Victoria's top prosecutor has defended her decision not to lay charges over the Lawyer X scandal despite a key figure being prepared to plead guilty and testify.
In a report tabled in state parliament on Thursday, Director of Public Prosecutions Kerri Judd hit back after special investigator Geoffrey Nettle suggested the chances of her laying charges were effectively nil.
Mr Nettle threatened to resign if the Office of the Special Investigator (OSI) was not wound up, declaring his investigation a waste of time and resources.
The former High Court judge was appointed in 2021 to examine if criminal cases could be made against barrister Nicola Gobbo and Victoria Police officers after a royal commission into her informing on clients during Melbourne's gangland wars.
Mr Nettle's office spoke to a potential witness about testifying for the prosecution against four police members if they were charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice.
The person, who was not named in Ms Judd's report and had left the jurisdiction, would have pleaded guilty to the same charge.
Ms Gobbo, who represented high-profile figures such as Tony Mokbel and Faruk Orman during the early 2000s while also acting as a police informant, has been living overseas and gave a TV interview in 2019 from a secret location.
In return for the individual's co-operation, the special investigator’s office told Ms Judd the prosecution would have to agree to recommend a community correction order as an appropriate sentence, among other conditions.
But based on statements detailing what the person was prepared to say, Ms Judd deduced they wanted legal immunity or an undertaking that their evidence would not be used against them.
"The OSI informed me - and I accept - that it had given the individual no assurances that I would give them an indemnity from prosecution or an undertaking that their evidence not be used against them," she wrote.
"But given the discrepancy in material provided to me, I had no confidence that the individual would in fact agree to plead guilty and give evidence as contemplated by the OSI."
Ultimately, Ms Judd refused to file charges against any of the five people nominated in what Mr Nettle's office dubbed Operation Spey, arguing the prospect of a guilty verdict was not reasonable.
Another two briefs of evidence were also knocked back on the same grounds, but Ms Judd was adamant she never ruled out authorising future prosecutions.
"I would consider any further briefs on their merits," she wrote.
"My decisions in relation to these matters should be interpreted as nothing other than the results of careful and realistic assessments of the evidence."
Premier Daniel Andrews said it was not uncommon for the best legal minds to have differing views on charges and it wasn't up to his government to intervene in the pair's public spat.
"No one in the Victorian parliament determines who gets charged and with what," he said.
"It's the evidence - and a comprehensive brief of evidence - that should be the only factor."
Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes rebuffed a call from the opposition to give the special investigator's office unilateral powers to lay charges, similar to those granted to the state's corruption watchdog.
"It is not appropriate for an investigative body to then decide whether they are the prosecutor as well," she said.
Ms Symes said Ms Judd was as eminent and respected as Mr Nettle in her field, and the government would accept her ruling that a jury would not convict anyone charged.
Shadow attorney-general Michael O'Brien said it was wholly unsatisfactory for no one to be charged after a multimillion-dollar royal commission into the greatest legal scandal in state history.
"It's been reported ... Nicola Gobbo was ready to plead guilty to charges and yet, despite that, the DPP says no," he said.
"She might have her reasons, but the public interest demands that these issues be tested in open court."
