Judgment in the nickel of time

It is well known that the wheels of justice can move slowly. Even as we write, teams of lawyers are awaiting a Supreme Court judgment on the $2 billion-plus Bell Group case that dates back to the financial ructions of early last decade.

So maybe it should have come as little surprise on Friday when the Supreme Court published a judgment dating back to the nickel boom of the early 1970s and penned by an esteemed judge who died almost four years ago.

The State’s newest old judgment arises from a sharemarket scandal in 1971 that involved a nickel exploration company called Leopold Minerals and its director Brian Howard Cutler.

Leopold was suspended from stock exchange trading not long after publishing some bumper drilling results.

Amid reports by other Leopold directors that they could not substantiate the big hits, WA detectives arrested Cutler in Sydney in April 1971.

A Supreme Court jury convicted Cutler on the two false information charges in 1972. One charge was that he intended to deceive shareholders and the other was that the false information could inflate Leopold share price.

Justice Francis Burt sentenced Cutler to 3½ years jail on July 17, 1972, and also gave a judgment that the businessman should only be punished for one offence because his two convictions related to the same act. The judge ruled no conviction be recorded on the share price charge.

The esteemed judge’s ruling has been referred to over the years by other judges and lawyers dealing with crime and punishment.

When a dedicated legal type went down to the Supreme Court’s dungeons recently to find the original judgment, it was nowhere to be found in the official records.

Hence the formal publication on Friday of The Queen versus Brian Howard Cutler — 36 years, two months and nine days after being given by Justice Burt.

Justice Burt later became WA chief justice, a knight of the realm and the State’s Governor. Sir Francis died in October 2004.

It is not known what became of Cutler.