The appeal division of the Family Court has also recommended cost certificates for each case, an infrequent step which allows for the Commonwealth to pick up the tab for legal costs when a court gets it wrong.

Baptism order

The run of bad cases comes amid talk of Judge Vasta being considered for a promotion to the Family Court, where his salary would rise from $378,230 to $458,840 and he would be entitled to a judicial pension. He was appointed in 2015 by then attorney-general George Brandis after spending his entire legal career as a public prosecutor.

Since then he has been overturned on appeal at least 15 times. He has heard more than 1000 cases.

The most recent appeal judgments were delivered on February 21 – a week after the contempt case. The father in that case was on suicide watch for six days until he was released pending his appeal against a 12-month sentence for contempt of court over a supposed failure to produce documents for a property division matter.

In the baptism case – Lysons v Lysons – the court set aside Judge Vasta's order "that the child to be baptised as a Catholic if it is in the view of a priest that it is appropriate for the baptism to occur".

Neither party, nor the Independent Children's Lawyer, had sought such an order, which Judge Vasta said he was making so the child would be able to attend a Catholic school.

In a unanimous judgment, Justice Judy Ryan, Justice Murray Aldridge and Justice Garry Watts said there was no evidence that baptism was essential to attend the school or that the parents had even agreed to bring up the child as a Catholic.


'Attempt to bully'

"They were unaware that when his Honour was forming the view that 'it is very important for [X] to have an identity', and '[X] must understand why it was that he was called into this world', and that '[X] was born so that he could be educated in the Catholic tradition', that his Honour was minded to ensure that [X] obtained salvation by way of baptism," the judgment said.

They said a threat to jail one party for five years for not complying with his orders was also unacceptable: "The statement might be seen as hyperbole, deployed in an attempt to bully the appellant into complying with the orders."

They added that there were concerns such an order might contravene section 116 of the Constitution, which concerns freedom of religion.

In the second appeal – Navarro v Navarro – the court reversed parenting orders made by Judge Vasta and said he "forfeited the advantage of judicial detachment".

It accepted Judge Vasta had employed "argumentative behaviour, and pejorative and gratuitous comments" towards the appellant during cross-examination and also to his counsel. The court noted he did the same in a 2018 case that led to a successful appeal for procedural unfairness.

'Lost composure'

Judge Vasta also wrongly suggested that the father had committed offences in privately taping conversations – which is not even an offence in Queensland – and "stealing" his wife's computer.

"When regard is had to the volume and tone of voice of the trial judge in some instances within the audio extracts, it is apparent that not only detachment, but also composure, was lost," the court said.

The head of both the Family Court and the Federal Circuit Court, Chief Justice Will Alstergren, declined to comment on whether Judge Vasta would be counselled or referred for remedial judicial training.