, as American tanks drive the Allied victory home...
A SMALL, SMALL WORLD
On June 28, 1963, the then-President of the United States of America, the late great John Fitzgerald Kennedy, addressed a joint session of the...
TRUE BELIEVERS
Legalising medicinal cannabis in Australia, the debate rages on. “Cannabis sativa is the greatest wonder-drug ever known to man.” The grizzled,...
TRIAL BY INTERNET
How does the criminal justice system cope with the information revolution of the Internet? In the first week of February 2008 the big boys at...
MORE ROBUST TIMES
For many the recent retrospective by Brisbane’s Courier Mail newspaper, celebrating the 30 year anniversary of the game-changing Fitzgerald...
BETWEEN MAN AND MYTH
There is so often a deep, unpassable chasm between man and myth. The late James Rieher Snuka, the professional wrestling icon better known to his...
WELCOME TO OCEANIA
We live in an everchanging world. Early in 2016, it was announced by the British government that a statue of the renowned English novelist, essayist...
FAIR GO AUSTRALIA
What goes around always seems to come around again. In February 1862 a familiar advertisement appeared in the employment columns of the London Times...
TAKING A BACKSEAT
In the old days good girls were told to stay out of the back seat of cars. But perhaps times have changed. Not so long ago I acted for a young...
DOG DAY AFTERNOON
Over the break I dropped in for a day of musical mayhem at the annual Falls Music & Arts Festival at Byron Bay. There was loads of good music on...
SANTA BAN
It seems like people can always find something to fight about, even at Christmas time. I guess that's why most lawyers love January so much. After a...
THE GENTEEL SILENCE
The complaint this week from would-be patrons of a popular Adelaide hotel that they were refused entry on racial grounds, has reopened some old...
SELECTIVE AMNESIA
Remember that awesome pub-crawl you went on in first year uni, the one organised by your student social association, where you started on shooters,...
THE MAN ON THE CLAPHAM OMNIBUS
Lawyers are well acquainted with the Reasonable Man. After all, he’s each and every one of us, although in truth none of us at all. He’s everyone...
SCHOOLIES, LOCKOUT LAWS AND JELLY SHOTS
With Schoolies 2016 and the Christmas silly season soon upon us, licensed premises owners, staff and patrons will need to brush up on Queensland’s...
THE EDUCATION OF AMASA
The Bible tells us that the sinner Saul was struck down on the road to Damascus. In a sudden flash of light from heaven, he experienced a divine,...
RACY BEHAVIOUR
This weekend’s Castrol Gold Coast 600 is yet another reminder that some people just seem to be a whole lot happier when someone gets their gear off....
SEND IN THE CLOWNS
The circus is in town. A crazy new phenomenon is sweeping across the US, Europe, and now even Australia. It trumps the Trump, it’s scarier than...
ATTACK OF THE DRONES
With the currently almost endemic proliferation in Australian society of audio- and video-recording mobile phones, and the recent announcement by...
BRINGING UP BABY
When couples are separating, and negotiating who gets what from the joint property pool, pets (most frequently dogs and cats) are often front and...
STOOL PIGEONS & G MEN
G men love stoolies. It’s a fact of life. Over the centuries, the one thing that has most frustrated the work of ‘government guys’ – the regulators...
BIG MONEY BARNEYS
Big-time prize fighting has always walked hand in hand with big money litigation. It’s a world of feast and famine, full of tough guys and shrewd...
NRL MATCH FIXING INVESTIGATION
Today’s news that six NRL stars will be interrogated over alleged match fixing, and face jail if they refuse to co-operate with investigators,...
THE DO’S AND DON’TS OF TELEMARKETING
In Australia we have some of the strictest telemarketing laws in the world and we need to. I’m sure everyone who reads this blog has received a...
BOOM TOWN
When I was a kid my brothers and I used to watch those corny old black-and-white midday matinee movies on TV, and one of my favourites was an action...
CITY OF DREAMS
When I was a young girl growing up in Brazil, I would often visit family and friends in the beautiful, bustling city of Rio de Janeiro. It was a...
WIDENING THE DOOR ON BCIPA
A recent decision handed down in the Brisbane Magistrates Court could have far reaching effects for building contractors and subcontractors...
