Seven years since an anti-corruption watchdog began investigating secret payments, a former mayor and developer have faced court.

Former Casey mayor Sameh Aziz and property developer John Woodman appeared at Melbourne Magistrates Court today via video link over $1.2 million of allegedly corrupted payments.

They were each charged by Victoria’s Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission in early September.

Aziz has been charged with five offences including receiving secret commissions, misuse of position and misconduct in public office, and Woodman charged with giving secret commissions.

The two accused men are charged on summons and were told to reappear at court on February 2 for a committal mention.

Aziz’s barrister Justin Wheelahan told the court there had been media interest in the matter “for some time”.

Woodman’s barrister Andrew Tragardh, a specialist in fraud offending, successfully had his client’s suburb redacted from court documents as he is “a well-known figure”.

IBAC began preliminary investigations into allegations against Aziz in November 2017, with a full probe beginning the following year.

The watchdog held public hearings in 2019 and 2020, into allegations of corrupted council conduct over planning and property development decisions at the City of Casey in Melbourne’s southeast.

State parliament sacked the entire Casey council in February 2020.

It will be alleged that Aziz and another councillor had accepted almost $1.2 million in payments to promote Woodman and his client’s interests, and failed to declare it as a conflict of interest.

IBAC’s probe centred on four planning proposals allegedly involving Woodman and his clients, including one to rezone land in Cranbourne West as residential to increase its value.

Woodman unsuccessfully tried to stop IBAC releasing its final report, which made 34 recommendations.

Days after its release, in July 2023, Woodman and Aziz launched a colourful defence in an eccentric 90-minute press conference plagued by technical difficulties.

It involved snippets from a silent film, a poster stating “something is rotten in the state of IBAC”, in reference to a line from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and a video of a football bouncing across an NRL pitch.

Both men denied all corruption claims against them at the time, with Woodman saying there was nothing improper about donating to political parties as long as there was nothing expected in return.