On Wednesday, the SA Court of Appeal listened to the Rangelea Holdings Pty Ltd lawyers say why they thought the judgement issued by the Chief Justice on 26 May 2023 was wrong. In particular the Directors of Rangelea Holdings Pty Ltd claimed it was wrong of the Chief Justice to appoint an Inspector to review how the Adnyamathanha Master Trust had been managed by Rangelea, including the Sub-Groups. The Rangelea directors also claimed other judgements made by the Chief Justice were wrong. The ATLA lawyers were then able to say why they thought the Chief Justice was correct and the orders made should be kept.
This hearing went on most of the day. It was difficult to listen to as it was lawyers talking about complex legal principals around things like trusts , beneficiaries and the powers of a registered native title body corporate.
There were three Justices hearing this appeal who will now consider what was said and decide if the judgement and orders made by the Chief Justice on 26 May 2023 were correct. This process could take up to another year before we will hear the outcome.
Rangelea’s appeal will further delay common law holders finding out how the royalty money has been managed by the directors of Rangelea. As at 31 August 2023 the SA Supreme Court was holding over $12 million dollars in royalty money.
The above hearing was live streamed and made available to all common law holders. Seventy-seven connections were made during the hearing with some connections having multiple people listening to and watching what was happening. I have had a lot of positive feedback on the live streaming. My thanks go out to the President of the Court of Appeal for allowing the live stream to be made available.
I will keep you informed of any news I receive from the Court.
Yours sincerely
Peter McQuoid