In this gripping exposé, lawyer Thomas Flitner shares a harrowing, firsthand account of what he alleges to be a calculated and punitive campaign by the Victorian Legal Services Board and Commissioner (VLSB+C) — one that he claims destroyed his business, reputation, and financial security, simply because he tried to hold the system accountable. After fighting the regulator in multiple forums for over a decade — including a successful case against the Victorian Government Solicitor — Thomas says he became a target. In this video, he reveals how the VLSB+C allegedly: Refused to allow the lawful sale of his firm to lawyer Stephen Walters, despite a valid contract and Stephen’s willingness to immediately meet licensing requirements; Moved in unannounced, changed the locks, seized files, and locked Thomas out of his own firm while he was sick at home and unaware of the impending raid; Threatened his staff, warning them that their legal careers would be in jeopardy if they spoke to him; Took possession of over 300 client files and archive boxes, including key documents Thomas needed to defend himself in an ongoing VCAT proceeding documents he still has no access to; Smeared his name to clients, resulting in property damage and even the theft of his practising certificate, which was later returned in an evidence bag from a police station; Ran up exorbitant fees, including an initial $61,000 bill from external manager Nick Curran, while allegedly doing little to maintain the firm or assist its clients; Suppressed his right to respond publicly, issuing threats and extracting a coerced Supreme Court undertaking that he would not take further legal action or publicly complain under threat of $30,000 in court costs; Reactivated baseless charges against his lawyer, Steven Walters, who continues to represent him, in what Thomas describes as an effort to isolate him from legal support; Used the Public Purpose Fund, a statutory fund meant to improve access to justice, to bankroll years of punitive legal action against him, which Thomas estimates has cost the regulator nearly $2 million. Throughout the conversation, Thomas paints a disturbing picture of a regulatory body operating without meaningful oversight, enabled by vast financial resources and a culture of impunity. He alleges the use of coercion, selective prosecution, and procedural manipulation to silence dissent and punish those who challenge authority. Now nearing another application for his practising certificate in October 2025, Thomas remains entangled in costly and emotionally draining litigation at VCAT still fighting to reclaim his career, his dignity, and his right to speak the truth. 📌 If you believe in justice, the rule of law, and the importance of institutional accountability, share this video. 💬 Comment below if you or someone you know has been subject to abuse of power by legal or police institutions. Your voice matters. 📢 Subscribe for more investigations into legal corruption cases
00:00So, you're saying that you made some serious complaints, which she tacitly admitted, and nothing came of those complaints?
00:10No.
00:12We were dealing with the Victorian Legal Services Commissioner.
00:14When they have a bone to pick with someone, they will try any trick in the book to take them down.
00:20And that led to their final thing of taking over my business under those allegations, sending Nick Curran in to destroy it.
00:30Because I had tried through cancer, sepsis, 15 years of harassment, management system directives, under extraordinary stress and cost.
00:41Me spending $700,000, me spending more hundreds of thousands of dollars.
00:45And at the end, taking away my now nine-year-old's inheritance and my life's work of 21 years.
00:53So, I know that you've told me this, and I've also seen some documents to that effect, that after they took over your business, fearing that they wouldn't take care of it properly, you found a buyer for your practice?
01:16Yes, entered into a contract as well, and provided that to them a week later.
01:20Okay.
01:20And had a meeting with them at the Legal Services Commissioner, with Howard Bowles, Gordon Cooper, and Nick Curran.
01:28Okay.
01:29And my lawyer.
01:31He's under investigation now.
01:34That lawyer is also, this is different from Mr. Glenn Mohamed.
01:36That's correct.
01:38What's the name of this lawyer?
01:39Stephen Walters.
01:40Okay.
01:41So, Stephen Walters was the lawyer that you proposed was willing to buy your business.
01:48And he's still representing me now to this day, even though they've tried to, by doing that, to try and push him away to represent me and leave me on my own.
01:56So, he's also under investigation?
01:58That's correct.
01:58Ongoing.
01:59And he's also, and they've laid charges in VCAT now against him.
02:02They've laid charges against him?
02:03So, it's in VCAT now, they matter, yes.
02:06Okay.
02:06So, were the charges only laid after he started representing you?
02:10Yes.
02:12Okay.
02:12They investigated eight years ago, these charges, and there was nothing, no basis.
02:16And now they've decided to reopen it and have taken him to VCAT.
02:20Okay.
02:20And charges.
02:22For transparency, I've spoken with Stephen Walters, and he told me about what the substance of the charges was,
02:32and that, effectively, they are completely facetious.
02:40It does seem that the Victorian Legal Services Commissioner would have more important things to do.
02:48But, for some reason, they are quite extraordinarily focused on people that embarrass them, rather than getting rid of the things that cause them embarrassment.
03:03Keep it out of the media, keep it out of the public eye.
03:08I mean, when I had a win in the other matter, both those matters, they have not been reported in the media.
03:15In other cases, lawyers have had their cases reported.
03:19But only when they lose against the commissioner.
03:21Well, that's right.
03:22Yes.
03:23Or the government.
03:25So, tell me more about the situation with Stephen Walters trying to buy your business and the Victorian Legal Services Commissioner's reaction to it.
03:41We ended into a contract because...
03:43When you say we...
03:44Me and Stephen Walters ended into a contract, and we provided that to them to look at.
03:52And all three of them, including the manager, said,
03:56no, I'm not going to allow the practice to be sold to Stephen Walters.
04:01But, clarify this for me.
04:06Your practice was run by a corporation.
04:09That's correct.
04:11Flammie Company, Proprietary Limited.
04:12And you were the director of the corporation.
04:13Sole director, secretary.
04:15Okay.
04:15So, you, as the director of the corporation, had...
04:23You were the sole director, you said.
