Trial by Media in the Internet Age
The growth of the internet generally, and social media in particular, has led two senior legal minds to warn that many Australians might not be getting a fair trial. Verdict based on the evidence Juries are meant to return their...
Panther, Prisoner, Professor: A Profile of Angela Davis
Angela Davis has been at the forefront of subversive political thought since the mid-60s. Currently, emerita professor in the History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Ms Davis has been constantly fighting oppression throughout her career. Davis grew...
Corruption and Nepotism Within the Queensland Police Force
As reported in a previous blog, two senior crime managers on the Gold Coast raised concerns in January about crime data being manipulated by members of the force in an effort to make it appear that crime and complaints are...
Possession or Use of a Firearm: What Do Courts Look at During Sentencing?
Many of the offences relating to the possession or use of firearms in New South Wales are contained in the Firearms Act 1996 (NSW) (‘the Act’). The Act was introduced as part of a national campaign to strengthen gun control,...
Pay Your Rates, or the Council May Sell Your Home
Many are predicting that home loan interest rates will soon start rising again. The likely impact on many Australian families will be ‘mortgage stress’ - a financial burden that is set to become a big problem all around Australia, as...
Cardinal George Pell May Never Face Trial in Australia
Earlier this week, Victorian police confirmed they had received advice from the State’s Director of Public Prosecutions regarding historic allegations of child sexual assault against former-Sydney Archbishop George Pell. While police are yet to announce whether formal charges will be...
Intersectional Oppression in the Criminal Justice System
Intersectionality is the concept that people are made up of multiple social identities, such as gender, ethnicity, class and sexual orientation. These aspects of identity are not mutually exclusive. They intersect to form a whole, which differs from the separate components....
First Test for NSW Anti-Protest Laws
Three people from a small community in New South Wales are facing up to seven years in prison after protesting against expansion plans for a coal mine located near the tiny town of Wollar where they live. Bev Smiles, Bruce...
“Free My Father”: An Interview with Jewher Ilham
On September 23 2014, peaceful Uyghur rights advocate Ilham Tohti was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Xinjiang People’s High Court in western China on separatism charges. The two-day trial was condemned as “grossly unfair” by human rights activists around the world....
Welfare Drug Testing Is an Invasive Punishment of the Poor
During his budget speech, Australian treasurer Scott Morrison announced that the federal government will “commence a modest drug testing trial for 5,000 new welfare recipients.” And those with a positive test result will be put onto cashless welfare cards. Australian social...
