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| Wivenhoe dam engineer John Ruffini will plead guilty to unlawfully working while unregistered during Queensland's disastrous 2011 floods. |
A DAM engineer will plead guilty to unlawfully working while unregistered during Queensland's disastrous 2011 floods.
John Lawrence Ruffini, 47, is being prosecuted by the state's Board of Professional Engineers on a charge of "carrying out a professional engineering service when not a registered engineer". Mr Ruffini worked as a flood operations engineer for Brisbane's Wivenhoe dam during the floods crisis in January 2011.
He was charged in September.
During a brief mention in the Brisbane Magistrates Court today, defence lawyer Patrick Murphy said his client planned to plead guilty.
"This matter has now resolved and is a plea," Mr Murphy said.
The plea hearing will take one hour and has been set down for December 12 in the same court.
Mr Ruffini did not appear and the magistrate allowed the engineer to "continue to remain at large".
The operation of the dams during the crisis was a key focus of the Queensland Floods Commission of Inquiry, led by Commissioner Cate Holmes, which found Wivenhoe operators had not escalated their flood mitigation strategy as required by the dam manual.
28.11.12
COMMENT: It is outrageous and quite unacceptable that Seqwater was employing an unregistered engineer during the height of the 2011 flood crisis. Doesn't Seqwater check the credentials of its employees? Putting people's homes and lives at risk with unregistered professional staff is a blight on Seqwater. Whoever is responsible for this debacle should be given the Royal Order of the Boot out of the organisation.
