Marcus Einfeld
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Marcus Richard Einfeld AO QC is an Australian lawyer, judge and social activist who served as Justice of the Federal Court of Australia and the Supreme Courts of New South Wales, Western Australia and the Australian Capital Territory as well as the President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission between 1986 and 1990. Once an iconic figure of left-wing politics in Australia, Einfeld's name has been dragged into disgrace by a series of scandals, culminating in his arrest for perjury on 29 March 2007.
[edit] History
[edit] Early life and education
Marcus Einfeld is the son of a prominent Sydney Labor Party member Sydney Einfeld and his wife Billie. He studied at Sydney Boys High School from 1951-5,and obtained his BA and LLB from the University of Sydney. He also claims two degrees from two unaccredited United States institutions, Pacific Western University and Century University.
[edit] Legal career
Einfeld is a Former Justice, Federal Court of Australia, and has served as Justice of the Supreme Courts of New South Wales, Western Australia, the Australian Capital Territory and the Eastern Caribbean.
Marcus Einfeld was a Justice of the Federal Court of Australia until April 2001 when he retired after almost 15 years service. He has been named by the National Trust of Australia as a National Living Treasure
[edit] Community and social involvement
Einfeld has been an executive member of the New South Wales Board of Deputies for many years and a Councillor of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry. Einfeld also started and served as the first Chairman of the Australian Campaign for the Rescue of Soviet Jewry following his earlier establishment of the London-based National Campaign for Soviet Jewry of the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Einfeld has been a spokesperson for Israeli and Jewish causes and has often confronted Palestinian supporters, the media, the UN, universities and other institutions. He was an invited speaker at United Israel Appeal (UIA) functions in Britain, the United States of America, Europe, Canada and Australia. Einfeld is Patron of the Australian Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Descendants and of the Sydney Jewish Museum.
Einfeld has served as AUSTCARE's "Ambassador for Refugees" and as an "Ambassador for Children" for UNICEF.
In 2002 Einfeld was presented a United Nations Association of Australia 'Founder's Award' for his contribution to justice and human rights.
[edit] Controversies
[edit] Solomon Islands Controversy
On 14 September 2006 Australian Prime Minister John Howard denounced a judicial inquiry into April riots in Honiara in the Solomon Islands headed by Einfeld as an attempt to subvert the legal process in Solomon Islands.
Einfeld, who was appointed to the multi-million-dollar inquiry by Manasseh Sogavare, was introduced to the Solomon Islands Prime Minister by a little-known Australian-based legal academic, Julian Moti, an adjunct professor of law at Bond University (Australia) who was acquitted of statutory rape of a 13 year old girl in Vanuatu.
In Honiara, Einfeld and Moti have become the focus of increasingly bitter attacks. The Solomons Star newspaper reported the Leader of the Opposition, Fred Fono, as saying the appointments were inappropriate and background checks should have excluded them both from high office.
This led to the Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare reportedly cancelling the appointment, saying Mr Einfeld would be replaced with an unnamed retired judge from Papua New Guinea. "Due to so much publicity about Mr Einfeld's past, I have now decided to cancel his appointment as chairman of the commission of inquiry," Mr Sogavare said. However, a spokesman for Einfeld said he had already decided to quit "because of ongoing tension between the Australian and Solomon Islands governments".
[edit] Plagiarism allegations
Professor John Carter of Sydney University made a formal complaint in 2003 of plagiarism by Marcus Einfeld. Carter alleged that Einfeld reproduced Carter's work in Halsbury's Laws of Australia without attribution. This was denied by Einfeld who stated that the lack of attribution was due to a printing error.[1] However Chief Justice of the Federal Court, Michael Black, apologised to Professor Carter and documents relating to the incident remain suppressed after Einfeld's lawyers opposed a Freedom of Information request for the documents.[2]
[edit] Allegations regarding making a statement on oath
On January 8, 2006, Einfeld's silver Lexus was caught doing sixty kilometres per hour in a fifty kilometre an hour zone in Mosman, Sydney. The penalty for breaking the speed limit was an $AUD77 fine however Einfeld has a record of speeding tickets and would receive enough demerits for this offence to take him to one short of losing his drivers license. When the case came to court in early August 2006, Einfeld claimed he had been in Forster on January 8, and that he had lent his car to a friend, Professor Teresa Brennan. He also signed a statutory declaration to that effect. It became apparent that this could not have been true as Teresa Brennan, who had been a Professor at Florida Atlantic University had been killed in an unsolved hit and run car accident in January 2003, three and a half years previously [3] [4]. He later attempted to clarify his statement by claiming that he had lent his car to another Professor Teresa Brennan, however, this woman has not yet been traced. He has since said that the driver was actually a person resident in the US and it would be possible "in the next few days to reveal who was the driver". [5] In January 2007 Ms Angela Liati came forward and announced that she had been in Einfeld's car on January 8, 2006 with a Teresa Brennan (not the deceased) but was unsure who was driving at the time of the infringement. [6]
It has been claimed that Einfeld has on three prior occasions avoided traffic notices by claiming that Australian women who lived in the United States had been driving his car at the time. Two of these notices, a speeding fine and traffic light infringement, occurred while Einsfeld was a Federal Court judge and involved a court-supplied car. On each occasion Einfeld made a statutory declaration and avoided any penalty[7]. On two occasions he claimed that Nadine Levick, an Australian academic resident in the United States, was driving his car. Levick denies all knowledge of the traffic offenses[8].
