Police are alerting hundreds of accused sexual offenders that they are re-examining the work of a digital forensics officer based in Bendigo, sparking fears cases have been compromised.
The ABC understands police are auditing the work of the officer from June 2016 until August 2025.
The ABC understands the audit could affect more than 600 cases, including those allegedly involving child abuse and sexual offence material.
Victoria Police’s legal department has written to defence lawyers to tell them their cases are affected by the internal audit.
The ABC has obtained a letter that says the digital forensics officer worked at the Bendigo Multidisciplinary Centre Laboratory.
The ABC understands the officer is a public servant and not a sworn police officer.
A letter sent to a party of a legal proceeding says the forensics officer’s expertise involved “search, seizure and preservation of digital evidence”, primarily through examining devices involved in crimes.
“The devices relied upon will need to be re-extracted and analysed,” the letter, which has been obtained, says.
The letter also requested one court case be adjourned as a result of the audit.
The forensics officer worked in Bendigo. (ABC News: Kristofor Lawson)
‘Incredibly worrying’
One Bendigo-based defence lawyer, who has declined to be identified because he is representing three affected people, says the situation is highly concerning.
“A lot of cases involve children and people who have been sentenced to jail,” he said.
“Many defence lawyers in the region have been contacted,” he said.
“If the conduct of this person has affected cases that have been finalised, it’s incredibly worrying.
“It’s frustrating, too, for the victims, witnesses and accused person — particularly those in custody.
“We don’t know the nature of the review. It’s not been made clear.”
The ABC is not aware of the details of the allegations against the digital forensics officer.
Do you know more? Contact Emile Pavlich on email pavlich.emile@abc.net.au.
Adjournments cause ‘huge amounts of stress’
Bendigo defence lawyer Karin Temperley said the situation could have a “huge impact” on the Central Victorian court system.
“The courts are clogged and things are delayed as is, so this is going to blow dates out hugely.
“We all know the adage, justice delayed is justice denied, and this is a further iteration of that.
“It would be nice if there was a bit more transparency.
“We know someone has been stood down and it is causing delays, but we don’t know much more than that.”
Karin Temperley says adjournments are likely to cause “huge amounts of stress”. (Supplied: TeAK Legal & Consulting)
Ms Temperley said she was particularly concerned that some of the cases affected by the internal audit were related to child abuse matters.
“A year in the life of a young child is a huge amount of time. We know it affects memory and those kind of things, so to have to deal with that anxiety and stress is going to be damaging,” she said.
Ms Temperley said, for most of her clients, the adjournments were likely to cause “huge amounts of stress”.
“Given the changes to the bail laws, people are already being held in police stations for far longer than they should be,” she said.
“It will potentially compound the harms in that space.
“It will also cause … anxiety for victims in matters where they’ve been potentially waiting years for an outcome.”
Ms Temperley is now looking into appealing a case from earlier in the year in which her client was sentenced to five years’ jail.
“There was a question about the level of duplication across about 30–40 devices,” she said.
“We weren’t told by Victoria Police about why they couldn’t give us an answer about that, we were just told it would take months.
“The client was keen to get a result, so we finalised — but all of this has come out since.
“It’s hard to say how much it’s affected [the] sentence, so I’m in the process of getting a second opinion.”
Victoria Police, the Australian Federal Police and the Office of Public Prosecutions have been contacted for comment.