After attempt at acquittal or retrial was dismissed, Patterson has 28 days to lodge an application for special leave to appeal to Australia’s high court

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After losing her bid for a retrial, the mushroom murderer Erin Patterson could take her fight to the highest court in Australia.

But her prospects of success are far from rosy, a legal expert says.

NSW supreme court judge otherwise dismisses case brought by film’s co-producers and awards Wilson almost $400,000 after star countersued

Rebel Wilson has been ordered to pay A$10 (US$7, £5) in damages after emerging victorious from a bitter legal spat with her latest film’s co-producers.

The Pitch Perfect star directed, co-produced and starred in The Deb, a musical comedy that became the battleground for multiple legal battles in Australia and the US.

Of the dozens of countries approached to water down their laws, Australia appears to be the only one considering it, publishers’ group says

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AI has already been trained on the works of Australian artists including Kylie Minogue and Nick Cave without compensation, the peak global body for music rights has claimed, as the Australian government has been warned against giving in to “strong-arming” from tech companies seeking to weaken copyright law.

The International Confederation of Music Publishers (ICMP) – which represents Sony, Warner and Universal as well as thousands of independent publishers on six continents – has warned that of the dozens of countries approached to water down copyright laws, Australia appears to be the only to consider doing so.

Ruling on Mount Pleasant coalmine shows ‘we cannot continue to dig up coal … and pretend the consequences have nothing to do with us’, group says

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A Hunter Valley community group has won Australia’s first high court case to consider climate change, in a ruling advocates say sets a binding national precedent for fossil fuel projects in New South Wales.

In a landmark judgment, the nation’s highest court ruled that the approval of MACH Energy’s Mount Pleasant coalmine expansion in Muswellbrook was invalid.

Kylie Ellina Truswell-Mobbs, 52, walks out of court after receiving suspended sentence over 2023 death of David Ronald Mobbs

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A Queensland woman facing a potential life sentence after she gave her terminally ill husband a lethal cocktail of drugs has walked out of court to the sound of cheers.

Kylie Ellina Truswell-Mobbs, 52, pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to assisting suicide in the supreme court in Brisbane on Monday.

Legal pioneer remembered as an advocate for equality and champion of women in the workplace

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Mary Gaudron, the first woman appointed to the high court of Australia, has been honoured for her contributions to the legal landscape after her death at the age of 83.

Gaudron was appointed to the high court in 1987, aged 44, and served until 2003.

Exclusive: Federal government court filings claim internal company documents included warnings about products being toxic

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Manufacturing company 3M knew more than 50 years ago that its firefighting products – including components in Pfas “forever chemicals” – could be hazardous to the health of humans and animals and damage the environment, the federal government has claimed in court documents.

In filings as part of its $2bn lawsuit against the multinational company, commonwealth lawyers said products sold to Australia were known to stay present in water and soil, were persistent in the human body and in animals, and contributed to conditions including reduced kidney function, alterations in immune function, effects on fertility and puberty and lower birth weight in babies.

The work was simple: deliver letters, notices of assessment and other important legal documents, by bicycle. The locations, I came to realise, were varied and inconvenient

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A gopher is a small, solitary rodent with large front teeth native to North and Central America. It’s also the name of the job some workplaces give to errand runners (though it’s more usually spelled gofer).

When I was a 21-year-old law student in Canberra, I was in desperate need of casual work. I came across an ad pinned to one of the corkboards outside the library. Bleary-eyed after another all-nighter to finish an assignment, I took down the number of the law firm.

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Judgment dismissing Charlotte MacInnes’s case expressed doubts about credibility of three key witnesses, and is likely to be appealed

Rebel Wilson’s self-styled brand as a truth teller was put to the test during a fiery defamation feud where rivals called her a bully.

But the Hollywood A-lister, referred to as “very difficult to be around” and “fucking nuts” during an at-times bruising trial, emerged from the federal court battle with the last laugh.

Judge finds Wilson did not defame Charlotte MacInnes, lead actor in Pitch Perfect star’s directorial debut The Deb

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After a blistering dispute that spanned continents and years, Hollywood A-lister Rebel Wilson has been found not to have defamed her co-star in a series of social media posts.

The Pitch Perfect star was sued by Australian actor Charlotte MacInnes, who played the lead role in Wilson’s directorial debut film The Deb.

Rapper pleads not guilty to six counts of sexually penetrating a 20-year-old woman without consent after a gig in Perth

A British YouTuber and musician bit and slapped a young female fan while he was raping her after a gig in Western Australia, a court has been told.