A MATTER OF RESTRAINT
Today’s news out of the Broncos Rugby League headquarters about an alleged “drunken incident” involving star centre James Roberts has let more than...
PRIVACY TALK
With Census Night just around the corner everyone is suddenly talking about Privacy. And so they should be. One of my pet hates is being interrupted...
CAN POLICE JUST RANDOMLY STOP AND SEARCH ME?
At festivals like Splendour in the Grass and Greazefest, music lovers have become accustomed to seeing police routinely searching people suspected...
TRIAL OF THE CENTURY
I was blown away by the latest ESPN ‘30 for 30’ documentary, ‘O.J.: Made in America’. Like the equally popular Channel 10 true crime drama ‘The...
HAVE YOU SEEN YOUR CREDIT STATUS LATELY?!
Have you checked your credit status lately? Chances are you’ve never heard of organisations like VEDA, Dunn and Bradstreet or Experian, but you can...
THE CANDYMAN CAN
Our perhaps most flamboyant and controversial client, the Gold Coast’s own Candyman, tobacco franchising supremo Mr Travers Beynon, had a win this...
TROLLS BEWARE
The Australian justice system has at last stomped decisively into the 21st century, striking out at online bullying and harassment. Following the...
THE WINDS OF CHANGE
What goes around comes around, I guess. My wife and I spent this week visiting our youngest daughter at her home in Brooklyn, New York City, where...
ALI RIP
Over the weekend, a great hero passed away. Muhammad Ali was not just a giant of the sport of boxing, he was one of the most influential characters...
AMERICAN PIE
Something crazy is happening in America right now. Crazy, and eerily familiar. As the left and right of US politics fight their perennial good...
FAIR ENOUGH
"That’s not fair.” My client’s assessment was spot-on, and more than a little ironic, given he was referring to the Fair Work Act. Like justice,...
SEX AND THE SLEEPY
Life is a risky undertaking that involves an endless series of perilous decisions. Some turn out triumphant, others disastrous. Last month I...
CRACKING THE EGG
We work all our lives to create a nest-egg that will hopefully sustain us comfortably in our retirement, and in this day and age most of us...
BETWEEN MAIN AND DESSERT
“So what did you think of the Baden-Clay decision?” It was the question I’d been dreading all night. As soon as it hit the dinner table seven pairs...
SADLY, A GROWTH INDUSTRY
In the mid-1960’s around 10% of all Australian marriages ended in divorce. According to the Australian Institute of Family Studies today that figure...
SCARY STORIES
This summer many of us became budding couch detectives and expert criminologists, all from the air-conditioned comfort of our very own lounge-rooms,...
BIG DOG SAYS “GOODNIGHT”
The hottest of hot topics in this state for the past couple of weeks has been the government’s push to implement stricter lockout laws, and tighten...
OCEAN ROAD MAGAZINE 2016 SUMMER ISSUE
I am thrilled to see that the current 2016 Summer Issue of the prominent lifestyle publication Ocean Road Magazine features as its cover story our...
STOLEN CHILDREN
Family law disputes often involve haggling over tens or hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of property, sometimes even more. With that much...
DOGS AND SMALL CHILDREN
The old show business adage warns you should never work with animals or children. They’re unruly, unpredictable, and way too cute, and in the end...
INTRODUCING GISELE REID
Next Monday, when Nyst Legal officially re-opens its doors for 2016, we will have the pleasure of welcoming aboard an exciting new addition to our...
FOR THE RECORD…
Last week the press had a field day taking pot-shots at Southport magistrate Bernadette Callaghan for ordering police to remove handcuffs from a...
THE HERO OF PALMYRA
The armed militants of Daesh, pillaging and plundering their way across the Middle East, proclaim themselves heroes of Islam. But heroes come in all...
NEW FIX FOR SERIAL JUNKIES
If you're hooked, as I am, on the phenomenally popular podcast, Serial, crank up those earphones and get ready for a new round of infuriating twists...
WOULD YOU BELIEVE…
Criminal defence lawyers often deal with desperate people - desperate to clear their name, desperate to establish their innocence, sometimes just...