In all, over a four year period, Einfeld incurred nine traffic fines for a range of offenses from speeding to parking illegally. In July 1999 Einfeld's court-supplied Ford Fairlane was picked up by a red light camera at the intersection of William and Crown streets in East Sydney. Einfeld claimed that his car was being serviced in Woolloomooloo although that was shown not to be the case. This fine was waived after Einfeld produced a statutory declaration the contents of which, along with four other documents relating to the case, remain suppressed by the Court. In 2003 the Court attempted to enforce an outstanding parking fine from 1998. After it did so, Einfeld claimed that he had been disabled in an accident at the time and his car was kept in a garage.[9]
[edit] Controversy about qualifications
Some of his postgraduate qualifications have been considered to be from non-traditional degree awarding sources. As soon as news of his legal troubles broke, several journalists also tracked down his academic qualifications. They were able to show that the awarding Universities for his two doctoral degrees are the unaccredited Pacific Western University and Century University.
Pacific Western University has been approved by the Bureau for Private Postsecondary and Vocational Education to grant degrees under the provisions of the California Education Code, Section 94310, and has been criticised as a diploma mill by some, including the U.S. Federal Government. In a 2004 Government Accounting Office Special Investigations Report on diploma mills[1], Pacific Western was mentioned by name:
For example, fees for degrees for domestic students at Pacific Western University are as follows: Bachelor of Science ($2,295); Master’s Degree in Business Administration ($2,395); and PhD ($2,595). School representatives emphasized to our undercover investigator that they are not in the business of providing, and do not permit students to enroll for, individual courses or training. Instead, the schools market and require payment for degrees on a flat-fee basis.
It has also been noticed as far away as Australia[2];
University of Sydney law dean Ron McCallum said he had never heard of the two universities, but said doctorates issued by degree mills "are not worth the paper they are written on".
[...] Sydney executive headhunter Peter Salt, of Salt & Shein, said anyone seeking a job on the basis of degrees from Pacific Western and Century universities "is obviously the wrong candidate".
Pacific Western University denies having any record of Einfeld suggesting that perhaps he did not obtain a degree from that institution[10].
[edit] Collapse of Australian Legal Resources International
Einfeld was the President of Australian Legal Resources International, a non-profit independent group of lawyers that supported democracy, human rights and the rule of law in developing countries. In August 2006 this organisation collapsed leaving creditors, including AusAID, the Australian Taxation Office, and St George Bank owed considerable sums of money[11]. AusAID also gave ALRI large sums of money as direct grants which increased as the company's financial position deteriorated. Some amount of money was spent to allow Einfeld to travel to the Caribbean, Indonesia and other countries. In May 2006 Einfeld was one of a number of people who voted for a plan to destroy ALRI's company records with the motion only passing after Einfeld and a former Victorian judge, Howard Nathan, used their proxies to vote in favour of the move[12].
[edit] Conflict of Interest Claims
Einfeld is a non-executive director of Australian gold mining company Diamond Rose. At the 2005 Diamond Rose Annual General meeting, it was proposed that a payment of $AUD350,000 be made to two non-executive directors including Einfeld. A clear majority of shareholders, unimpressed by poor performance, voted against the motion, but proxy votes were then called. The motion passed due to the proxy votes of an American-based company Global Gold Corporation of which Einfeld was also a member of the board. Diamond Rose claims that Einfeld has resigned from the board of Global Gold Corporation before the vote was taken, however it is unclear at exactly what date Einfeld did resign and so avoid a possible conflict of interest. The financial state of Diamond Rose also remains unclear after the Australian Stock Exchange officially asked whether the company has "sufficient cash to fund its activities"[13]
[edit] Alleged padding of Einfeld's curriculum vitae
Einfeld's entry to Who's Who claimed that he was a director of British retailer Marks and Spencer from 1975 to 1976. At the time he would have been in his mid-thirties although there is some dispute about when Einfeld was born. However Marks and Spencer claims it has no record of Einfeld working for them at all much less serving on the board[14]. His 2006 Who's Who entry also claimed that he was the vice-president of the Australian branch of the International Commssion of Jurists and sat on the board of the The Benevolent Society, a leading Sydney charity. According to those two organisations he had resigned from The Benevolent Society in 2002 and had not served as national vice-president of the ICJ since 2000[15].
[edit] Alleged United Nations Peace Award
Einfeld's oft repeated claims to have been awarded a United Nations Peace Award in 2002 failed to specify that the award was presented by a local Australian organisation called the United Nations Association of Australia, and not the United Nations Organisation based in New York.
[edit] Alleged insurance problems
As President of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Einfeld, asked the Commission to compensate him for a lost overcoat and several other personal items that disappeared during a trip to New York on Commission business. Einfeld is alleged to have received compensation from the Commission but also to have claimed for the same items from his insurance company. Allegedly he resigned as President of the Commission shortly after this was brought to the attention of the Commission. According to former secretary of the Commission, "Working with Marcus Einfeld as president of the commission involved a constant series of difficulties"[16]
[edit] Police investigation
On September 8, 2006, police from the Fraud Squad raided Einfeld's Woollahra home. Police seized part of a computer owned by Einfeld. [17]
On March 29, 2007, Einfeld was arrested by New South Wales police. He has been charged with 13 offences, including perjury, perverting the course of justice and making and using false statutory declarations. [18]
