But it was unclear from court documents whether or not police opposed bail for the man who allegedly went on to mow down dozens of pedestrians in the CBD six days later, Deputy Chief Magistrate Jelena Popovic said in a hearing on Wednesday.

Gargasoulas was on bail when he is alleged to have deliberately driven at pedestrians in Bourke Street about 1.30pm on Friday, killing five people - including a three-month-old baby boy and a 10-year-old girl - and hitting another 32 people. More charges are expected to be laid.

He was on bail over charges of speeding on the wrong side of the road and ignoring a police direction to stop, according to documents tendered to the Magistrates Court on Monday.

Gargasoulas was released by a bail justice at St Kilda police station on January 14.

The details of that hearing, and what was alleged in it, have so far been kept secret.

On Wednesday, Fairfax Media applied to the Magistrates Court to have documents associated with Gargasoulas' bail justice hearing released.

Magistrate Jelena Popovic refused the request.

However, she said the file before her did not disclose whether police had opposed bail.

"There is nothing on this file to indicate that," Ms Popovic said.

"It would indicate that the bail justice was told something by the police officer, which caused the bail justice to take the view that it was appropriate to grant bail."

The day after the Bourke Street tragedy, Mr Ashton and Mr Andrews told reporters police had opposed bail.

"A bail justice made the decision, police opposed that," said Mr Andrews, who pronounced himself "angry" with the decision.

"The courts are independent," Mr Ashton told reporters on Saturday."I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't reflect that police were often frustrated in relation to trying to keep people in custody and they're bailed."On Wednesday, a police spokeswoman told Fairfax: "I can confirm that bail was opposed by police ... at the out of sessions bail/remand hearing held at St Kilda Police Station".

Spokespeople for both Victoria Police and Mr Andrews said both stood by their comments.

Gargasoulas, 26, was interviewed by homicide squad detectives on Monday and charged with five counts of murder, but refused to appear before Melbourne Magistrates Court - as is his legal right - the same day, because he was unwell.

Ms Popovic presided over his first appearance in the Magistrates Court, and also Fairfax's application on Wednesday.

She requested that Fairfax not disclose the reasons for her refusing to release the documents.

Fairfax's bid to access the documents was also opposed by the Office of Public Prosecutions and Gargasoulas' defence team.

Senior Crown prosecutor Brendan Kissane said the bail justice hearing was not recorded, and releasing the documents without a recording of what was said could present a "potentially misleading" picture of what happened before the bail justice - who has not been named.

"To dig further than that is potentially going to have an impact on the ability of the accused to get a fair trial," he said.

Ms Popovic said based on the material before her, she believed some media reporting about the bail justice who released Gargasoulas was unfair.

- with Cameron Houston and Adam Cooper