The life and times of Salim Mehajer

The life and times of Salim Mehajer

SALIM Mehajer has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which his lawyer said has made him delusional and could explain his extravagant wedding and claims of luxury assets.

The former councillor looked tanned and muscular as he appeared via video from jail in the NSW Supreme Court.

Mehajer, whose father Mohamed was in the court, is applying for bail to appeal a conviction on electoral fraud.

His defence counsel Michael Finnane, QC, told Justice David Davies that Mehajer had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder but it was uncertain how far the illness went back.

“This man has a diagnosable mental illness,” Mr Finnane said.

“He needs to have it treated.

“There is no indication how far back this mental illness commenced.

“It can start as a teenager, it can start later in life.”

Mr Finnane said Mehajer was delusional and his extravagant wedding and claims of luxury assets could be part of that bipolar delusion.

He told the NSW Supreme Court that claims by Mehajer to have personal assets, jewellery and paintings worth $1.725m might be a delusion.

“My client first came to notice by a wedding of some extravagance,” Mr Finnane said. “That is consistent with this type of disorder.”

Crown prosecutor Jennifer Single told the court that a psychiatrist’s report indicated “a hypermanic phase” of bipolar disorder around the time of Mehajer’s 2015 wedding.

But Ms Single said that there was no evidence that the disorder was “causal at the time of offending”.

Mehajer, who spent most of the court hearing writing in a notebook inside the Cooma prison video book, at one point stood up and tried to interrupt proceedings.

“May I interrupt?” Mehajer asked twice, to which Justice Davies twice said “No”.

Justice Davies heard crown evidence about a bail application by Mehajer, and an alleged appeal for Legal Aid funding for his legal representation and appeal.

Mehajer is planning to appeal some of his convictions of electoral fraud.

An appeal hearing about Mehajer’s non-eligibility for Legal Aid was due to be heard tonight, it was alleged in court.

The court heard that Mehajer was stripped of his assets after being made bankrupt.

“He has no property of his own any more,” Mr Finnane said.

Mr Finnane presented a letter from a GP, who is Salim Mehajer’s brother in law. But another doctor, a forensic psychiatrist, had diagnosed Mehajer with bipolar disorder.

Mr Finnane said that Mr Mehajer took responsibility for some matters he had been charged with, but he also did not accept responsibility for a large number of the charges.

“He actually has not been convicted of very much at all … and some of it traffic matters,” Mr Finnane said.

Mehajer has spent the last five months in Cooma Correctional Centre, the former 19th century mental institution and current prison where Roxy Jacenko’s husband Oliver Curtis served his year-long sentence for insider trading.

The incarcerated property developer is currently in the jail typically used to house crooked police, paedophiles, and high-profile inmates who require protection from other inmates.

Mehajer has been serving a minimum 11-month sentence for election fraud.

The former Auburn deputy mayor was jailed in June.

Mr Finnane said Mehajer was a bankrupt, but intended to apply to have his bankruptcy annulled.

Mehajer also “owes a large sum of money to the Commissioner of Taxation which he intends to challenge”.

Mr Finnane said Mehajer was not a flight risk overseas because “his life is here”.

Justice Davies reserved his decision on whether to grant Mehajer bail until next week on a date yet to be fixed.

Asked outside the court if he was concerned about his son, Mohamed Mehajer said “I have no comment to make”.

Mehajer has continually played up behind bars, wilfully breaching jail rules, assaulting a prison officer and receiving the highest penalty possible by a prison governor.

His bail hearing heard the former property developer had continually been confined to his cell, denied access to television, phone calls, contact visits and “buy-ups” of items such as chocolate, biscuits and toiletries.

Ms Single said when Mehajer assaulted a prison guard on September 7, he was given 56 days off privileges.

He had also been punished for refuse or fail drug test, fail to comply with prison routine, and unlawful use of a phone or fax.

Justice Davies said Mehajer’s breaches of prison rules while incarcerated were concerning because they showed Mehajer did “not comply with rules and regulations”.

Mr Finnane argued however that first time inmates often breached prison rules.

Earlier this year, Mehajer pleaded guilty to assault occasioning actual bodily harm and destroying the iPhone 7 of a woman who filmed him outside Sydney’s Star casino.

In April last year, Mehajer threw an EFTPOS machine at taxi driver Nazir Syed, injuring his nose.

He was given a good behaviour bond and ordered to undergo anger management counselling.

Mehajer is due to appeal his conviction for assault occasioning actual bodily harm against Channel 7 journalist Laura Banks.

On April 2 last year as he was leaving a police station after being charged with the taxi driver assault, Mehajer slammed shut a door on Banks, bruising her hand.

Banks was among a group of journalists waiting outside the police station for Mehajer.

Magistrate Joanne Keogh found Mehajer guilty, but recorded no penalty, saying a “frenzied media pack” displaying “appalling and predatory behaviour” had hunted Mehajer.

From Cooma Correctional Centre Mehajer in August, he stated that he would be moving from the Snow Mountains jail back to Silverwater Correctional Centre in western Sydney.

In April this year, he was granted bail on unconnected charges relating to an allegedly staged car crash last October.

The crash happened when Mehajer was on his way to court to face a hearing over the casino taxi driver assault.

Police charged Mehajer with perverting the course of justice and conspiring to cheat or defraud, and five co-accused with varying charges stemming from the alleged scam.

Mehajer was refused bail and placed in custody in January over the crash allegations, but in April was granted bail on strict conditions with a $200,000 bond.

candace.sutton@news.com.au

If you or someone you know is in need of crisis or mental health support, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or visit www.lifeline.org.au/gethelp