A subsequent deal netted the Obeids around $30 million<\/a>, which has not been recovered by authorities.<\/p>\nToday, in a unanimous decision, the High Court dismissed their appeal against the convictions.<\/p>\n
That decision brings the case to an end.<\/p>\n
Charges of conspiracy![\"a](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/98f4df74364d915b8a0f92ba6a356f36.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Ian Macdonald was sentenced to nine years and six months over the conspiracy. (AAP: Joel Carrett\u00a0)<\/p>\n
The allegation was that the three conspired over the coal mine exploration licence in 2008 and 2009.<\/p>\n
They were all charged with conspiracy, and finally sentenced after the 2021 judge-alone trial.<\/p>\n
Macdonald was sentenced to nine years and six months, Eddie Obeid to seven years and Moses Obeid to five years.<\/p>\n
Both of the Obeids are now on parole or supervised release.<\/p>\n
Only Macdonald remains in jail.<\/p>\n
An appeal by the three was rejected, prompting the High Court case, where their lawyers questioned whether there was evidence to support an agreement capable of amounting to the conspiracy.<\/p>\n
The court heard there was no evidence about what was actually agreed.<\/p>\n
But the prosecution told the High Court all the legal elements required had been met in the Crown case, to support the charge of conspiracy.<\/p>\n
The charges had their origin in an explosive investigation by the NSW corruption watchdog, the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC).<\/p>\n
![\"a](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/cd05dd3f64f0013abc25bdf6121e314c.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Former NSW Labor minister Eddie Obeid was jailed for his role in the conspiracy. (AAP: Bianca De Marchi)<\/p>\n
In 2013, the three were taken to ICAC, where the allegations about a deal were examined.<\/p>\n
In the end, they were charged with conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office.<\/p>\n
The first trial took a year, overseen by NSW judge Elizabeth Fullerton.<\/p>\n
The judge found Macdonald committed five acts of misconduct in setting up and granting the licence.<\/p>\n
Justice Fullerton said Moses Obeid had had a “hands-on approach” and exploited Macdonald’s misconduct, and that Eddie Obeid knew about it.<\/p>\n
Millions in profit not recovered![\"two](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/20c81404d0de69d5e394c142283fc43d.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Eddie Obeid’s son Moses, right, was jailed for the conspiracy. (AAP: Bianca\u00a0De Marchi)<\/p>\n
At the time of the alleged conspiracy, exploration for minerals in NSW could only be conducted with the approval of the minister, who was then Ian Macdonald.<\/p>\n
In 2008, the Obeids owned a property known as Cherrydale in the Bylong Valley, which was partly within what later became the Mt Penny coal release area.<\/p>\n
The family took steps to acquire nearby properties and formed a joint venture with a company known as Monaro Mining.<\/p>\n
When Monaro withdrew, the Obeid family partnered with Cascade Coal, which later secured the mining lease and bought out the Obeid interests after media reports about Obeid involvement.<\/p>\n
It later emerged authorities had not been able to recover any of the $30 million the Obeids were said to have made from the deal.<\/p>\n
The High Court found the Crown had made out the case for a conspiracy.<\/p>\n
The court said the alleged agreement contemplated acts to be done by Macdonald, which would result in the “offence of misconduct in public office”.<\/p>\n
The court said that was still the case even though it was not known exactly what Macdonald would do to bring about the object of the plan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The High Court has thrown out an appeal by former New South Wales Labor ministers Ian MacDonald and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2666,64,63,2667,19165,235374,1108,235371,308,31861,235373,1788,44068,2668,235375,52893,235372,44],"class_list":["post-456982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-act","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-canberra","tag-coal","tag-corrupt","tag-court","tag-eddie-obeid","tag-exploration","tag-high-court","tag-ian-macdonald","tag-labor","tag-licence","tag-local-stories","tag-ministers","tag-misconduct","tag-moses-obeid","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}