Male Escort Convictions No Bar To Bar Admission In Queensland

An interesting decision on admission from the Queensland Supreme Court holds that prior criminal matters as a male escort did not prevent pre-certification of an applicant’s character and fitness.

From the executive summary

KMB (‘the Appellant’) appealed the decision of the Legal Practitioners Admissions Board (Queensland) (‘the Board’) to refuse the Appellant’s application for early consideration of suitability for admission to the legal profession.

The Supreme Court of Queensland (‘the Court’) allowed the appeal, and declared that the Appellant’s prior offences did not adversely affect an assessment as to whether the Appellant was a fit and proper person for admission to the legal profession.

The Court made the following orders:

• appeal be allowed;
• the Board’s decision be set aside; and
• declaration be made that the matters contained in the Applicant’s application do not, without more, adversely affect an assessment as to whether the Appellant is a fit and proper person to be admitted to the legal profession

The conduct at issue

The Appellant, now 34 years old,  had disclosed in this application his prior convictions. These convictions were comprised of two counts of unlawful sodomy and two counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16.

At the time of the offences the Appellant was 24 years old and working as a male escort. On two occasions the Appellant engaged in various sexual acts with a 15 year old boy who had contacted the Appellant.

It was not challenged at trial that the Applicant believed the boy was 16 years of age, and that the Appellant had mistakenly believed this to be the legal age of consent in Queensland.

After his arrest and conviction the Appellant never worked as a male escort again.

Present fitness

The Court noted that:

• it is 10 years since the offences were committed;
• the Appellant did not engage in any further work as a male prostitute after he was charged;
• he completed two degrees in music at Griffith University and a degree in law at Queensland University of Technology with first class honours;
• he has worked extensively both on a paid and on a pro bono bases as a professional musician at a very high level; and
• he has worked as a paralegal at a large Brisbane solicitors’ firm and as an assistant to a practising barrister.

Expert B opined that the Appellant suffers no “major mental illness or psychological personality disorder” and “represents a negligible risk of any future sexual offending”.

The Court found that these facts were not challenged during cross-examination of the Appellant.

Thus, the Court found that the circumstances relating to the Appellant’s offences do not demonstrate such an “ongoing flaw in the Appellant’s character” that the Appellant could not be considered a fit and proper person to be admitted.

(Mike Frisch)