Pat O'Shane

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Pat O'Shane (born 1941) is a controversial magistrate living in Sydney, Australia. A former head of the New South Wales Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs, O'Shane was appointed a magistrate in 1986. She is married to Allan Coles. As of 2007, O'Shane was facing disciplinary proceedings at the state's Judicial Commission over her alleged bias against police.

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[edit] Personal

O'Shane was born in Mossman, Queensland near Cairns, in 1941 to a father of Irish descent and an Aboriginal mother. She has said that, because of her mixed parentage, she was the target of racist taunts from both black and white children.

O'Shane described her childhood thus:

We lived in a tent with a dirt floor ... We didn't have running water. I knew that we lived in different circumstances from the other kids at school. I was used to kids calling me black gin and black nigger ... I often had physical fights: black eyes, bloody nose, that kind of thing. By the time I got to secondary school, what I used to do with my fists I started doing with my tongue ... To this day, men tell me that I'm a very aggressive woman.

Gladys O'Shane died suddenly in 1964, leaving Pat to take care of the family.

O'Shane worked as a teacher at Cairns State High School in the 1960s before pursuing a career in law. Students and co-workers from her time at Cairns describe her as "aggressive" and "volatile", however the school's current principal told The Australian that "O'Shane was highly thought of at the school and I have never heard negative comments about her."

In 1976, she became one of the first Aboriginal Australians to become a barrister. Later, she served as the first female head of the New South Wales Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs.

In 1986, the Wran Labor government appointed her as a state magistrate - making her the first Aboriginal Australian to hold such a post.

In 1993, O'Shane was named Chancellor of the University of New England in Armidale. She served in this post until 2003.

The magistrate's six-year-old nephew Tjandamurra O'Shane was set alight in the playground of Cairns North State School in 1996, in a case that attracted a great deal of public sympathy for the family.

In 1998, the National Trust named O'Shane one of Australia's 100 "living treasures".

In 2004, O'Shane learned that Allan Coles, her 77-year-old second husband, had had an extramarital affair with a neighbour, she dumped his belongings on the neighbour's doorstep and kicked Coles out of the house. Coles successfully applied for an apprehended violence order against O'Shane. She received electro-convulsive therapy for manic depression in the wake of the incident.

In 2007 O'Shane was placed on a further apprehended violence order after complaints to police that she was "intimidating and harassing" her ex-husbands lover Heather Armstrong.[1]

[edit] Controversial rulings

In a 2007 feature on O'Shane, The Australian reported that "controversy and confrontation have remained continuing themes in her life." O'Shane's attitudes towards law enforcement officials in particular have come in for sustained criticism. New South Wales Police minister John Watkins has said that O'Shane is a "serial offender when it comes to people in uniform," demonstrating "on an ongoing basis a prejudice against the police of this state."

One of her staunchest defenders is Lee Rhiannon, who represents the Australian Greens in the New South Wales Legislative Council. "Pat O'Shane has had a distinguished record as barrister, department head and now magistrate," she told The Australian in 2007, "The Government's pursuit of her is a disgrace."

O'Shane's rulings with regard to an attack on two transit officers are to be the subject of proceedings at the New South Wales Judicial Commission. Some have speculated that her career as a magistrate is in jeopardy.

[edit] Berlei

In 1993, O'Shane decreed that four women, found by her court to have defaced a Berlei bra billboard advertisement, would not have convictions recorded against them. Later O'Shane, in her own words, "launched into a bit of a spiel about violence against women in this society," describing the bra ad itself as "the real crime".

A Sydney Morning Herald article by Janet Albrechtsen on the case was the subject of a defamation action. Judge Rex Smart found that the article implied O'Shane's judgments were influenced by anger and bitterness. Though Smart agreed that O'Shane had been angry at the time of the ruling, he awarded the magistrate $220,000 in damages. This was reduced on appeal to $175,000.

O'Shane's attitudes on the subject of violence against women are opaque, however. In defence of rape accused Geoff Clark, O'Shane told the Nine Network's Sunday programme that "I can tell you on the basis of my experience that a lot of women manufacture a lot of stories against men."

[edit] Michael Kanaan

In 1999, O'Shane dismissed charges against Michael Kanaan, accused of shooting at police. O'Shane described the officers involved in the case as "stupid, reckless and foolhardy." Kanaan was later convicted of three murders. Kanaan was later acquitted of attempted murder involving the police shooting but convicted of a lesser offence. He was sentenced to 12 years, to be served with his three life terms for murder.

[edit] Paul Makucha

O'Shane was heavily criticised for her treatment in 2004 of Paul Makucha, a businessman sued for non-payment of a surveyor's invoice. Representing himself, Makucha sought to have O'Shane removed from the case, claiming, on the basis of her comments towards him, she was biased. O'Shane pressed on with the trial, and after a heated argument with Makucha, found him in contempt. The magistrate had him detained and strip searched in the court's cells. O'Shane continued the case in Makucha's absence and found against him.

The Court of Appeal found O'Shane's actions to be "wholly inappropriate". Later, the Judicial Commission's Conduct Division, which has the power to refer errant judges to Parliament for dismissal, found in her favour. It was only the third time in its history that the Commission had been asked to rule on a judge's conduct.

[edit] Rufus Richardson

In 2005, O'Shane dismissed charges against Rufus Richardson, accused of shouting "Youse are fucked" at police officers. O'Shane justified her decision on the grounds that she was "not sure that there is such a thing as community standards any more" and that swearing at police was "to be expected ... at that time of night."

[edit] Garry Rose

In 2006, O'Shane acquitted Garry Terrence Rose, a man accused of abusing and spitting on two transit officers at Redfern railway station, Sydney. Although Rose was caught on closed-circuit television threatening the officers, O'Shane declined to convict him.

O'Shane has engendered the very public hostility of both police and politicians, and the feeling appears to be mutual. In 2001, O'Shane alleged that the New South Wales Police Force "waged a very long campaign against me ... They didn't want me there because of my ideology and my philosophies."

In 2007, Watkins complained to the Judicial Commission about O'Shane, a process that could see the magistrate brought before parliament - and perhaps sacked from her $210,000-a-year job. The minister cited O'Shane's conduct in the Kanaan, Richardson and Rose matters as evidence of bias against law enforcement officials.

[edit] Indigenous politics

O'Shane is a vocal contributor to debates on issues affecting Aboriginal Australians. In 2001, she claimed that Charles Perkins, a respected Aboriginal rights activist who had died the year before, "was promoted beyond his capabilities" and "achieved nothing like what I achieved in five short years with the state government in New South Wales."

She also attacked Noel Pearson, an activist respected on both sides of politics. "His entire outlook on life is in fact white Anglo-Australian," O'Shane has claimed. "He's very clever with the words ... But in my opinion it has no substance."

O'Shane has been a vocal defender of former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission chairman Geoff Clark, who has faced numerous allegations of sexual assault.

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Preceded by
Rob Robertson-Cuninghame		 Chancellor of the University of New England
1994-2003		 Succeeded by
John Cassidy