Stephen Klotz

• Acting for Quarry Street in High Court appeal. Quarry Street successfully appealed to Court of Appeal of SCNSW from decision of The Land and Environment Court of NSW upholding Minister’s grant of Aboriginal Land Claim over Paddington Bowling Club. The Local Aboriginal Land Councils obtained special leave to appeal to the High Court. The issue on appeal is whether the land was “claimable Crown lands” within the meaning of section 36 of the Act, in particular whether the fact that the land was subject of a lawful, registered lease means that it was “lawfully used” and not claimable. The High Court appeal was heard on 13 March 2025; judgment was reserved.
• Acted for Gregory Hawkins in Federal Court of Australia proceedings brought by ASIC against him and ten other former directors and officers of The Star Casino.  ASIC alleged against Mr Hawkins (and other defendants) that he had breached his duty as an officer of The Star by failing to take steps to prevent The Star from doing business with a junket known as ‘Suncity’, whose conduct was alleged to have exposed The Star to, amongst others, a foreseeable risk that it would be in breach of its anti-money laundering obligations. We negotiated a settlement with ASIC, which was approved by the Court, in which Mr Hawkins admitted to contraventions of section 180(1) of the Corporations Act and consented to orders that he be disqualified from managing corporations in Australia for a period of time, pay a penalty and make a contribution to ASIC’s costs. 
• Acting for Reconstruction Authority of NSW in Supreme Court of NSW proceedings for orders to evict some 40 or more squatters from a number of properties in Lismore and Mullumbimby in northern NSW, which the Authority had bought from the prior owners under the Government’s resilient homes programme.
• Acting for KONE in pursuing substantial warranty claims arising out of a share purchase agreement.
• Acting for Elumina eLearning Pty Ltd in proceedings in the Commercial List of the Supreme Court of New South Wales against NxGen Communications Pte Ltd in relation to a dispute over the construction of an agreement for the provision by Elumina to NxGen of certain IT services.  We negotiated a satisfactory settlement of the dispute shortly following a mediation.
• Acting for purchasers of property at Mascot on claim against vendors for material misdescription of the property in pre-contractual marketing and in contract for sale. Matter settled without recourse to litigation on the basis of a refund of part of the purchase price.
• Acting for property developer PRC Capital in proceeding in Supreme Court of NSW against Stockland over the meaning and effect of a dealing prohibition contained in a deed relating to the development of land at Kemps Creek in Greater Western Sydney. Matter settled at mediation.
• Acting for Hanes Group entities in Federal Court proceedings brought against them by Wesfarmers for alleged breaches of warranties arising out of the sale of Hanes’ workwear business to Wesfarmers in late 2014.
• Acting for the former CEO and CFO of Dick Smith in proceedings brought against them in the Commercial List of the Supreme Court of NSW by the National Australia Bank and HSBC Bank Australia alleging misleading and deceptive conduct in connection with the entry into and extension of finance facilities with Dick Smith. Included appeal to Court of Appeal of SCNSW and an appeal to the High Court.
• Acting for Kuwaiti investment firm, Amwal International Investment Company, in an action in the Supreme Court of Victoria against Pepperstone Pty Ltd, an online Forex and CFD broker, to recover funds withdrawn from a trading account without authorisation and in breach of their trading terms.
• Acting for Retail Employees Superannuation Trust (REST) in proceedings brought against it in the Supreme Court of South Australia by Romeos Retail Group to recover superannuation contributions alleged to have been paid by mistake.
• Acting for a creditor of Swan Services Group (In Liquidation) in Supreme Court proceedings to recover her loan. The liquidator cross claimed that payments made to her were void as preferential payments or, alternatively, were uncommercial or unreasonable director related transactions and, in addition, made an insolvent trading claim against her, asserting that she was a shadow director.
• Acting for Rio Tinto Minerals Inc in an ICC arbitration arising out of the sale of a subsidiary.
• Acting for Local Government Financial Services Pty Ltd (LGFS) in Federal Court proceedings brought by Bathurst and a number of other local councils involving claims arising out of failed investments of $16.5m in a synthetic structured credit investment product sold to them by LGFS. LGFS cross-claimed against Standard & Poor’s and its professional indemnity insurer, which had denied indemnity. Included appeal to Full Court of Federal Court.
• Acting on an appeal in the High Court for the owners of the Glasshouse building in a dispute with Westfield over the interpretation of an easement integral to Westfield’s then proposed development of the Westfield Shopping Centre.

Best Lawyers in Australia 
2014-2026 | Alternative Dispute Resolution, Commercial Law and Litigation 
2014-2024 | Alternative Dispute Resolution and Litigation

The Legal 500 Asia Pacific 
2024 | Dispute resolution: litigation
2022 | Key lawyer – Dispute resolution: litigation
2018 | Dispute Resolution