Sir Albert Asher Wolff (30 April 1899 – 27 October 1977) was a Chief Justice of the

Supreme Court of Western Australia The Supreme Court of Western Australia is the highest state court in the Australian State of Western Australia. It has unlimited jurisdiction within the state in civil matters (although it usually only hears matters involving sums of A$750,00 ...

, which is the highest ranking court in the

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

n State of Western Australia. Wolf also served as

Lieutenant Governor of Western Australia The governor of Western Australia is the representative in Western Australia of the monarch of Australia, currently King Charles III. As with the other governors of the Australian states, the governor of Western Australia performs constitutional ...

Early life

Born on 30 April 1899 at Geraldton, Western Australia, and registered as Asher Albert, he was the only son and second of four children to a Russian-born jeweller, and his English wife. From an orthodox Jewish family, Wolff was educated at Geraldton State and Perth Boys' schools and won a scholarship to Perth Modern School. In 1924 he married schoolteacher Ida Violet Jackson, at the district registrar's office in Perth.

Judiciary career

After serving articles in a legal firm, he was admitted to the

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

on 20 October 1921, and practised at Goomalling and in Perth until appointed crown prosecutor in 1926. Wolff prosecuted constables J. G. St Jack and R. H. Regan for murder following the 1926

Forrest River massacre The Forrest River massacre, or Oombulgurri massacre of June 1926, was a massacre of Indigenous Australian people by a group of law enforcement personnel and civilians in the wake of the killing of a pastoralist in the Kimberley region of Wester ...

; they were acquitted. In 1929 he was promoted crown solicitor and parliamentary draftsman and won repute for his drafting skills. He was appointed to the Supreme Court bench in 1938. In 1949 Wolff presided over an Air Court of Inquiry into the crash of a Douglas DC-3 aircraft at Perth Airport which killed all 18 people on board."Air Tragedy Inquiry"
'' The West Australian'' – 29 September 1949, p.16 (National Library of Australia) Retrieved 2012-05-01 The aircraft was operated by Western Australian airline MacRobertson Miller Aviation. The Court was unable to determine the precise cause of the accident. Wolff became senior puisne justice in 1954. In February 1959 he succeeded Sir John Dwyer as chief justice and became deputy president of the State Arbitration Court; he was knighted via in June. Wolff was also committed to capital punishment. One of his most contentious criminal cases was the 1961 murder trial of the deaf mute Darryl Raymond Beamish. Wolff pronounced the death sentence, which was later commuted to life imprisonment. After the emergence of fresh evidence, in 2005 the conviction was quashed.Australian Dictionary of Biography
/ref> Presiding over a royal commission into youth unemployment and the apprenticeship system, Wolff had recommended improving literacy at the primary level, raising the school leaving age to 15 and reviewing policy and funding for technical education. By singling out the building industry for inadequate training regulations he hastened the passage of the ''Builders' Registration Act (1939)''. Wolff retired from the position of chief justice on 30 April 1969. He served as

from 1968 until 1974.

Later life and death

Sir Albert Wolff died on 27 October 1977 at the Home of Peace, Subiaco, and was buried in the Jewish Orthodox section of Karrakatta Cemetery after a State funeral.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolff, Albert Asher 1899 births 1977 deaths Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George Chief Justices of Western Australia Judges of the Supreme Court of Western Australia People educated at Perth Modern School People from Geraldton Australian Jews Australian people of Russian-Jewish descent Burials at Karrakatta Cemetery

Early life

Judiciary career

Later life and death

See also

References