“KELLY” MACGROARTY RIP
This week saw the passing of my very dear friend and mentor Kelly Macgroarty, one of Queensland’s greatest criminal law defence barristers of any...
SWEET LITTLE FISH
Little fish are sweet. High profile defamation actions and messy murder trials may make for big headlines, but from a lawyer's point of view the...
TAKING ON THE STATE
Experienced lawyers will tell you, you can’t really call yourself a litigator until you’ve won the unwinnable case, and lost the un-loseable. I’ve...
FROM LITTLE THINGS
Last week ‘New York’s Finest’ were reaching for their Smartphones, posting happy snaps of panhandlers begging on Broadway and vagrants urinating in...
A FINE COMMERCIAL LINE
Last month the Nyst Legal commercial litigation team spent nearly two weeks in the Federal Court in Melbourne, flanked by a phalanx of QC's, arguing...
POLICY OR POLITICS?
Last week the Supreme Court ordered the Queensland Parole Board to pay convicted bank robber Brenden Abbott’s legal costs because it failed to make...
CSI WASHINGTON DC
So you think that all CSI stuff is pretty impressive, huh? Think again. On February 24, 1981, a young woman was raped in her Washington DC home by...
THE BLOODY INSULT
Not everything's about money. One of my favourite Australian films of all time is Ken Hannan’s classic 1975 drama Sunday Too Far Away. It tells the...
A VERY BIG CALL
I was surprised to read this week former Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock's comment that it is unlikely proposed anti-terror laws would see an...
THE RUMBLE OF TURBULENT TIMES
Well, the final figures are in, and it's official - the Manny Pacquiao-Floyd Mayweather Jr. prize-fight last month was the most lucrative bout in...
PARTY TIME
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the suburbs… Earlier this year, eight years after he made national headlines when the party he threw...
VERNONS MUSIC AWARD
Nyst Legal trainee lawyer Jonny Nyst, did the Gold Coast proud last night with a first-place gong at the Queensland Music Awards. Jonny’s band, The...
DALLIANCE DISCOUNTS
If you're thinking of sharing your bed with someone sometime soon, it might be best to stop and think about precisely what you may be signing up...
RUFFLED EAGLE FEATHERS
A clash of Queensland judicial personalities flared earlier this week, with the Courier Mail newspaper reporting on Wednesday a serious difference...
A CRISIS OF CREDIBILITY
Sadly, there is a growing sense of inevitability surrounding impending execution of Bali Nine members Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran. The...
A CALL TO ALL GOOD MEN
It’s high time for good men to stand up and do something about domestic violence. Last year domestic violence was the leading cause of death and...
Vive l’humanité
As distressing as last week’s terrorist attacks in Paris proved to be, they were not the first, and certainly not the worst, acts of terrorism the...
SHOWTIME
Talk about art imitating life imitating art imitating life. In the 2002 American action-comedy movie Showtime two odd-couple cops are ordered by the...
Open Justice
Questions about racial inequality continue to simmer in the United States following last week's decision of a Staten Island Grand Jury not to indict...
THE UNDERBELLY ISSUE
A couple of years back, at the International Criminal Law Congress, I delivered a paper on the effect of pre-trial publicity on jury trials....
TEN YEARS ON
10 years ago today, on 27 November 2004, the indigenous community of Palm Island erupted. The islanders had just heard read out at a public meeting...
Supreme Court Rules Incentive Clawbacks Unenforceable
What goes up must come down, and vice versa. In a town that’s seen more than its share of booms and busts, landlords understand the concept all too...
LEST WE FORGET
Today marks the 96th anniversary of the end of World War I. In four short years that conflict resulted in an estimated 40 million casualties,...
EXACTLY WHAT THEY TAKE
Frank Darabont’s 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption is an enduring classic of American cinema. Based on the Stephen King novella Rita Hayworth and...
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD
They say money can't buy happiness, but most of us are willing to give it a shot. Australians spend billions of dollars every year on lottery...
BIG THINGS GROW
From little things big things grow. How true it is. I was filled with an enormous sense of pride recently when I drove past one of the giant...
