Acting Justice Lex Lasry AM

Justice Lex Lasry was admitted in Victoria in 1973 and joined the Victorian Bar.  His practice was in criminal law.  He conducted criminal trials and appeals for both prosecution and defence.  Apart from being a trial lawyer, Justice Lasry also served as junior counsel assisting the Costigan Royal Commission into the activities of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union, the NCSC enquiry into the failed Rothwells organisation (both in collaboration with Rex Wild KC, former NT Director of Public Prosecutions) and junior counsel in Inquests into the fatal shooting of eight “persons of interest” by Victoria Police.

In 1990 Justice Lasry was appointed Queen’s Counsel and until his appointment to the Supreme Court of Victoria in 2007,  in addition to his criminal practice, he conducted a Royal Commission into the Victorian Ambulance Service, represented Van Nguyen charged with drug trafficking in Singapore, represented (until 2007) Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, two the Bali 9, represented the Law Council of Australia as the independent observer at the trial of David Hicks at Guantanamo Bay Cuba, represented “Jihad” Jack Thomas in his terrorism trial, represented former police officer Peter Halloran in Sierra Leone, assisted the ACT Coroner in her enquiry into the 2003 Canberra bushfires and, for four years, was the Chair of the Victorian Criminal Bar Association.

As a judge of the Supreme Court of Victoria, Justice Lasry sat in the Criminal Division and upon his retirement in 2018 he had been the Principal Judge of that Division for four years.  Justice Lasry sat in numerous murder trials some of which were notorious. He also sat occasionally as an Acting Justice of Appeal.  After formal retirement in 2018 Justice Lasry continued as an Acting Justice of the Court until February 2024.