LawMaster has been labeled a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner

The development of LawMaster started in 1988 as a product of the partnership of David Toohey and Jim Henderson. Since then LawMaster has achieved the highest level of competency from Microsoft being labeled a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner. Having received this title, it meant that LawMaster had gained the knowledge, skills and commitment to implement technology solutions to match the exact needs of the client. At this level, LawMaster has access to the resources and support in which they need to stand out in the marketplace. LawMaster places a great emphasis on their continual Research and Development, this has allowed the company to expand their market share, servicing firms from as little as sole practitioners to large firms employing up to 300 people. As LawMaster has been labeled a Gold Partner, this has entitled the company to reap the benefits that Microsoft has to offer for example free access to their Partner Learning Centre, Partner Training and Readiness Resource Centre, Online Tutorials, Virtual Labs and so on. If you would like to learn more about LawMaster and the solutions they offer visit www.lawmaster.com.au or contact our office on 1300 135 214.

ACT – A Total Rewrite of the Liquor Licensing Laws

Attorney General of the ACT Simon Corbell has publicised his intentions of a total rewrite of the ACT’s liquor licensing laws. The focus will revolve around the improvement of public safety within the entertainment precincts of Canberra.

The new laws include making it an offence to:

• Supply alcohol to an intoxicated person by patrons and employees on licensed premises;

• Abusing, threatening or intimidating an employee for refusing service of alcohol; and,

• Offering alcohol promotions which encourage rapid consumption of alcohol.

 Key elements of the reform package include:

• Risk based licensing fees based on opening hours with premises trading past midnight until 2am or 4am to pay a higher level of fees commensurate with the risks they pose to public safety;

• Dedicated ACT Policing liquor licensing teams and other regulatory activities funded from the new fee structure;

• The provision for lockouts at licensed premises if required in the future;

• The introduction of mandatory responsible service of alcohol training for all staff and security guards;

• A requirement on licensees to provide, contribute towards, or otherwise identify transport options for patrons to get home safely after early morning trading;

• New police powers including the power to impose an emergency 24 hour suspension of trade on the spot;

• Public notification of liquor licensing applications with provision for members of the community to comment on prospective liquor licences;

• New powers for the Commissioner for Fair Trading to impose and vary conditions on a licence at any time to protect the interests of the community; and

• New powers for the Commissioner for Fair Trading to refuse a licence application if it is not in the interests of the broader community, aimed at preventing the over representation of licensed premises in a single location.

 The Government will release an exposure draft of the new Liquor Act early next year for public comment. The proposed amendments will then be considered by the Legislative Assembly in mid 2010.

Sex-crime Teacher Escapes Prison Sentence in Sydney

A former Knox Grammar teacher who pleaded guilty to child sex charges has walked free from a Sydney court.

Damien Vance, 55, was given a two-year good behaviour bond in Hornsby Local Court on Wednesday for sexual assault by inciting an indecent act.

Between February and October 1988, Vance, who was teaching at the private school, incited a 14-year-old boy to an act of mutual masturbation.

He was arrested in April this year at his home in Melbourne.

In sentencing Vance, Magistrate Leslie Brennan said the offence was at the lower end of the scale but not at the bottom.

He agreed with Vance’s solicitor Bruce Williams that Vance had shown no signs of problem behaviour since the incident.

The significant time that had passed since the offence had no bearing on the sentence, he said.

“Some 21 years later the matter has resurfaced,” Mr Brennan told the court.

“It was probably always on the mind of the young boy.”

Vance’s name has been added to the Child Protection Register, which Mr Brennan said would effectively end his teaching career.

Vance is one of five former Knox Grammar school teachers who have been charged with sexual assault offences at the school in the 1970s and 1980s.

ACCC forcing Smoking addiction therapists to provide evidence on Success Rates

Warnings have been made by Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) acting chairman, Peter Kell, to those who are wishing to quit smoking, be provided with the accurate information from the people selling these services.

ACCC examinations have exposed that some hypnotherapists and laser clinics are making unofficial and deceptive claims about the success rate of their smoking addiction treatments.

“Hypnotherapists Angelo and Susan Sette, trading as Stop Smoking in One Hour, admitted they could not substantiate advertised claims that 100 per cent of smokers successfully give up after attending a maximum of four treatment sessions,” Mr Kell said.

Hypnotherapists will now publish counteractive notices and are not allowed to engage in similar conduct in the future, this is part of court-enforable undertakings provided to the ACCC.

“A number of ‘stop smoking’ laser therapy clinics around the country have also amended their advertising after the ACCC raised concerns regarding claims about the success of laser technology,” Mr Kell said.

Mr Kell said treatment providers must not mislead consumers by making claims that cannot be backed up with evidence.

Dust Storm smothers NSW & Southern Queensland

Recent DUST storm that suffocated NSW and Southern Queensland increased air pollution levels to 1,500 times their normal levels – the highest on record.

Towns across far west NSW were yesterday hit with strong winds and low visibility, and dust swept up from those areas crossed through the state, blanketing Sydney from early today.

Principal Research Scientist with the NSW Department of Climate Change and Water, Dr John Leys, states that dust storms are common in rural areas.

Dr Leys said “Dust storms like this occur quite regularly but they rarely travel this far east and come through Sydney”.

He said preliminary estimates illustrated the dust plume stretched 600km along the NSW coast from Sydney to the Queensland border this morning, dumping up to 75,000 tonnes of dust per hour into the Tasman Sea.
“It’s travelled about 1500km to get to Sydney,” Dr Leys said.

