"In 1994 Robert Richter QC and Philip Dunn QC represented Detectives Lockwood and Avon who were charged with the murder of Gary Abdallah. Police suspected that Abdallah supplied the stolen car used to lure two young police officers, Steven Tynan and Damien Eyre, to their deaths in Walsh Street, South Yarra. Lockwood and Avon arrested Abdallah and took him to his Drummond Street flat. The prosecution case was that they executed him. Lockwood said Abdallah pulled a .357 magnum on him when he momentarily turned away. Lockwood fired 6 shots from his own revolver and then grabbed Avon's revolver and fired one shot more.

Martin Tighe's painting depicts Richter and Dunn as they were at the Bar table in Court 4 of the Supreme Court of Victoria, just before Richter's final address to the jury. They are checking Lockwood's revolver. Richter will shortly demonstrate that it took only 1.6 seconds to fire the shots. This portrait echoes Rembrandt's painting, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp. Dr Tulp looked around at Rembrandt while in the middle of dissecting a cadaver in front of a group of students. Richter and Dunn, depicted as they are now, look up as if distracted from their analysis. They are 25 years older than they were during the trial. It is a moment of tense stillness before a dramatic recreation. The chiaroscuro isolates the two advocates in the darkness of the trial. Both Lockwood and Avon were acquitted. Richter and Dunn are the leaders of the Australian Criminal Bar. "

Campbell Thomson
Barrister

The Portrait of Richter and Dunn is a commission from The Victorian Bar's Arts and Collections committee. The committee oversees the commission of portraits of the Bar's illuminaries past and present.

The portrait can be viewed in the Peter O'Callaghan QC Gallery in the foyer of the Owen Dixon West building.