Wells - The court reporter

For my mother, Cecilia, who died on

12 September 2016.

Contents

IN JANUARY 2016 MY mother, Cecilia, found out that she had terminal cancer and came from her home in country New South Wales to stay with me for a while in Sydney for treatment, while my father Allan stayed at home.

I was covering the Sydney siege inquest. She spent long days on her own watching me standing in the gutter outside the John Maddison Tower court building in Goulburn Street in the CBD doing live television crosses on the ABC News Channel and listening to my radio news stories and live program crosses on ABC Radio Sydney.

Her palliative care drugs made her anxious and she was petrified of dying. One night when I got home, she was so worked up that she was pacing back and forth in my house.

Mum, I dont think you are going to die tonight, I said to her and got her into the car to go out for a drive to try to take her mind off things.

As we pulled out of the car park she settled a bit.

Im proud of you, she said, but Ive never seen where you work can you show me some of the courts in the city?

So we spent hours driving around the CBD, past the ABC at Ultimo, past the John Maddison Tower court complex, past the Downing Centre Courts and Central Local Court in Liverpool Street, past the Law Courts building in Queens Square, the St James Road Court, the King Street Courthouse and Darlinghurst Courthouse, past Glebe Coroners Court on Parramatta Road and past the new ICAC building on Elizabeth Street and the old one on Castlereagh Street.

I explained to her that these were just a few of the courts Id been hanging around for almost a decade and we didnt have time to go out to all the other courts in the suburbs.

We were on our way back to my inner west house when she said, Where does Eddie Obeid live? She had seen photos of the former Labor ministers Hunters Hill home in the news for many years.

So we went past there too and ate a choc-top ice cream in a park overlooking the water near Hunters Hill.

Mum had calmed right down by now.

You might be sad when I die so you need to keep busy, she said. You could write a book about some of your adventures in the courts and all the people youve seen and talked to.

So that is what Ive done.

Over the last decade I have covered hundreds of different court cases and I have filed more than 10,000 radio news stories alone. That figure does not include thousands of live radio and television crosses. I have been closely involved with the ABC News Channel since it started in 2010 doing live television crosses on major court cases and have worked with ABC Online from the very start covering court stories.

I have covered so many cases I actually forget Ive covered some of them and am only reminded of them when I come across videos and recordings of my work or stories online. Not always remembering some of the detail of the more confronting things Ive covered is probably a good thing, because like a doctor or police officer you cant carry it all around with you and you need to switch off sometimes and keep a certain distance and objectivity to get the job done.

I have had moments in court when the public gallery has erupted into fits of laughter, fights have broken out or people have collapsed with grief.

Ive done stories about horrific stabbing, shooting and beheading murders. Ive covered a case involving a member of the Milat family, another involving bush fugitive Malcolm Naden, and the murder trials of former water-polo champion Keli Lane, ex-chauffeur Gordon Wood and Sydney man Jeffrey Gilham who was jailed for life after being convicted of murdering his parents Helen and Stephen Gilham in their Woronora home in Sydneys south, but was later acquitted on appeal when new evidence was found.

I have covered cases involving politicians, including the court case between former speaker Peter Slipper and his ex-staffer James Ashby, and cases involving the Health Services Union, and senior police, including former New South Wales Crime Commission investigator Mark Standen, who was jailed for conspiring to import drugs.

One Federal Court case I covered involved a public servant who sued for compensation after injuring herself having sex in a motel her employer had booked for a work trip in country New South Wales. The woman claimed that a glass light fitting that came away from the wall, hit her in the face, injuring her nose and mouth and causing a psychiatric adjustment disorder. She won the Federal Court case but then the governments workplace safety body, Comcare, appealed to the High Court and won, so the compensation she thought she was entitled to never eventuated.

The round has taken me into court for cases involving celebrities such as the late Leonard Cohen, Gina Rinehart and her family, and ex-Hey Dad! television star Robert Hughes.

Ive covered grubby, horrible cases involving sex offenders, husband killers, wife killers, child killers, petty thieves and very bad drivers.

There are cases Ive followed in and out of several court jurisdictions and appeals that have resulted in acquittals or shorter jail sentences.

Inquests into the death and disappearance of people whose families still grieve have been part of my job, including the long-running Sydney siege inquest and inquests into the cruise-ship death of Dianne Brimble, television newsreader Charmaine Dragun, tasered Brazilian student Laudisio Curti and the Quakers Hill nursing home mass murders.

Ive covered terrorism trials, bikie trials, sexual harassment and animal cruelty cases and a case involving a woman who killed her children with rat poison and another who jumped to her death after doing a self-help course.

The long-running Church Sex Abuse inquiries, ICAC inquiries, copyright matters, Industrial Court matters, Land and Environment Court matters, defamation and copyright cases and committal hearings have all been part of my job.

Ive been chased, spat on, threatened with physical violence, stopped from entering a court and injured on the job, but have, on the flipside of all that, had the incredible reward of connecting with audiences and being in court for some of the biggest moments in New South Wales politics.

A courtroom presents life in all its complexities and it can provide the most amazing and addictive theatre. The case itself is often a subplot for all the dynamics and relationships in a public gallery.

I wrote this book to fulfil my promise to my mum and it is dedicated to her memory. I hope that you find the courts and all the colourful stories and characters as interesting to read about as I did to witness.

ON 13 FEBRUARY 2017 Robert Xie was given five life sentences for murdering five members of his wifes family by bashing them to death as they lay sleeping in their beds in the quiet, leafy, middle-class Sydney suburb of North Epping. Just a month earlier a jury found him guilty in a majority eleven to one verdict when it couldnt reach a unanimous one. The case was intriguing and frustrating at the same time for me because it had dragged on for so long. I had been following it since Xies arrest in 2011 and his subsequent committal hearing and the aftermath.

This short and rather frail man always had a calm demeanour in court. He looked no different than the other suited professionals on their way to work in the CBD each day. He was a trained ear, nose and throat surgeon who was born in China and came to Australia in 1999. Xie owned a restaurant in Melbourne before moving to Sydney where he was mostly not working.

In 2011 he was charged with murdering his wifes brother Min Norman Lin (forty-five); Mr Lins wife, Yun Li Lily (forty-three); their two sons Henry (twelve) and Terry (nine); and Lilys sister Yun Bi Irene (thirty-nine). Their bodies were found early on Saturday 18 July 2009 in their home after Norman Lin didnt show up to open his newsagency.