Appointment of Judge of the High Court

  • Paul East
Attorney-General

The Attorney-General Paul East announced today the appointment of John Warwick Gendall of Wellington as a Judge of the High Court. Justice Gendall graduated with an LLM (Hons) from Victoria University of Wellington in 1967 and was a Teaching Fellow at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, Canada from 1967 to 1968.

He joined the Wellington firm of Buddle Findlay in 1968 and remained with them until he commenced practice as a barrister sole in 1986. He was appointed a Queen's Counsel in 1996.

He was a council member of the Wellington District Law Society between 1973 and 1983 and served as President between 1982 and 1983. He was also an Executive Member of the New Zealand Law Society between 1982 and 1983 and served as Vice President in 1985. Between 1982 and 1985 he chaired the Wellington District Legal Aid Committee.

He served as Chairman of the Handicapped Children's Appeal Board between 1981 and 1985, and in 1990 contributed to the Department of Justice working paper on matrimonial property. He was also a member of the Department of Justice National Advisory Committee for the Prevention of Child Abuse between 1984 and 1986. Between 1985 and 1995 he was a trustee of the Todd Foundation, as an appointee of the New Zealand Law Society.

More recently he has been a member of the Crown Prosecutors Panel in Wellington and Chairman of the New Zealand Accountants Society Appeal Board. He has also been Chairman of the Motor Vehicle Dealers Disciplinary Committee and the Pharmaceutical Society Disciplinary Committee. He has also been a member of the Legal Aid Review Authority. He has also acted as legal assessor to the Medical Practitioners Disciplinary Committee, the Nursing Council of New Zealand and the Psychological Society of New Zealand. He was an Appeal Judge for the New Zealand Racing Conference, and a member of the Courts Consultative Sub-Committee on TV and Radio Broadcasting in Courts.

Outside of the Law Justice Gendall has been President of AFS International Scholarships and Senior Vice President of the New Zealand Football Association. He has also been a member of the Australian and New Zealand Sports Law Association. He is an elder of St Ronans Presbyterian Church at Eastbourne.

The new Judge's appointment commences on 1 October 1996. He will sit in Wellington.