Queensland v Mr Stradford [2025] HCA 3
The High Court has held that immunity from civil suit ‘is the same for judges of all courts’ 13. After Judge Vasta in the Federal Circuit Court (FCC) jailed Mr S for contempt, Mr S sued for false imprisonment.
One issue was whether the FCC was ‘any court’ for Criminal Code purposes14 – ‘yes’. The Interpretation Act said that, subject to a contrary intention, reference to an ‘entity’ is to an entity ‘in and for Queensland’. The plurality (at [126]) held that a contrary intention could appear in any Act, and that it was to be identified ‘using both judge-made rules of construction and the rules of construction specified in statutes’15. It was just not made out in this case.
This principle is from Episode 118 of interpretation NOW!
Footnotes:
13 Wiping away the ancient distinction between superior & inferior courts.
14 s 249 of the Criminal Code (Qld) ‘execution of warrants’.
15 DRJ [2020] NSWCA 242 [115], cf Pearce [6.18], Mutton 79 ALR 509 (512).