The Commonwealth has dropped 42 charges against public-servant-turned-whistleblower Richard Boyle, with the case yet to go to trial before a jury.
Key points:
- The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions has reduced the charges against ATO whistleblower Richard Boyle from 66 to 24 offences
- Senator Rex Patrick said the CDPP was not acting in line with its model litigant obligations by initially lodging charges in a “scatter-gun approach”
- Mr Boyle’s revelations aired in a joint Fairfax-ABC Four Corners media investigation resulted in a number of positive changes
The charges were dropped days after a federal parliamentary report found the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) had conducted a “superficial” investigation into his public interest disclosure.
The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (CDPP) has reduced the charges against Mr Boyle from 66 to 24.
But if found guilty of each of the alleged offences — including using a listening device to “overhear, record, monitor or listen” to a private conversation, recording another person’s tax file number and disclosing protected information — Mr Boyle could still face a maximum sentence that means he spends the rest of his life in jail.
Mr Boyle is relying on the public interest disclosure in pleading not guilty to the alleged offences.
The Adelaide-based public servant worked at the ATO for years as a debt collector but turned whistleblower to reveal disturbing practices at the agency to a recent j