Chris Eiser, Manager of Atmospheric Science at the Department, said measurements taken in Sydney today demonstrate the highest level of particle concentration on record to this day.

“An average day would see around 10 micrograms of particles per cubic metre of air and a bushfire might generate 500 micrograms” said Chris Eiser. Levels today soared to 15,400 micrograms per cubic metre of air at one location.

“During a dust storm, that’s when we get our highest levels historically and this is the highest we’ve measured in Sydney,” Mr Eiser said.

Sydney Barrister Under Bribery Investigation

A barrister in NSW has allegedlly accepted a payment of $12, 000 on the promise of making a police investigation disappear through bribes to the prosecutor.

On Monday, the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) inquiry into whether John Hart bribed a prosecutor, judge or magistrate to give favourable treatment to his clients began.

A former client of Hart, Jason Michael Kelly, told ICAC Hart approached him following his acquittal in a sexual assault trial in February and warned police would investigate further allegations, reported The Australian.

“Mr Hart said to me that (a NSW police detective) had told him I might have got off this time but she was going to get me on something and she was not going to stop until she did,” he said. “(Mr Hart) said, ‘You might survive this case, but there is no way you can go through this again … you won’t survive’.”

Hart allegedly said: “I can make this go away. I can make a payment to some people.”

Kelly paid $10,000 into Hart’s TAB account and gave him $2000 in cash to ensure the investigation would disappear. Recorded conversations between Hart and Kelly were played to the inquiry, including one from April .

Information from: Lawyer’s Weekly

Roberta claims Underbelly Star fired shots at her on Christmas Day!

After a jealous rage over another woman, a heavily pregnant Roberta was shot at several times by Gangland figure Carl Williams, she claims in her new book to be released later this month.

Roberta Williams, now ex-wife of the convicted killer, claims she was heavily pregnant with daughter Dhakota when the incident occurred on Christmas day in 2000.

The incident took place when she tracked her then husband down after he had left a family get together to be with another woman.

Roberta reveals in her tell-all book ‘My Life’, she eventually found him in a woman’s house and started screaming at him, to which he responded by pointing a .38 revolver in her direction, pulling the trigger.

“I saw him standing there with his gun in his hand, yelling at me to f— off, then he just lifted the gun and started shooting at me, firing off three or four shots - I can’t remember exactly how many … I mean, I was seven months pregnant so I couldn’t run anywhere even if I’d wanted to.”

Information from: Herald Sun http://is.gd/3meXh

The Importance of Business Intelligence to Your Companies Success

LawMaster’s Business Intelligence (BI) is a web based solution to deliver your company with the big picture in order to achieve success. BI aids in gathering, storing, analysing, and providing access to data to help enterprise users make better business decisions. It delivers a shared understanding of key data across the whole company assisting in monitoring and improving corporate performance.

With LawMaster’s BI installed you can find out how your company is doing, understand why and plan for the future instantly. BI is a common information system across the whole company, it takes data from your operations systems – such as Case & Matter Management, Document Management, Time Billing, Time Costing, Payroll, Sales etc – and provides an integrated view of that areas performance.

Key Benefits of BI include:

• Connects users to information efficiently and effectively

• Focus your organisation through a centralized information portal

• Proactively detect issues as well as opportunities before causing detriment to the company

• Provide a shared understanding of performance across the whole company.

• Reducing manual reports and processes with automation.

• Quicker, fact-based decision making.

• Reliable presentation of information, as it improves the data accuracy and minimizes errors.

• Alignment of an organisation around a consistent set of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and Metrics

To find out more information visit Lawmaster Legal Software

Shoplifter Caught Claiming to be the Wife of Gov. Sonny Perdue

When confronted by a clerk at a convenience store in Pooler, USA, a woman caught stealing fuel and a bag of Cheetos, claimed to be the wife of Gov. Sonny Perdue.

Shortly after noon on Friday the 11th September, the female suspect pumped a little over 15 gallons of gas, worth $37, into her white Ford Explorer at the Clyde’s Market near Pooler Parkway.

Police reported that the female suspect then entered the store, picked up a bag of Cheetos and offered a cheque as well as her debit card, however both modes of payment were declined.

The woman then told the clerk that she was the Governor’s wife and then she ‘started to whisper into her phone, stating she was talking to the FBI’, according to the incident report.

The woman then seized her purse as well as the Cheetos and escaped without paying for either the gas nor the chips valued at $1.29. Police are continuing their investigation into the incident.

Information from: http://www.savannahnow.com/

Investigation begins into the Balibo Five Murders

An investigation has commenced, by the Australian Federal Police, into the murders of five Aussie men back in 1975 in East Timor.
Sound recordist Tony Stewart, cameramen Brian Peters and Gary Cunningham and television journalists Malcolm Rennie and Greg Shackleton were allegedly assassinated by the Special Forces in Indonesia.
In November 2007, the Balibo Five were executed while attempting to capture information regarding the invasion of East Timor by Indonesian troops, NSW Deput Coroner Dorelle Pinch found. ‘The Balibo Five … were shot and or stabbed deliberately, and not in the heat of battle” in order to silence them from exposing Indonesia’s 1975 East Timor invasion’.This has now been referred to Robert McClelland, Attorney General.
The investigation begun in August 2009, by the Australian Federal Police. A brief of evidence can be collated depending on the amount of material found. The Australian Federal Police will then pass on their findings to the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions.