The Victorian Director of Public Prosecutions Jeremy Rapke QC resigned on Friday. The reason for his resignation was because he was caught out promoting Diana Karamicov, a 28-year-old female lawyer, whom he was having a sexual relationship with.

Now Mr Rapke is a 61-year-old married man who is in a position of great responsibility. For him to promote someone he was having an affair with not only is it extremely corrupt, but the affair alone would have left him wide open for blackmail. Apparently it was widely known in legal circles that he was having the affair.

I wonder if he was ever blackmailed? I am sure that many criminals he was prosecuting on behalf of the Victorian people would have tried to blackmail him if they had known.

The affair first came to light October last year when James Campbell ran his story in the Sunday Herald Sun exposing the affair. “If it is true, that Rapke has appointed his close personal friend to a senior statutory office as an Associate Crown Prosecutor, for which she was not the best qualified candidate, this is the most extraordinary act of corruption exposed about a senior figure in the Victorian justice system in living memory.”

The Government of the day led by Premier Robert Brumby and the Attorney General Robert Hulls refused to do anything. But they lost power in December last year and the new Premier Ted Baillieu and Attorney General Robert Clark appointed retired judge Frank Vincent to investigate the claims. The current government has been sitting on the report from Frank Vincent for the last 7 weeks and have refused to make it public, then Rapke resigned on Friday.

To bring you up to date with his resignation it is best covered by James Cameron himself in his latest story published today titled “‘Error of judgment’ sparks Jeremy Rapke demise” (Click here to read the full story)

The fact that Jeremy Rapke QC was having an affair with Diana Karamicov and promoted her is not the only allegation of corruption against Rapke. In a story titled “Police demand probe into Rapke claims” by Keith Moor of the Herald Sun on the 16th February this year it starts off:

“SEVERAL serving and retired police are challenging the Vincent inquiry’s refusal to probe their allegations against Director of Public Prosecutions Jeremy Rapke, QC.”

It goes on to say: ” It accused the head of the inquiry, former Supreme Court judge Frank Vincent, QC, of improperly constraining his inquiry by wrongly narrowing its terms of reference. Mr Rapke last week denied any involvement in any of the allegations raised by the officers.”

“The retired and serving officers yesterday claimed Mr Vincent’s decision not to investigate their claims was “contrary to the common law”.”

“Our submission falls well within the terms of reference as specified by the Attorney-General and there is an obligation for it to be accepted,” their latest submission said.

The Herald Sun last week revealed the Vincent inquiry had received several separate submissions from retired and serving police. Each of the submissions contained new allegations against Mr Rapke and the Office of Public Prosecutions.” (Click here to read the full story)

There is a saying that you should not have an inquiry unless you already know the outcome. Obviously the previous Government did not want to know about the corruption at the Director of Public Prosecutions office and refused to do anything. What has become clear by the current Governments failure to release the Vincent report and by Vincent to fully investigate all claims of corruption about Rapke is that the current Government are also trying to conceal the corruption going on at the Director of Public Prosecutions office as well.

So much for Victoria getting rid of corruption when Premier Brumby lost Government last December. Based on the above there seems to have only been a batten change. And now Premier Baillieu has got the batten in hand is running like hell.