Indigenous Man Dies After Being Restrained by NSW Prison Guards
On December 29 last year, David Dungay, an Indigenous man from Kempsey in NSW, died in custody at Sydney’s Long Bay Correctional Complex in Matraville. The 26-year-old Dunghutti man was eating biscuits in the prison’s mental health unit, when he...
Motion Passed to End Sniffer Dog Operations and Introduce Pill Testing
Last Wednesday, an Australian Greens motion passed before the federal Senate calling on the Turnbull government to introduce a range of harm minimisation policies. These include the introduction of pill testing trials at this year’s upcoming festival season and the...
Judicial Appointments: Politics or Merit?
The appointment of Tim Carmody to the position of Queensland’s Chief Justice on 8 July 2014, was one of the most controversial decisions in Australia’s recent legal history. Carmody had previously held the position of Chief Magistrate of the Local...
Stop Arresting People for Drugs! Nimbin Locals Protest
On August 31 this year, another of Nimbin’s so-called “Lane Boys” was arrested at Nimbin police station under Strike Force Cuppa, a cross-border police investigation into the large scale supply of cannabis in the NSW Northern Rivers town. The 26-year-old...
Racial Imbalance in the NSW Judiciary
On April 26 this year, Victorian attorney-general Martin Pakula announced the appointment of Urfa Masood to the Magistrates’ Court of Victoria. Ms Masood, who is of Sri Lankan background, began practising as a solicitor with the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service...
Bogus Books Delivered to Sydney Mosques Defame Uyghur Leader
Two weeks ago, boxes containing hundreds of copies of a book defaming the character of exiled Uyghur leader Rebiya Kadeer were mysteriously dropped off out the front of several Sydney mosques. The incident seems to be an attempt to discredit...
Drug Consumption Rooms: Minimising Harm to Users and the Community
Over the last decade, patterns of illicit drug use have changed around Australia. In 2001, when the Uniting Medically Supervised Injecting Centre (MSIC) was established in Kings Cross, there was an epidemic of heroin overdoses in the local area. But...
Jury Deliberation Are Not Always Secret, says High Court
The cloak of secrecy that usually surrounds jury deliberations was recently lifted when the Western Australian Court of Appeal investigated the implications of a “mysterious note” written by a juror. The note, addressed to the District Court judge, had been...
Police Breach Legal Protocols in the Lead-up to Indigenous Death in Custody
NSW police detained Rebecca Maher early on the morning of July 19 this year on the side of Wollombi Road in Cessnock. Police say they were responding to reports from passing motorists about her highly intoxicated state. At around 1am,...
Should Injecting Rooms Be Open to Pregnant Women?
NSW Health is currently undertaking a mandatory review of the Uniting Medically Supervised Injecting Centre (MSIC) in Kings Cross. The centre - the only one of its kind in Australia - was established in 2001 in response to an epidemic...
