reach an out of court settlement in another matter where a house had been used in relation to the cultivation of cannabis. In that case the defendant agreed to pay the Territory a significant sum of money to discharge a forfeiture action for his house.

There was a decrease in the number of matters pursued in the last financial year due, in large part, to prosecutorial resources being focused on the Blitz. There will however, be a significant increase in actions pursued in the following reporting period, and the Magistrates Court has agreed to standing confiscation of criminal assets list to facilitate this.

During the reporting period the following activity took place:

• Number of matters referred to DPP by AFP – 14
• Value referred - $1,338,585.00
• Value of restrained property for financial year - $1,273,890.00
• Value of forfeited property for financial year - $549,572.83
• Applications to restrain property – 3
• Applications for conviction forfeiture orders – 1
• Applications for buy back order – 1 (agreed by this office)
• Applications for unclaimed tainted property – nil

REGULATORY MATTERS

The Office prosecutes regulatory matters referred to it by ACT Government agencies and the RSPCA in respect of legislation those agencies administer.

The management of the regulatory practice is an escalating challenge for the Office. These matters can sometimes involve tricky or complex legal and factual issues. In addition, these matters tend to be investigated by staff who are not highly trained as investigators or experienced in investigations. For this reason, briefs of evidence that are submitted are of variable quality. Also, briefs are sometimes submitted just before statutory time limits expire, and this presents challenges for proper dispositions of matters when the general work of the Office is so consistently busy.

Within the Office, the regulatory practice is managed by a dedicated prosecutor who has responsibility for allocating regulatory files and liaising with the regulatory agencies. Each regulatory matter is allocated to a particular prosecutor who retains carriage of it from the beginning to the end of the prosecution.

Discussions with a variety of regulatory agencies suggest a dramatic increase in the number of regulatory matters being referred to the Office within the next financial year.

The variety of matters is shown by the following table, and some regulatory matters are set out in the Case Reports section of this report. During the reporting period, the following matters were finalised:

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ANNUAL REPORT  2011-12  DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS                                                                                    26

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