The Northern Rivers Times
November 30, 2023
4 NEWS
How trying to dodge a traffic fine could land you in jail By Tim Howard A Northern Rivers legal expert has warned that people who take dodgy legal advice from certain websites to keep them from paying traffic fines could end up in jail. Associate Professor David Heilpern, Dean of Law at Southern Cross University, presented his findings at a conference hosted by the University Technology Sydney on Friday. Associate Professor Heilpern, who spent more than 20 years as a magistrate on NSW Local Court circuits, was worried at the increase in number of people fronting court using “legal gobbledegook” to defend themselves. During his research for the paper for the The Pseudolaw and The Administration of Justice conference, Associate Professor Heilpern signed up to for-profit websites peddling the false promise people could use legal loopholes and tactics to get out of traffic offences. “Of most concern is that these websites and publications actually encourage subscribers to break the law in a manner that could lead them to prison,” he said. One of the aims of
Friday’s conference was to explore a range of issues associated with the troubling rise of the sovereign citizens movement. Associate Professor Heilpern described the movement as a disparate group of conspiracy theorists and anti-government activists bonded by the idea that government law does not apply to them unless they provide consent. He said the movement had its roots in the Southern USA among groups of people who had a deep hatred of parliamentary-style government. “They’re an offshoot of the Klu Klux Klan who have pro-segregationist beliefs and an intense hatred of paying taxes and laws that rein in their rights to own guns,” he said. “But we have our own versions of it here that grew during the 1950s, 60s and 70s. “In Western Australia there was the Hutt River Province, where Prince Leonard I of Hutt, proclaimed he’d seceded and set up his own country.” The fate of the Principality of Hutt River, as it came to be known, is a salutary lesson to those who give
sovereign citizen ideas credence. Between its establishment in 1970 and its collapse in 2020, the principality became a curiosity for its bizarre attitude to governments and the Australian Tax Office. One judge described the legal arguments the province employed as “fatuous, frivolous, and
the “Prince” failed to provide the ATO with certain documents. It was a portent of the eventual fate of the principality, which fell apart when the ATO came calling. On August 3 2020 the principality was formally dissolved with the ATO demanding the payment of millions in unpaid taxes across its
on the spectrum. He said in the past 18 months there had been three incidents where people expressing sovereign citizen beliefs had been killed. “There was the incident in Queensland last year when five people, including two police officers, were killed. “This year there was the siege in Newcastle
“I cannot believe that various federal and state consumer protection agencies have not shut these scam sites down given that they encourage serious criminal offences, and advise readers to use claims, tactics and legal arguments that have never worked in any court in Australia,” he said. He said existing laws were sufficient for the task, if the will was there to police them. Associate Professor Heilpern said he had also experience encouraging signs over the years. He recalled a case in Grafton Local Court
South Cross University Dean of Law David Heilpern has delivered a paper calling for certain websites offering dodgy advice to get out of paying traffic fines to be shut down. He describes them as “the gateway drug” for extreme right wing beliefs.
vexatious.” Perhaps the most bizarre occurred In 1977 when Prince Leonard declared war on Australia, but called it off a few days later. The reasoning – if you could call it that – was that under the Geneva Treaty Convention of 1949 a government should show full respect to a nation that remained undefeated after a state of war. A more likely explanation was it came a few months after
50-year history as well as the financial impact of Covid-19. The principality’s land was sold off to settle the tax dispute. Associate Professor Heilpern said the Hutt River example was a bizarre curiosity, but there was a dangerous “pointy end” to the sovereign citizens movement. He said using these ideas trying to get out of a traffic fine, was a “gateway drug” into the more dangerous beliefs
and and another in Lithgow where people either suicided or were killed by police Associate Professor Heilpern expressed frustration more wasn’t being done to rein in the movement. In one of the glaring examples uncovered as part of his work, a company was providing advice on how to provide a false statutory declaration – itself an offence – which would not absolve the driver in any event.
where an accused, Robert Sudy, sought to defend a matter using pseudo-legal arguments. “I spent some time with Mr Sudy explaining how none of the arguments he presented had any basis in law,” he said. He said Mr Sudy had changed his mind on this matter and gone on to set up a website, the Freeman Delusion, which had become one of the largest repositories of information debunking sovereign citizen beliefs. For more go to https:// freemandelusion.com
