In the end all the gangland snitch got was a silver pen, death threats and a royal commission.

She was once celebrated - a go-to lawyer for criminals wanting bail under tricky circumstances. But at the same time, unbeknownst to many of them, she was helping police tie up the cases against them.

For many years she did it with anonymity. While some came to suspect she was an informer - a snitch, a dog - they never had the proof they needed to expose her.

In March last year, Victoria Police's efforts to hide their wrongdoing and her identity came crashing down and Ms Gobbo was outed as Lawyer X.

Initially it was believed the woman, from a prominent legal family, had been sucked into the criminal underworld at the height of her career.

After graduating from Melbourne University she was admitted to practice as a lawyer in 1996 and became a barrister two years later.

It was thought she started informing in 2003 before officially signing up as Informer 3838 two years later, blaming gangland heavies Tony Mokbel and his family for her turn to the dark side of the criminal underworld.

But a royal commission into her informing uncovered that her tattling began before her legal career did.

In 1993 she escaped conviction for drug possession after police uncovered a cannabis stash in the house she shared with her boyfriend. She pointed them right to it, police said.

In 1995 she was registered as an informer when giving police tips about her ex-lover's continued drug crimes.

In 1999 she was back at it again, recruited by Jeff Pope - who would go on to become a Victoria Police assistant commissioner - to inform against her then-employer for money laundering. The investigation went nowhere.

The 2005 stint, running until 2010, was her most prolific. She claimed she was motivated solely by a desire to get the "Mokbel monkey" off her back - fearing her position as the family's lawyer would put her in danger.

She had other underworld clients too, including gangland killer Carl Williams and Moran family patriarch Lewis Moran. Williams was jailed for murdering Moran, and was later murdered himself.

A royal commission has found more than 1000 cases could have been tainted by the scandalous relationship between Ms Gobbo and Victoria Police. A final report is due to be released on Monday.

Mokbel reportedly bragged last year, before a prison stabbing that resulted in serious injuries, that he was confident the Lawyer X scandal would have him freed.

Already two people - Faruk Orman and Zlate Cvetanovski - have had their convictions overturned.

Her involvement varied - from spying on clients, sharing tidbits about their activities and leading police to drug labs. Later she convinced killers to roll on other killers, while representing them both.

Ultimately it was her involvement with ex-detective Paul Dale that brought things crashing down.

She turned from informer to witness to help police after wearing a wire to coax confessions from Mr Dale over the murder of her fellow police informer Terence Hodson. A murder charge against Mr Dale was dropped.

In 2010 she sued Victoria Police and received nearly $3 million after claiming they failed to protect her as a witness.

She feared death by "a bullet in the head" if her identity got out, so maintained a strategy of plausible deniability by hiding in plain sight.

"If this gets out, say nice things at my eulogy because I will be gone - and enjoy the royal commission," she once told handlers.

When that royal commission rolled around she spent months trying to avoid giving evidence, only to show up claiming she was happy to be there.

She confessed to being a spectacular liar and played the victim, telling the inquiry over the phone from a secure location that she had just wanted to belong.

Ultimately, she said going to Victoria Police was a mistake.

"Going to them was an insane, idiotic thing to do ... wrong on so many levels and what then transpired was just more craziness," she said.

Ms Gobbo often complained that she got little thanks for her informing.

In 2007 she was taken out for a thank you dinner and presented with a pen as a gift for her hard work - but it's a night she didn't recall fondly.

"What an awful night that was. I got a silver pen and watched them all get pissed. It was just insane," she said.

Less kind gifts were sent from the underworld - including two bullets in a sympathy card and a blown up car.

Ms Gobbo shut down her criminal law practice in 2009, around the same time she was officially deregistered by Victoria Police.

She held onto her practising certificate until 2013, but stopped working as a lawyer.

This year she accepted the reality that she would never again practise law in Victoria, agreeing to a Supreme Court order removing her from Victoria's bar roll.

Her whereabouts are currently unknown.

Australian Associated Press