Wrongful Convictions Report

Speaking to a crowded room of invited guests in the middle of Sydney’s legal precinct, former Chamberlain lawyer Stuart Tipple said it’s a book that should be written, adding,  “… the problem with our adversarial system is that it is not a system that pursues the truth”.  Continue reading →

Photos from the May 8, 2025 launch of FRAMED at State Chambers, Martin Place. All photos by David Miller. Continue reading →

Stuart Tipple, the lawyer who represented Lindy Chamberlain, will officially launch Andrew L. Urban’s latest book, FRAMED – how the legal system framed Robert Xie for the Lin family murders, on Thursday May 8, 2025. Margaret Cunneen SC will be the special guest at the event.

Tipple has been there done that; Lindy Chamberlain was convicted of her baby’s murder but ultimately – years later – exonerated and compensated for that wrongful conviction. The system has not changed; it is as prone to error as ever, notably in the field of forensic evidence.

The launch will be held from 6pm – 7.30; refreshments will be served.

RSVP TO: andrew.urban@wrongfulconvictionsreport.org

The first five readers to accept this invitation for you & a guest will be provided with details of the venue in the Sydney CBD.

Some first readers of Andrew L. Urban’s new book, FRAMED – how the legal system framed Robert Xie for the Lin family murders, share their responses.

“After several years of research, Andrew Urban’s new book, Framed, is a thorough examination of the terrible, brutal murders of the Lin family in 2009 that shocked Sydney, as brought to trial – four times. The book contains information of which very few ordinary Australians are likely to be aware.

Crucially, Urban argues that a jury acting rationally ought to have entertained reasonable doubt about the guilt of the accused – Robert Xie. He dissects the way the prosecution tried to negate his alibi, which was supported under oath by his wife, Kathy. If he’s right, this is an extraordinary failure of the justice system. Read it and judge for yourself.”
Margaret Cunneen SC
Barrister at Law

“I have finished reading the book. As I have found with all Urban’s writings, very easy to read. I had always questioned whether one person could have carried out the crime. Now I am even more convinced there must have been more than one person, and there was no person known who could have possibly helped Xie. As you have pointed out there are many more questions to be resolved (eg the secret phone).

“As the wife of wrongfully convicted Noel Greenaway, I am well aware of how the legal system can go off the rails and do terrible damage to innocent people.”
Rowena Greenaway
 

After the Chamberlain Royal Commission, exoneration and compensation most commentators opined, “Well the system got it right in the end.” In fact, the system completely failed and continues to fail. The Chamberlains were fortunate to have people who kept asking the right questions. This is a luxury afforded to very few.

Our adversarial system is not designed to find the truth. The truth is better found in the Royal Commission Inquiry model. Without people having the courage and determination to examine and question the system, miscarriages will never be corrected.

The eminent English jurist, John Macdonell observed, “There is no accepted test of civilisation. It is not wealth or the degree of comfort or the average duration of life or the increase of knowledge. All such tests would be disputed. In default of any other measure, may it not be suggested that as good a measure as any is the degree to which men are sensitive to wrongdoing and desirous to right it.”

This book examines the trials and conviction of Robert Xie. After four trials there are many unanswered questions.

I applaud the author for asking the questions that need to be answered.
Stuart Tipple
Lawyer

Clearly the onus of proof has been reversed in this case and speculation has been presented as if it were ‘evidence’ which is clearly an affront to human dignity as much as it is to a properly ordered legal system.

The fourth and final trial was clearly farcical in terms of any possibility of a rational assessment of the ‘evidence’ – months of technical scientific evidence with weeks of legal submissions which even a trained lawyer would find hard to follow must have made the task as impossible for the legal participants as it was for the jury and the accused. But after having gone to all that expense and trouble there had to be a verdict, and the outcome in this case is as offensive to justice as it is to rationality. Nothing short of a Royal Commission will get this badly damaged ship back on course.
Dr Bob Moles
Flinders University
Adjunct Associate Professor
College of Business, Government and Law
Flinders University of South Australia

This insightful book raises many important questions in relation to forensic evidence, the treatment of key witnesses by those in authority, and the use of prison informants. Urban reveals startling information about factors and forces external to the family which were relevant to the case. The book is a sad and shocking exposé of miscarriage of justice in the criminal justice system.
Rosemary Eliott

More reviews (scroll down)

Andrew L. Urban

Robert Xie’s infamous convictions for the five murders of the Lin family in 2009 relied on the jury being convinced Beyond Reasonable Doubt of his guilt. But not even the prosecution or the trial judge were so convinced, new book + shows.

