NSW Justice Amendment Package Part 1: Expanded Police Powers and More Criminal Offences
The state’s chief law officer, attorney-general Mark Speakman, has been busy thinking of ways to strengthen and expand laws which criminalise citizens and empower police officers. As a result, our state parliament recently passed what might be described as a...
Drug Rehabilitation Programmes Reduce Reoffending Rates
The ACT will begin a new trial for drug and alcohol sentencing this week, favouring rehabilitation over prison time. The alternative sentencing arrangement will accept 35 people when it begins, giving these offenders the opportunity to spend time in rehabilitation...
Pregnant Mum Pleads Guilty to Multiple Fraud Offences
A pregnant mother of two has pleaded guilty to multiple fraud offences in Wollongong Local Court after police raided her home and found a criminal to-do-list sticky taped to her bedroom wall. The list detailed the criminal activities she would...
No Right to Know: Government is Secretly Prosecuting Australian Citizens
Bohemian novelist Franz Kafka’s 1915 novel The Trial tells the surreal tale of bank clerk Josef K, who awakens one morning to find that two agents working for an unidentified government agency have turned up to arrest him on unspecified...
Westpac Accused of Enabling Child Sex Trafficking
Most Australians were horrified when real-life examples of bad behaviour by banks came tumbling out during last year’s Royal Commission into Finance and Banking. But this week’s news that AUSTRAC (Australian Transactions Reports and Analysis Centre) has accused Westpac of...
Alan Jones Ordered to Pay for “Vicious and Spiteful” Attack on Aussie Family
We recently reported on the Wagner family of Toowoomba who were the recipients of a damages awards in excess of $3 million after a court found that Nine Network Australia and their journalist Nicholas Cater falsely reported that the family...
Ongoing Drug Supply Charges Can Remain in the Local Court
Supplying a prohibited drug on an ongoing basis - or ‘ongoing drug supply’ - is an offence under section 25A of the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985 which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and/or a...
Israel Folau’s Multi-Million Dollar Claim Against Rugby Australia – Baseless, Fair or Excessive?
Rugby fans around Australia have had mixed reactions to the news that Israel Folau has increased his claim against Rugby Australia to $14 million. The former Wallabies star and his former employer are expected to attend mediation in the coming...
Channel Nine Ordered to Pay Millions for Defaming Family
A court has ordered Nine Network Australia and journalist Nicholas Cater to pay four members of a Toowoomba family a total of more than $3 million for falsely reporting that they were responsible for floods that led to the destruction...
How Can I Get a Pro Bono Lawyer in New South Wales?
The Law Council of Australia warned in July that legal aid funding is at “breaking point”, following a high-profile murder trial in NSW having to be postponed because of the deplorably low pay rates that simply weren’t attracting barristers that...
