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  • Chris Nyst, Opinion

Twentieth Century Hero

The 1953 Morris Minor utility was small by any standard. Its cabin was barely big enough for one mum and one dad, so all the kids got bundled into the back. It was right there in the back of the old ute, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with my two big brothers on the rattling metal tray, that I first heard the awful news. Shortly after noon, US-time, on 22 November 1963, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States of America, was shot down on the streets of Dallas, Texas. Even as a little kid, when my parents pulled up to the roadside to solemnly report what they had just heard on the radio, I understood immediately from the shock and sadness in my mother’s voice the world had changed forever. Fifty-four years later, who doesn’t still remember that terrible day?
  • Chris Nyst, Criminal Law

Intoxicated People

This week I learned some stuff about intoxicated people. Given the popular national penchant for a cold beer on a hot day, perhaps it’s unsurprising that it happened on a trip to the sweltering tropics. The whole saga started more than a year ago when the Liquor and Gaming regulators decided to raid a Far North Queensland pub to make sure everyone up there was conducting themselves with all appropriate decorum and discretion. As it turned out, they concluded to their shock and horror that they weren’t.
  • Brendan Nyst, Criminal Law, Defamation, Hollywood, International

Harvey-World Troubles

The nasty news, gossip and scandal that started with Hollywood heavyweight Harvey Weinstein has grown into a tsunami of distasteful allegations of misogynistic and worse sexual misconduct in the United States, reaching to the very upper echelons of the industry. It has been fascinating to watch the reaction from all corners of the community, one that perhaps marks a pivotal turning-point in cultural attitudes regarding the latitude we as a society will permit those in positions of power. It has already seemingly sounded the death knell for the once stellar careers of more than a few noted luminaries in Hollywood and Washington.
  • Chris Nyst, International, Opinion, Politics

The Man In The Arena

When I first started doing trial work as a young lawyer I was constantly surprised and intrigued by the persistent inconsistency between different eyewitness accounts of the exact same incident. Particularly when dealing with a violent or otherwise shocking event, such as a car crash or a brutal street brawl, no two witnesses seemed to remember the same event in the same way. For a defence lawyer it was the welcome stuff of reasonable doubt, but I soon learned it was also just a fact of life. When people are confronted by emergent and traumatic circumstances, their brains can only take in so much detail, and the fact two witnesses remember one event in completely different ways doesn't necessarily mean either one is telling fibs. Quite the contrary.
  • Criminal Law

The Best-Laid Plans

The weather’s already started to heat up, and summer’s on its way. Woo-hoo! That means cocktails, beers and BBQ’s by the pool, long days at the beach and a bunch of other mindless summer merriment. And speaking of mindless, it also means the start of a whole new round of summer music festivals.
  • Family Law

Separation And An IKEA Future

Marriage breakdown can be tough. Even when separating parties are more than pleased to wave their erstwhile better half goodbye, they are still faced not only with the job of carving up their previously-joint property, but also the jolt of severing their attachment to the physical accoutrements of the relationship. Where children are involved, of course the stress goes up exponentially, as the children’s physical and emotional needs, and the disruptive impact of the separation on their daily lives, become the paramount consideration.
  • Chris Nyst, Criminal Law, Dispute Resolution, International, Technology

Judgement Day

The other night I had the craziest dream. Remember Haley Joel Osment? He's that cute-but-oh-so-creepy little weird kid with the Sad Sack face who kept seeing dead people in M. Night Shymalan’s 1999 supernatural horror-movie The Sixth Sense. If you were as spooked as I definitely was by that things-that-go-bump-in-the-night ghost story, you won’t have forgotten this kid in a hurry. But then, as if The Sixth Sense wasn't quite spooky enough, in 2001 he backed it up with a dark and contemplative tale called AI Artificial Intelligence, which was even more disturbing. This time he played – surprise, surprise – another cute, creepy little weird kid, only with a slight and distinctly unsettling difference. He’s a robot.
  • Human Rights, Jonathan Nyst, Opinion, Politics

The Great Dissenter

“I am the result of a loving upbringing in a peaceful country, with wonderful parents and siblings, a very long-term relationship, stability, support – but a feeling that life isn't always just and that there is injustice for people and we should do something about it.”
  • Chris Nyst, Criminal Law, Opinion

Redemption Road

There is no more powerful human narrative than the story of redemption, the assurance that no matter what evil we have done we can atone, strive to be better and ultimately find forgiveness. Not everyone believes in true redemption. But, like the good preacher, a good lawyer has to believe we all can hope to one day be delivered from our sins.
  • Brendan Nyst, Dispute Resolution, Litigation, Wills and Estates

The Executor And The Prodigal Son

By all accounts the recently deceased was a pretty cranky old dude. Even his life-long best friend, my client, the sole beneficiary and executor of the old guy’s last will and testament, had to acknowledge that fact. But then, even by his own admission, they both were. They were cut from the same cloth, no-nonsense old-school Aussie battlers, raised on Struggle Street. Hard men of a by-gone era with little time for tears or new age sensibilities, who had grown into lonely, curmudgeonly old codgers. But they were two grumpy old men who happily endured each other’s inhospitable habits. So it’s probably unsurprising that, years earlier, when the old guy’s family had finally had enough of his gruff, uncompromising ways, he was left only with his old mate from the old days for solace and support. It was a two-way street. Neither had made much time for friendships or relationships; they were too busy just getting on with life.
  • Chris Nyst, International, Opinion, Sport

How Sweet It Is

As a longtime lover of the ‘Sweet Science’, I felt a secret sense of satisfaction in watching the measured way in which Floyd “Money" Mayweather defeated the game and garrulous UFC world champion Conor McGregor on the weekend, with an emphatic TKO in the 10th round of their scheduled 12-round bout in Las Vegas Nevada.
  • Chris Nyst, Criminal Law

Swings and Roundabouts

It's funny the way things seem to go on swings and roundabouts. In 1945 the troops returned from World War II celebrating victory over fascism and the arbitrary and excessive use of power by the State. By the early 1950s politicians like American Senator Joe McCarthy had fuelled Cold War fears of Communist subversion, and convinced the populace there was “a Red under every bed”. So Americans surrendered their civil rights to avert the Communist threat. But then, a few years later, after a series of reckless, often-unsubstantiated accusations and character assassinations, McCarthy’s public hearings were discredited and shut down. By the early 1960s a new generation was again championing civil rights and libertarianism.

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