In the ignominious history of the case of Robert Xie, there are many flaws in the Crown case, but none so egregious as the attempt to negate his alibi: in bed by his wife’s side, as she confirmed to police and under oath.

Her Honour Elizabeth Fullerton, the trial judge, in her sentencing remarks at first states that ‘Consistent with the verdicts of the jury,’ the Crown has disproved alibi, but then states – in apparent contradiction – that she is not satisfied Beyond Reasonable Doubt that Robert did sedate his wife. If Her Honour doubted the Crown’s sedation scenario, wasn’t she obligated to raise that matter with the jury?

If there is doubt about the sedation, and it is the only obstacle to the alibi, the alibi must stand. If the alibi stands, the guilty verdict must be quashed.

1     Crown accepts the accused could leave the bed unnoticed without sedating wife

T4968.35

CROWN PROSECUTOR SMITH: Your Honour, in relation to the character direction that your Honour handed down last week, The only issue that the Crown raises is that your Honour will be aware that the evidence of Brenda Lin is not relied upon only for the purposes of motive #, but also in terms of disproving the purported alibi by Kathy Lin.

HER HONOUR: Quite so. Yes. And I say in that direction, yes – I have unnecessarily, or wrongly limited the use of her evidence. The Crown submission is this is it Ms Crown, that if the jury were satisfied that the accused left his bed on repeated occasions between August 2009 and May 2011 to enter the children’s bedroom, with the intent of assaulting Brenda, then they would more comfortably be satisfied that the alibi is not made out on the evidence?

CROWN PROSECUTOR SMITH: They (jury) could use it as another piece of evidence that the Crown relies upon for disproving the alibi in terms of Mrs Lin not being aware that that was occurring.

2     But Her Honour not satisfied BRD about sedation

Sentencing remarks

Par 28 Consistent with the verdicts of the jury, the Crown disproved the alibi relied upon by the offender at his trial to the criminal standard.

Par 31 The jury were directed that they were entitled to have regard to all of the evidence led at trial when considering whether the Crown had negatived alibi Beyond Reasonable Doubt. While I consider it very likely that the offender sedated his wife, I am unable to be satisfied of that fact beyond reasonable doubt. There remains, in my view, a possibility that Kathy Lin simply did not wake when the offender left the house sometime after 2am on 18 July 2009, returning later that morning. In coming to that view, I have taken into account Kathy Lin’s evidence that she had never woken to find the offender not beside her in bed and would always wake if he left the bed for any reason. Since I accept Ms AB’s evidence that the offender entered the bedroom she shared with the offender’s son and sexually assaulted her on repeated occasions between August 2009, when she became a member of the offender’s household, and when he was arrested in May 2011, Kathy Lin’s evidence that she would always wake if the offender left the bed, and that he had never done so and gone into Ms AB’s bedroom at night, cannot be accepted as reliable.

Comment: Even so, if Kathy Lin’s evidence is regarded as unreliable, despite the failure of the sedation allegation, it follows that it may or may not be true…hence it cannot support negation of alibi beyond reasonable doubt.

It is clear that the failure to negate sedation mitigates against the guilty verdict, which thus represents a gross miscarriage of justice. The Crown case in this extraordinary multiple murder of close family members by the accused is based on flimsy (& contradictory) snitch evidence, speculation about sedation, speculation about an imaginary weapon and a motive that defies reason.

“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence…” Carl Sagan (1934 – 1996) – and, we could add, a jury acting rationally.

Because the appeal courts are not judges of the facts, their role must be to check the law and logic of the trial process. When proposition A and proposition B are combined, does that lead to conclusion C ? For the Appeal Court it is not a question of whether A,B and C are correct, it is only a question of whether the reasoning is correct. It is arguable that the Appeal Court failed.

# “purposes of motive” refers to the Crown’s assertion that Robert Xie brutally murdered his wife’s relations, including the two youngsters, to remove them as obstacles to his sexual abuse of their daughter, Brenda. This unsupported and preposterous proposition was taken seriously – even by the judge.

+ Andrew L. Urban’s new book, FRAMED – how the legal system framed Robert Xie for the Lin family murders is now available in kindle and paperback.