ANDREW JOHN FRASER
Allegation / charges
Struck Off the Roll of Practitioners
Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision
A Western Australian practitioner was convicted in the County Court of Victoria on his plea of guilty of being knowingly concerned in the importation of a commercial quantity of cocaine, trafficking in cocaine, and possession of ecstasy, and was sentenced to a total of 7 years imprisonment (5 year non-parole). The Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal found him guilty of illegal conduct and reported to the Full Court recommending he be struck off. The Full Court held he was no longer a fit and proper person to remain in the profession and ordered his name struck from the roll, with no order for costs by consent. No express finding of dishonesty was made by the tribunal/court, though the sentencing judge described his behaviour as dishonourable.
Duties found breached:
Aggravating factors:
- Status as a solicitor placed him in special relationship with the law and bound by oath to uphold it
- Offences intimately related to his legal practice - offered legal/quasi-legal advice to forward the importation
- Repeated and persistent trafficking over a lengthy period
- Public scandal reflecting on the profession as a whole
- Large commercial quantity of cocaine (3.7 kg, valued $1.35m-$2.7m)
Mitigating factors:
- Pleaded guilty to the offences
- Admitted the allegations before the Tribunal
- Role in the scheme was useful rather than essential; importation probably would have occurred without his participation