Yung Filly, 30, has pleaded not guilty to six counts of sexually penetrating a 20-year-old woman without consent in a Perth hotel room in September 2024.

Prime minister Anthony Albanese says too many children still on platforms but he is ‘heartened’ by world-leading law

• Social media bans go global: big tech faces a reckoning after Australia’s crackdown

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The federal government will double the penalty for breaches of Australia’s youth social media ban to $99m, arguing tech companies are “not doing enough” to keep children off harmful social media sites.

And the eSafety commissioner, now investigating potential breaches of the law by Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube, will have its information-gathering powers strengthened under proposed further reforms.

Launchers that shoot ‘bullet-like missiles’, chemical irritants and stinger grenades: experts say these weapons can cause serious injury or even death. But they are deployed by police against crowds with little scrutiny

Projectiles that release powder designed to burn the eyes and throat. Flashbang grenades. Teargas. Launchers that resemble semi-automatic rifles.

In Victoria, police have refused to publicly provide the make and model of their rubber bullets and other weapons even to the state’s parliamentarians due to “operational and community safety considerations”.

Contracts worth millions for these weapons are often with third-party distributors rather than the manufacturers, obscuring what police have access to.

During coronial inquests, after baton rounds and other weapons may have contributed to deaths, Victoria police have sought suppression orders that bar media from describing any details of weaponry.

In some states, details about Tasers have been suppressed during inquests, including the training materials given to officers.

Guardian Australia approached each force in the country for a list of the manufacturer and model of their less lethal weapons but all declined to provide one, with most citing operational safety.

Interim report contains 14 recommendations, after inquiry examined agencies’ actions before the attack in which 15 people were killed

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Sydney’s Jewish community told police of a “high” threat of an attack at December’s Chanukah by the Sea festival at Bondi beach, but New South Wales police appeared not to have completed a comprehensive risk assessment for the event, an interim royal commission report has found.

The interim report of the royal commission into antisemitism and social cohesion, established in the wake of December’s terror attack, found no gap in current laws that could have prevented the shooting. But it did call for greater coordination of policing at Jewish festivals and events.

The supreme court has handed down its judgment in a case over mining royalties. Here’s what you need to know

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Gina Rinehart’s company will have to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to a rival business after securing the rights but losing some royalties on a major mine in a landmark court case.

The more than 15-year-long Western Australian supreme court case pitted the extended families of Rinehart’s father and his business partner against each other, while tying up mining company Rio Tinto and a string of others.

Former SAS soldier and Victoria Cross recipient, who has always denied wrongdoing, did not immediately apply for bail on Wednesday

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Ben Roberts-Smith will remain in jail for at least a week after his legal representatives declined to apply for bail on Wednesday, a day after Australia’s most decorated soldier was charged with war crimes.

His case will return for a bail review hearing at Downing Centre local court in Sydney on 17 April.

Woman denies allegations of aggravated kidnapping during Augusto Pinochet’s 1970s military dictatorship

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A former Sydney nanny and cleaner accused by Chile of being a torturer and kidnapper for Augusto Pinochet’s military dictatorship in the 1970s will be extradited to Chile to face court over kidnapping allegations after losing her seven-year battle to remain in Australia.

Adriana Elcira Rivas, now in her 70s, is accused of participating in the disappearances of seven people in 1976 – including a woman who was five months pregnant – while working for Pinochet’s secret police force.

Australia’s high court finds singer’s label and merchandise distributor had been ‘assiduous infringers’ of trademark

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The Sydney fashion designer behind the Katie Perry label has won her epic trademark dispute with US pop star Katy Perry, after a legal battle lasting almost 17 years.

In a majority decision on Wednesday, Australia’s high court found the designer’s label did not breach trademark laws and was not likely to cause confusion, regardless of the singer’s reputation when it was registered.

Sammy Yahood accuses Labor of ‘tyranny’ after the government cancelled his visa hours before his flight was due to depart

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The government has cancelled the visa of a Jewish influencer who has previously called for the ban of Islam and was booked to speak at several events in Australia.

The right-leaning Australian Jewish Association (AJA) said Sammy Yahood’s visa was cancelled three hours before his flight was due to depart.

The policy to cut off social media access for more than 2 million under-16s remains popular with Australians, while other countries look to follow suit

On the lawns of the prime minister’s Kirribilli residence in Sydney, overlooking the harbour, Anthony Albanese said he had never been prouder.

“This is a day in which my pride to be prime minister of Australia has never been greater. This is world-leading. This is Australia showing enough is enough,” he said as the country’s under-16s social media ban came into effect on Wednesday.