High Court of Australia Hears the Magill vs. Magill Paternity Fraud Case
The High Court of Australia heard the Magill vs. Magill case on April 7, 2006
Transcripts can be read on this website Read More ..
Australia's High Court Judgment
The media release of November 9, 2006, from Australia's High Court regarding their decision can be read here Read More ..
The Judgment can be read here
Paternity fraud 'dad' loses appeal
The Age, Australia, November 9, 2006
A man who sued his former wife after paying child support for two children fathered by his wife's lover today lost his appeal to the High Court.
The judges unanimously ruled that the case for paternity fraud brought by Liam Neale Magill failed.
Three judges held that no action for deceit could lie in representations about paternity made between spouses. Read More ..
Husband loses 'duped' child support claim
The Sydney Morning Herald, Australia, by Tim Dick, November 9, 2006
Liam Magill ... lost his claim.
Photo: Paul Harris
A man who claimed he was duped into supporting his wife's two children has lost his claim for damages against his wife for supporting them.
The High Court in Melbourne today rejected a suit by Liam Magill, who married Meredith Magill in 1988, and with whom he thought he had fathered three children.
But the youngest two were not his; fathered instead by another man, his wife's lover.
He paid child support for all three children until 1999 and, in 2000, DNA testing proved he was not the father of the two youngest children.
Mr Magill won $70,000 in the Victorian County Court for economic loss and a psychiatric condition because, the court found, his wife intended him to sign the birth forms as the father, knowing he was not the father.
That decision was overturned, with the Court of Appeal finding he had not relied on the birth forms to do anything except give the children his surname. Read More ..
Duped 'dad' to fight court ruling
The Age, By Peter Gregory, Chief court reporter, April 16, 2005
A Melbourne man who found he was paying maintenance for another man's children is challenging a court decision that removed a $70,000 damages payout earlier awarded to him.
Liam Neal Magill, 54, has lodged an application for special leave to appeal to the High Court against a ruling made last month in favour of his ex-wife, Meredith Jane Magill, 38.
Mr Magill took legal action in January 2001 after DNA tests proved he had not fathered two of the couple's three children. Read More ..
PRESS RELEASE - 22APR05
A Landmark Decision
By Vivien Mavropoulos, Instructing Solicitor for Liam Magill
On the 31 January 2002, Mr Magill issued proceedings in the County court based on the law of deceit. Mr Magill alleged that he suffered loss and damages for loss of earnings and use of moneys and also for personal injuries, comprising severe anxiety and depression in consequence of false representations made by Mrs Magill as to the paternity of two of their three children. Read More ..
Court test for duped fathers in 'DNA age'
The Australian, Australia's national newspaper, by Natasha Robinson, November 19, 2005
A FATHER who was tricked into paying tens of thousands of dollars to his unfaithful ex-wife for two children that were not his has won the right to take his six-year battle for compensation to the High Court.
A three-member sitting of the court sent Liam Magill's case to the full bench after finding yesterday that the dispute was an appropriate test of emerging social dilemmas in the "age of DNA" and sperm donation.
Mr Magill was initially awarded $70,000 by the Victorian County Court in November 2002 when he sued his wife for general damages and economic loss from his payment of child support.
However, his former wife, Meredith Magill, 37, successfully appealed against the decision when the Victorian Court of Appeal ruled there was no evidence to show she had intended to deceive her then husband about the paternity of the children. Read More ..
Australia's High Court takes support case
United Press International (UPI), Australia, November 19, 2005
MELBOURNE, Nov. 19 (UPI) -- Australia's High Court has agreed to hear the case of a man trying to recoup tens of thousands in child support he paid for children he didn't father.
Liam Magill had been thwarted in his efforts for six years to get back the money after DNA tests proved two of three children he thought were his were actually someone else's, The Australian reported Saturday. Read More ..
Child Support Agency forced to pay back wrongly accused men
The Guardian, U.K., David Hencke, Westminster correspondent, Monday November 28, 2005
The Child Support Agency has had to refund hundreds of thousands of pounds in maintenance payments to Read More .. than 3,000 men after DNA tests revealed that they had been wrongly named by mothers in paternity suits. One in six men who took a DNA test to challenge claims by women that they were the fathers of their children were cleared by the results, according to official figures disclosed by the agency.
Under CSA rules, men must start paying maintenance the moment they are named by mothers as the father of the child. They can challenge the ruling by asking for a DNA test but have to pay for it themselves. Read More ..
Dudded dad wins OK for compo fight
Herald Sun, Australia, by Norrie Ross, law reporter, November 19, 2005
A MAN who found he was supporting two children he had not fathered can continue his fight for compensation.
Liam Magill, 54, hugged his current partner after the High Court yesterday granted him special leave to appeal against a ruling that he was not entitled to compensation.
During arguments in the case Justice Michael Kirby said the issues of parenthood were important in an age of DNA testing.
In March, the Victorian Court of Appeal stripped Mr Magill of a $70,000 County Court payout from his ex-wife, Meredith, on a legal technicality.
Mr Magill had said birth certificates shown to him by his ex-wife led him to believe he was the father of a daughter and son. Read More ..
CanadianCRC editor's note: The above article is all wrong. The case of Liam Magill was never about child financial support. The case was about damages resulting from the paternity fraud. which were in addition to amounts owed him for supporting children that weren't his biological children. The mother already owed Liam Magill the the cost of raising the 2 children during the marriage and for child support paid after the end of the marriage when she received child financial support from her ex-husband. Under Australian family law, the Child Support Agency (CSA), the national government collection agency, had the obligation to collect this from the mother.
Many of the newspapers in Australia and elsewhere got the essence of the paternity fraud case wrong and misreported on it.
Reference the new family laws of Australia as of June 2005.
With regards to another lawsuit by Magill which is against the CSA, Liam Magill has reported to the Canadian Children's Rights Council that the CSA had been delinquent in seeking repayment by the mother and is suing them for their lack of action to collect on his behalf. His case is basically that they have not done what they do for parents that receive child financial support payments.