The Empire Strikes Back: Guilty twice in one day

Drug law reform campaigners have received guilty verdicts in two cases in Darwin today.

NAP (Network Against Prohibition) members Rob Indersmith and Gary Meyerhoff were both found guilty of “failing to comply with the instruction of an authorised officer” for failing to dismantle the drug users’ embassy from the grounds of parliament house on the 2nd of May last year. A third NAP member, Roy Waters was found not guilty.

Rob and Gary were each fined $300, $40 victims compensation levy (the victim being the government) and $560 each for court costs, to pay for the private prosecutor who handled our case, thankyou Tom Berkely.

Interestingly, Magistrate Jenny Blockland found that Roy, Rob and Gary were not covered by the Geneva Convention, as claimed by the NAP team, because the war on drugs is not a conflict. This argument needs to be refined for further court battles.

Later in the day, 5 NAP and PARIAH (People Against Racism in Aboriginal Homelands) members, Ema Birkeland-Corro, Mick Lambe, Rob Indersmith, Stuart Highway and Gary Meyerhoff were found guilty of “deliberately disrupting the legislative assembly whilst it is in motion.” The magistrate, Dick Wallace reached his decision within an hour of the final submissions from the defendants. Surprise, surprise.

He ignored our argument that the entry into parliament was an expression of our right to freedom of speech. In fact, this case has shown that in Australia we have a right to freedom of speech but governments can legislate this out of existence. We have no bill of rights in Australia. Another blow for democracy.

Wallace denied that NAP members had been provoked by the NT establishment. Although he conceded police harassment and the laying of frivolous charges, he stated that not enough wrongful acts had been committed against NAP members to warrant our entry into the chamber.

He also denied that the ongoing war on drugs was a wrongful act, in that it was expressly lawful. Governments have passed laws to make this genocide legal. Gary reminded Wallace that the genocide of five million Jewish people in Europe in the forties was also lawful, and carried out by a democratically elected government with the support of judges and magistrates. Wallace said that many people had been hanged as a result of this, after the war. NAP members retorted that many people may also hang when the drug war ends, and it is found to be a wrongful act, genocide.

Sentencing for this matter has been adjourned until 10am on the 23rd of May 2003 at the Darwin Magistrate’s Court. The maximum penalty for the offence is three years imprisonment.

When asked by ABC TV reporter Kate Carter whether the NAP/PARIAH team was surprised by the verdict, Gary said “what do you expect when the magistrate is paid $4000 a week by the government. This case just shows that Australia is not a democracy and that we don’t have a right to protest.”

The NAP/PARIAH team will appeal both decisions in the Northern Territory Supreme Court.