Strike-off recommended for lawyer who drunkenly bribed cops

When the officers said no, Winning folded up the bank notes and held them out to them “for some time”. Later, as he was being removed from the car, Winning tried again by asking if they “wanna lazy quid”.

Although he pleaded guilty to the drunk driving charge, Winning maintained all he did was make a “drunken, facetious, mischievous joke” and, in any event, was so intoxicated that he could not have formed any corrupt intent. He was found guilty in October 2020.

With assistance from two panel members, Justice Martin Burns of the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal said the conduct justified “a finding of professional misconduct along with an order removing the respondent’s name from the local roll”.

“It is conduct which bespeaks not only a lack of trustworthiness and integrity but a preparedness to flout the law. The character of the respondent is so ‘indelibly marked’ by this conduct that he cannot be regarded as a fit and proper person to be on the roll,” he added.

Given Winning did not engage with the disciplinary process beyond sending emails that indicated he agreed with the orders sought by the Legal Services Commissioner, there was no evidence before the tribunal to “suggest otherwise”, Justice Burns said.

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Winning was also found to have engaged in professional misconduct by advancing a case at a rape trial that did not reflect, and was not based on, the facts instructed by his client. This included his cross-examination of the complainant and his closing address to the jury.

In later quashing the client’s guilty finding, the Court of Appeal said it was “telling” that Winning’s evidence about his conduct “involved a coalescence of problems and implausibility of the very kind likely to be present if [the client’s] complaint is true”.

Winning’s account of the client’s “significant shift” in instructions was also found to “not withstand scrutiny and should be rejected”.

On this charge, Justice Burns said such a “serious and consequential” departure from standards of competence and diligence required of a lawyer “can never be tolerated”.

“The respondent ignored his instructions and, instead, developed a case before the jury which actively misrepresented his client’s position. It deprived his client of a trial according to law. It also undermined the administration of criminal justice,” he said.

On the third and final charge, Winning was found to have engaged in unsatisfactory professional conduct for sending an email intended for the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions that “used discourteous, offensive and insulting language”.

In the email, Winning wrote it was “impossible to deal with you” and suggested they “trump up another bullshit charge against me”.

Although intended for the prosecutor’s office, the email was actually sent to the associate for the justice presiding over their case, who remarked in court that it was “not courteous correspondence”.

Winning has already been disciplined on two earlier occasions for similar misconduct, including for profanity-laden statements in open court where he accused the prosecutor of dishonesty.

While the third charge was at the “lower level of gravity”, Justice Burns said there was no doubt the email was well beyond courtesy.

“There is simply no place for communications of that kind in the practice of the law,” Justice Burns said.

“It almost goes without saying that composing and then sending this email fell short of the standard of competence and diligence that a member of the public is entitled to expect of a reasonably competent Australian legal practitioner.”

The case: Legal Services Commissioner v Winning [2025] QCAT 198