The no-nonsense judge who will sentence three men for gang raping a trio of teenagers on a bucks weekend is an old friend of Queen Mary of Denmark and was a guest at her fairytale wedding.
Judge Gina O’Rourke attended the University of Tasmania with the woman then known simply as Mary Donaldson in the early 1990s and the pair remained close over the years.
O’Rourke was among the Australian contingent Mary invited to witness her marriage to Crown Prince Frederik in Copenhagen Cathedral in May 2004, along with other mates including bridesmaid Amber Petty.
She then joined kings and queens, presidents and prime ministers, and members of Europe’s royal and noble families at Fredensborg Palace for the post-wedding festivities.
O’Rourke was appointed to the District Court bench in January 2018 after 15 years with the NSW Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, and an earlier two-year stint with the Commonwealth equivalent.
As a Crown prosecutor she ran more than 200 jury trials including high-profile cases of murder and sexual assault as well as serious fraud and international drug running.
The mother-of-three was known on the court circuit for wearing sharp Scanlan Theodore suits and high heels, with her hair in a signature short black bob.
Most recently, O’Rourke presided over the joint trials of brothers Maurice and Marius Hawell and their friend Andrew David as they pleaded not guilty to gang raping three women in Newcastle.
The no-nonsense judge who will sentence three men for gang raping a trio of teenagers on a bucks weekend is an old friend of Queen Mary of Denmark and was a guest at her wedding
The three Sydney men were part of a group of nine who rented an Airbnb one weekend in February 2022 ahead of the pending wedding of Maurice Hawell.
On the Friday night they raped two 18-year-old women they brought back from the nearby Cambridge Hotel and raped a 19-year-old woman in the apartment the next evening.
Maurice Hawell and David, both 30, claimed any sex they had with the women was consensual, while 22-year-old Marius Hawell insisted he did not take part in any sexual activity at all.
After an almost four-week trial a jury last month found all three guilty of multiple counts of aggravated sexual assault in company.
O’Rourke remanded both Hawells and David in custody for a sentence hearing on September 17 after none of them applied for bail.
In March last year, O’Rourke jailed former prisoner officer Wayne Astill for 23 years for raping or indecently assaulting female inmates at Dillwynia Correctional Centre.
That sentence, in which O’Rourke set a minimum term of 15 years and four months, was unanimously upheld by the Court of Criminal Appeal earlier this month.
Judge Gina O’Rourke attended the University of Tasmania with the woman then known simply as Mary Donaldson in the early 1990s and the pair remained close over the years
O’Rourke’s background – and her brushes with royalty – were outlined at her swearing in ceremony by barrister Michael McHugh SC.
Raised at Ulverstone on Tasmania’s northern coast, O’Rourke excelled at sport, making state basketball teams, but always wanted to become a lawyer.
She met Hobart-born Mary Donaldson at the University of Tasmania from where the future queen graduated in 1995 with a combined Bachelor of Commerce and Bachelor of Laws degree.
Having honed her legal skills in the Northern Territory where she ran trials in remote Indigenous communities – sometimes underneath trees or in school rooms – O’Rourke moved to NSW.
In the DDP’s Sydney office O’Rourke had chambers opposite Deputy Senior Crown Prosecutor Paul Conlon, who later became a distinguished judge of the District Court.
McHugh said Conlon had been immediately impressed with O’Rourke’s ‘no-nonsense approach’ and meticulous preparation for trials.
‘His Honour warmly recalls the occasion on which you returned a brief with what at first seemed an incredible excuse,’ McHugh said in his welcoming speech.
‘You were attending the royal wedding of Frederik, Crown Prince of Denmark and one Mary Donaldson.
‘You were, of course, good friends with Princess Mary from university and indeed you were invited to the royal wedding.’
O’Rourke presided over the joint trials of Maurice Hawell (above), Marius Hawell and their friend Andrew David as they pleaded not guilty to gang raping three women in Newcastle
Conlon, who is now chairman of the NSW Rugby League and still an acting District Court judge, had described attending a royal wedding as ‘without question’ the best excuse he had ever heard for returning a brief.
‘Your attendance at the royal wedding, I am told, is legendary,’ McHugh told O’Rourke in his speech.
Other guests described O’Rourke rubbing shoulders with Princess Caroline of Monaco and Sir Roger Moore, the third actor to play James Bond on the big screen.
McHugh said Tasmania’s then governor Richard Butler had stepped on the train of O’Rourke’s gown as she was making her way into the church.
Following her marriage, Mary assumed her husband’s title and became Her Royal Highness the Crown Princess of Denmark.
Of O’Rourke’s career with the DPP, McHugh said ‘police wanted you as their prosecutor, solicitors wanted to instruct you and juniors wanted to junior you’.
‘It has been said that Your Honour has the judicial backbone needed to handle matters which call for strong penalties to be imposed as well as those where leniency is called for,’ McHugh said.
O’Rourke then joined kings and queens, presidents and prime ministers, and other members of Europe’s royal and noble families at Fredensborg Palace for post-wedding festivities (above)
During her time at the DPP, O’Rourke successfully prosecuted Hey Dad..! star Robert Hughes for child sex offences and multimillionaire property developer Ron Medich for ordering the contract murder of business rival Michael McGurk.
Mary Donaldson met Crown Prince Frederik at the Slip Inn in Sydney’s central business district during the 2000 Olympics when they were 28 and 32 respectively.
She was sales director for real estate firm Belle Property, having been in advertising since she graduated the same year as Mary, and became engaged to Frederik in October 2003.
He ascended the Danish throne as King Frederik X in January this year upon his mother Margrethe II’s abdication after a 52-year reign, making his wife Queen Mary.
The couple has four children: Christian, Crown Prince of Denmark, Princess Isabella, Prince Vincent and Princess Josephine.
Queen Mary, 52, and King Frederik, 56, have endured months of rumours the monarch had an affair with Mexican socialite Genoveva Casanova, which the latter has denied strenuously.
The royal couple has been in Paris to support the Danish team at the Olympics, with Mary also visiting Australian athletes.
