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8 May 2013 Michael Mcguire, Penelope Debelle Reported in the Advertiser “Fearless and Flawed - the Remarkable Life of Paul Rofe”

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8 May 2013 Michael Mcguire, Penelope Debelle Reported in the Advertiser “Fearless and Flawed - the Remarkable Life of Paul Rofe” Networked Knowledge Media Report Networked Knowledge Prosecution Reports: http://netk.net.au/ProsecutionsHome.asp On 8 May 2013 Michael McGuire, Penelope Debelle reported in The Advertiser “Fearless and flawed - the remarkable life of Paul Rofe”. Right to the end, Paul Rofe was pursuing his great love of the law. Barrister Nick Niarchos, with whom he set up Elliot Johnson chambers in the city, said Mr Rofe was preparing for a trial next week when he died of heart failure on Tuesday. "You could say he died with his boots on," Mr Niarchos said. "He was going to trial next week with a defence brief. We are grateful for the peaceful way he went." It was a peaceful end to an often turbulent life. Mr Rofe was appointed SA's first Director of Public Prosecutions in 1992. It was created to be an independent office, free of government interference, and Mr Rofe delighted in the scope it gave him not only to pursue criminals but also to offer opinions on subjects beyond his brief. He courted controversy with his views on free heroin trials for addicts, decriminalising cannabis and that some paedophiles should not be jailed but publicly shamed through measures such as special markers on their cars. Mr Rofe had his own brush with the law in 1996 when he was fined $1000 and banned from driving for 15 months after recording a blood alcohol level of 0.178 after a day at Mt Lofty Golf Club. In 2003, he admitted to a gambling problem after a TV crew filmed him visiting the TAB 10 times in one day. It prompted him to promise then Attorney-General Michael Atkinson that would stop visiting the TAB during work hours. He was also a hardcore smoker. It caused a stroke in 1999 and he was diagnosed with lung cancer. Mr Rofe was in remission, but continued to smoke until the end. But amid the human foibles, there was a sharp and penetrating legal mind. His ability to read and absorb a brief was well known in Adelaide's law circles and his mental powers stayed with him to the end. "He had a very acute mind - he could read something once and write you an opinion without requiring one single alteration or change of grammar or anything else, right off the top of his head," Mr Niarchos said. "It was a very rare gift he had." But if the law was his last love, it was not his first. After leaving St Ignatius College, also the alma mater of current DPP Adam Kimber, he studied medicine for a year but dropped out and jumped into the law. Mr Rofe was also a fearsome competitor on the football field. He played more than 200 games for Adelaide University as a tough centre half-forward and was named captain of the All Australian amateur team in 1974. When his playing days ended he served as the SANFL tribunal commissioner and on the Crows board. In an interview in 1999, shortly after he'd been reappointed DPP for a second seven-year term by Premier John Olsen, he spoke about the philosophy he brought to the job. "`You can sound all pretentious about this," he said. "But, at the end of the day, it's about justice, about what is right and wrong." That sense of justice was evident in his devastation at being forced to drop the case against Richard Kelvin's murderer Bevan Spencer von Einem for the killings of Alan Barnes and Mark Langley. It followed 14 months of legal argument. It was also evident in the long-running prosecution of the 1994 murder of Anna Jane Cheney by Henry Keogh, which involved two trials and numerous appeals. But within the legal community, Mr Rofe was renowned as a prosecutor who wouldn't push a case too far. Retired Northern Territory Chief Justice Brian Martin said Mr Rofe was not without his flaws, and had been badly treated at times in the media, but was good at his job. "It's obvious, from my experience and the experience of others when he became DPP, that he was a very fair prosecutor who looked after his staff exceptionally well." It meant Mr Rofe was also willing to take the tough decisions even if they were unpopular. He said one of his toughest moments in the job was dropping murder charges against accused NCA bomber Domenic Perre, who was alleged to have killed federal police officer Geoffrey Bowen by sending him a bomb in the post. But it was another contentious decision that was to end his career. Mr Rofe helped negotiate a plea bargain with the lawyers of Paul Habib Nemer, who shot newspaper delivery man Geoffrey Williams through the eye. Nemer received a suspended jail term and a $100 good behaviour bond. The leniency of the sentence provoked outrage in the community and a furious Premier Mike Rann demanded that Mr Rofe appeal against the sentence. Mr Rofe tried to ride out the storm and said he wouldn't bow to political pressure but the government forced his hand and an appeal was lodged. Nemer was subsequently sentenced to four years and nine months in jail. Adding to his humiliation, a report by then Solicitor- General Chris Kourakis, now Chief Justice, found Mr Rofe's handling of the Nemer case was "inept". Mr Rofe, who never married or had children, is survived by lifelong friend Susan Biggs, two sisters and a brother. .
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