Where a person is charged under s 30(2)(b) of the Australian Crime Commission Act 2002 (Cth) with refusing to answer questions at an examination, and attended under compulsion of a s 28 summons, the validity of the summons is relevant to whether the examiner had power to require the witness to answer questions, and the accused has a legitimate forensic interest in documents relating to the validity of the summons. Collateral challenge to the validity of a witness summons in criminal proceedings is not confined to defects appearing on the face of the summons but extends to jurisdictional error. However, the question whether the validity of the summons is an element of the offence or merely a precondition to the examiner's power was left open by the majority.
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