Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday announced Former High Court justice Virginia Bell to lead the federal Royal Commission into the Bondi terror attack.
Beginning her legal career as a volunteer and solicitor at the Redfern Legal Centre in the 1970s, Bell marched in the first Mardi Gras in 1978, after which she and John Terry provided legal defence to the 53 people arrested, going on to create resources for the next march advising protesters on ways to avoid arrest.
Bell was admitted to the NSW Bar in 1984 and served as a public defender from 1986 to 1989. In 1995, she became counsel assisting the Wood Royal Commission into corruption in the New South Wales Police, and was appointed Senior Counsel in 1997.
She served on the NSW Supreme Court from 1999 and on the Court of Appeal from 2008, before being nominated by then-Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as the fourth woman to serve on the High Court in 2009, replacing Justice Michael Kirby, a position she held until her retirement in 2021.
An openly gay woman, Bell lives with her partner, a barrister, in inner city Sydney.