SO LONG MAGGIE AND DAVE, AND THANKS FOR ALL THE FISSION
I guess just about everybody who's ever had anything much to do with the Australian film industry has a soft spot for television film reviewers...
CARLY NYST ADDRESSES UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL
On Friday last week my dear daughter Carly Nyst, a UK-based Australian lawyer who is currently the Legal Director of the human rights group Privacy...
NO SURPRISE IN PISTORIUS VERDICT
Notwithstanding all the hoopla being currently kicked up in the public press, I expect the verdict hardly raised a single eyebrow amongst...
SATTS TELLS IT ALL IN GLORY DETAIL
Yesterday I joined South Sydney faithful at the old Redfern Town Hall in Sydney for the launch of Glory, Glory, the autobiographical account of the...
CEDRIC HAMPSON, ONE OF GOD’S OWN GENTLEMEN. RIP.
When I received a call last night to hear my old friend and mentor Cedric Hampson QC had passed away at his home over the weekend I was left with a...
NEED FOR RESTRAINT
Earlier this week I was sitting in the public gallery of a Magistrates Court on the Sunshine Coast waiting for my client's matter to be called...
BREAKING THE CYCLE
Violence begets violence. We’ve all become accustomed to television images of US police responding to even the most apparently minor civil...
HEAVEN FORBID, MAYBE EVEN YOU AND ME
Last week I was invited by Amnesty International to join a panel of criminal justice experts discussing the human rights implications of...
ANIMAL RIGHTS, OR JUST PLAIN MONKEY BUSINESS?
As a novelist and film-maker, and advisor to a singer-songwriter son heavily involved in the music industry here in Australia as well as...
BACK TO THE FUTURE – SOUTHPORT NAMED THE ‘NEW’ CBD
It's great to see Southport officially recognised by the State Government as the Gold Coast's ‘new’ CBD. What a great story. It's got everything but...
WHY HIGHER RESIDENTIAL DENSITY MAKES SOUND SOCIO-ECONOMIC SENSE
Established in 2008, the Grattan Institute is a Melbourne-based public policy think tank which focuses on the key policy areas of Cities, Energy,...
BUGGING COFFINS?! HAS IT REALLY COME TO THIS?
Years ago I was involved in a major Australian Federal Police investigation into a high-profile union administrator (amongst others) in which the...
WHEN ARE YOUNG COPS GOING TO BE TAUGHT CHOKER HOLDS ARE LETHAL?
About 20 years ago I acted for a young police officer who was charged with assault occasioning grievous bodily harm after he applied a particularly...
STAY OFF SOCIAL MEDIA AND OUT OF THE FAMILY COURT?
Over the past several years anecdotal experience in the our family law practice has had some at Nyst Legal raising their eyebrows about the number...
BROTHER FOR BROTHER
We choose our friends. We don’t choose our family. But family is family, for better or for worse. Mostly we love them, at times they drive us to...
WATCH PHONES TAKING US BACK TO THE FUTURE.
When I was a kid every afternoon after school my brothers and I used to love watching The Dick Tracy Show on T.V. Detective Dickie would hurtle...
PRE-NUPTIAL AGREEMENTS NOW CENSORING SOCIAL MEDIA. OKAY, WHY NOT?
These days the ambit of Pre-Nuptial Agreements is extensive, in some cases even regulating partners’ behaviour and interactions on Social Media...
HOT MUGSHOT GUY – ARE WE SERIOUSLY LOSING IT?
The story that went viral last week about the so-called "hot mugshot guy" Jeremy Meeks raises some very interesting social issues in this new world...
RESISTANCE TO CRUISE SHIP TERMINAL – SOUND POLICY OR JUST NOSTALGIA?
I see Councillor Susie Douglas is leading the charge with the Gold Coast Community Alliance to fight the proposed cruise ship terminal. There’s...
IS THE CHIEF JUSTICE DEBATE ABOUT CARMODY?
I read with great interest the newspaper report on comments made by Court of Appeal Justice John Muir in his recent address to the North Queensland...
WHAT SORT OF PEOPLE DO WE WANT AS OUR JUDGES?
Opinions differ as to how we should select our judicial officers. Inevitably, ambitions, politics and prejudice play a part in people's views on the...