THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD THURSDAY, NIARCH 29. 2OTB l*s Nerrs JUSTICE Time served, with good behaviour : sentenceinhercareer, on i notoriousSydneyunderworld i flgure and convictedkillerArthur Michaela i "Neddy" Smith-dubbeda Whitbourn i Supreme Court "frequent flyer"by : NSWBarAssociationpresident r ArthurMoses, SC. Justice Carolyn Simpson, : A former president of the volunteer fl refl ghter, former i Council for Civil Liberties and English teacher and one-time i NSW Society of Labour Lawyers, aspiring j ournalist, credits her i Simpsonbeganherbarristerial long career in the law to a series of i career in 1976 and was appointed "strokes ofgood luck". : silkin 1989. That is not how herjudicial Carolyn Simpson, in 1994, before r It followed an unhappy stint as a colleagues see it. At her farewell her rise to be on Australia's first : schoolteacher, and she left after ceremonythisweek, NSW Chief all-female bench (above). Photos: i flve years with a "burning ambition Justice Tom Bathurst hadjust Brendan Esposito, Kate Callas i tobeajournalist". "one complaipt": Simpson was I "Butnobodywouldemployme "far too humble". contemplating a career in the legal i as a journalist, although I did come Today, Simpson will retire from profession, perhaps with judicial , second in an interview with the late the Supreme Court after 24 years, ambition: don'tbe daunted. The i Donald Horne, editor of the now- including almost three years on the obstacles are there: your challenge i defunct Bulletin fmagazinel," NSW Court of Appeal. is to surmount them. To adopt and i Justice Simpson said. She was the second woman adapt the message of the former i "Although it did not seem so at appointed to the court in its president ofthe United States: : the time, failingto secure 194-year history and boasts the nowl amtobe released, although "In a chance conversation in the Yes, you can." ' i employment in the world of distinction ofbeing its Iongest- not without supervision," she said. lift last week, with Justice In ajudicial career spanning a i journalismwas my flrst stroke of servingfemale judge. NSW Law Society president IJacqueline] Gleeson, I learned quarter ofa century, Simpson i Iuck." The quick-witted Simpson, who Doug Humphreys said Simpson that, in her four years ofthe presided over a series ofhigh- i In a farewell speech that was at was born in the central western was called to the bar at a time when Federal Court, two per cent - two profile cases and made history in i turns wry and rousing, Simpson NSW town of Forbes, quipped on "it was hard for women to survive per cent - of the silks who had 1999 when she sat on the first all- i described the joy of "producing a Tuesday that she had, in the in the law" but she "did not just appeared before her were women. female appeal bench in Australia i judgment - still warm from the language of criminal sentencing survive; Ishe] thrived". This is 2018!" she said. with Justices Margaret Beazley, r printer, to be savoured like freshly laws, been given "a minimum term But Simpson said there The figures were "bad", now President ofthe Court of i bakedbread". of12 years and an additional term remained "real hurdles for women Simpson said, but she was Appeal, andVirginia Bell, now a I "Sheer bliss - at least until it [is ofanother 12 years". aspiring to be successful optimistic. High Courtjudge. i appealedl . when it might turn "I have never sought parole, and barristers". "To those youngwomen Simpson imposed just one life i intochookfood.".