04:24That's correct.
04:25And so, you were solely responsible for making business decisions about the corporation.
04:30And you decided that the corporation no longer wanted to run that business itself.
04:35And it would be in its best commercial interest to sell that business to...
04:41Continue on.
04:42To save it.
04:45And the person you were selling the business to had the right license to run that business.
04:52Is that right?
04:53That's correct.
04:54The only thing that he was missing was a trust account for a certificate to be able to operate the trust account.
04:59So, did they say that it's because he has...
05:01No, no, no.
05:02No, it wasn't because they said, no, we're not going to allow it.
05:04He said, I'm doing the course.
05:06Just give me a week or less than that and I'll have it done.
05:10They said, no, it's not going to be allowed.
05:12We're going to run it.
05:14And ultimately, from day one, clients wanted to pay their bills.
05:19My staff were shut off to talk to me from day one.
05:21I was locked out.
05:22I was actually homesick the day they turned up.
05:24So, it was unbeknownst to me they would turn up.
05:26Because the legal board wrote a letter to Stephen Walters and sent it at 6pm the night before.
05:33So, it was done out of hours that he didn't see it till later until they'd already entered my office.
05:38They were changing the locks.
05:39Told me that I was never welcome there.
05:41And started talking to my staff, telling them not to talk to me.
05:44So, to this day, my staff were told that their legal careers would be in jeopardy if they gave me information, if they told me what they were up to in there.
05:56Eventually, what happened was that bills were run up.
06:00They stayed for another two weeks, didn't pay the staff because everything had been paid up, the rent for the month, for October.
06:04They stayed for the end, cleaned out 300 odd files and boxes and archive and this other matters file that they had not given me access to to defend myself at BCAP and the copy of it.
06:17So, I don't even have those details.
06:20Took my computers, took my personal documents on my computers, put them all on a hard drive because I've seen the bill.
06:30Well, the first bill was $61,000 for the first month by the manager.
06:33Not sure what he did there.
06:35But, and also the clients were contacting me, some of the clients personally on my mobile, saying, well, they're not doing anything.
06:41They've lost our wills.
06:42They've lost this to this day.
06:44I said, look, I'm not allowed to comment.
06:46I wasn't even allowed to put a letter out to the clients.
06:49One became so irate thinking that the government, I was a bad person, that they actually stole my practice certificate off the wall, which led to Nick Curran's senior associate, the lady there, contacting me saying, it was stolen a week ago.
07:03So, you may want to report that to the Victorian police, which I did.
07:07And then they went and had him return it to the Greensboro police station, where I collected it from in a plastic bag, like an evidence bag.
07:16So, that's how they spiked people up.
07:19They told them that I was a bad person.
07:21They told them not to have anything to do with me because the legal board was all righteous.
07:25And so, I never had a chance to write a letter out.
07:29Stephen and me, we put together a letter.
07:32Nick Curran threatened us to put the letter out.
07:35I even took Supreme Court proceedings against the legal board and the manager and turned up at court and the judge wouldn't hear the matter.
07:44He said, go outside.
07:45Their barrister threatened me with $30,000 in costs for one day, that if the judge didn't want to hear it, I'd be up for costs.
07:54So, I had to walk away because at that point, I'd lost my business, lost my income, had my bank accounts taken away, the office account and money coming into the business, which I was going to live on.
08:07I had no income source.
08:08I was already single, living on my own, mortgage and some school expenses to pay, private school expenses.
08:15So, I had to walk away and give an undertaking to Nick Curran that I wouldn't take any further action against him because I dared to speak up in the Supreme Court about what they were doing.
08:26But how is that legal?
08:27How can they make you give an undertaking that you wouldn't complain against them?
08:32This is the way that they push their settlement terms to try and drive people silent.
08:38So, you're saying that they told you that if you, even though you had agreed to withdraw that case on the first day, that if you did not give them an undertaking...
08:54And continue agitating about what they're doing.
08:56...which would effectively make it a criminal offence if you then broke that undertaking.
09:02Yes.
09:03So, they told you that unless you agree to never make a complaint against them or be prosecuted criminally for making a complaint against them, you'd have to give them $30,000.
09:16That's correct.
09:17And this was an offer that a barrister put to your barrister.
09:25That's correct, yeah.
09:26I had legal representation.
09:27I had Stephen Walters and a barrister.
09:29And they had their barrister there and their Nick Curran and their lawyers, familiar to our legal services commissioner.
09:35It's a good thing that it was their barrister.
09:36Otherwise, they would have taken their licence for it.
09:39That's correct.
09:41But this is what they get away with.
09:42This is the way they operate.
09:44They're not beholden to anyone.
09:45There's no oversight.
09:47They have $3.2 billion in their kitty from our sister's interests, from their trust accounts and from fees, which is meant to go out to community legal organisations and judges, studies, etc.
09:59But what they use is that public purpose fund to fund lawyers and investigations.
10:05And I have calculated that they would have spent close to $2 million over that time just prosecuting me, let alone I've spent hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars, probably a million dollars in losses, fighting them.
10:18And you continue to fight them?
10:20And I continue to fight them to this day.
10:22We're still in front of VCAT.
10:24And this will lead to more costs?
10:27And if you eventually win?
10:28There's more heartache, even though I haven't been a lawyer practicing for a year and a half or nearly two years now.
10:34And the hearing in VCAT will probably be next year.
10:37So they're likely to spend much more money on this.
10:40That's right.
10:40And I have a right to apply for my certificate in October 2025, in a few months.
10:46But of course, they'll come back with a reasoning.
10:49Well, you've got charges pending in VCAT because you didn't adhere to the management system directives and you didn't let Marriott Hubble-Smith in.
10:58And we don't think you're a fit and proper person to be a lawyer.
