Don,
You forgot the 'assault' charge for wrenching away too hard or any other reason the
cop can come up with.
I remember seeing an amateur video on TV that showed two policemen beating up several
Aboriginal people with
their truncheons and yet the Indigenous people were charged with the triple whammy.
Never heard if the police ever had to explain themselves.
Trudy
Don Clark wrote:
> One thing the police have been doing for years by utilising the offensive
> language laws is the 'trifecta', well known to Aboriginal people. It works
> like this.
>
> A patrol van may hear an alert of, say, a break and enter in the district.
> while cruising along they stop and pull up an Aboriginal person. They will
> ask about the offence stating they have reason to believe, etc......
>
> That person will usually tell the copper to 'fuck off', or something
> similar.
>
> The officer will then try to apprehend the person and will lay hands on him
> for the purpose of arresting the 'offender'. The 'offender' will try to get
> away, knowing what very well may happen to him if he is arrested. Ergo he
> is 'resisting arrest'.
>
> Now when the court case comes up for judgement there will be no mention of
> the break and enter they originally stopped him for. However, the charge
> will be 'offensive language and resist arrest'. The person will be fined
> and/or gaoled for the offence.
>
> To my knowledge there has never been a magistrate willing to stand up and
> ask what they were doing with the man in the first place. There has never
> been a magistrate who has called this harassment. There has never been a
> magistrate who has questioned the police tactics. So a man/woman,
> ostensibly innocent, will be sent to gaol.
>
> This is just one of the ways police keep indigenous incarceration rates up.
> Tricky buggers aren't they?
>
> Don
>
> Don Clark
> President
> Indigenous Social Justice Association
> PO Box K555
>
> There can be no real reconciliation without social justice
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> HAYMARKET NSW 1240
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Trudy Bray <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: news-clip <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Wednesday, 1 September 1999 11:05
> Subject: SMH - F-word has lost its power to offend, magistrate rules
>
> > F-word has lost its power to offend, magistrate rules
> >
> > Date: 01/09/99
> >
> > By DEBRA JOPSON
> >
> > A NSW magistrate has ruled that the word "f---" is not offensive language
> and has suggested it is time for a policy change.
> >
> > "The word f--- is extremely commonplace now and has lost much of its
> punch," said Mr David Heilpern, in Dubbo Local Court, as he
> > dismissed an offensive language charge against an 18-year-old Aboriginal
> man.
> >
> > It is the first time a magistrate has so openly criticised the legal
> standing of the "F" word since Ms Pat O'Shane dismissed charges, nine
> > years ago against a man who called police "f---ing poofters".
> >
> > She said using "collateral damage" to describe human war casualties was
> worse.
> >
> > In the Dubbo case, Mr Shannon Thomas Dunn allegedly told a police officer
> to "f--- off" when the policeman held on to the handlebars
> > of a bike he was riding.
> >
> > However, community standards had changed and this word was used in school
> playgrounds every day, Mr Heilpern said in his judgment.
> > It was common on television and he had heard it twice recently in a
> PG-rated movie.
> >
> > "If your children like Triple J and listen to it in the morning, one
> cannot help be assailed by the word 'f---' with regularity between
> > mouthfuls of toast."
> >
> > Microphones regularly picked up football heroes using it. They might be
> sin-binned, but were not charged.
> >
> > "We live in an era where Federal ministers use the word over the telephone
> to constituents and are not charged."
> >
> > Even on the conservative Internet search engine Infoseek more than 2.5
> million Web sites indexed the word. On country-town streets, it
> > could be heard as a term of affection.
> >
> > Although it "may be difficult to comprehend from the leafy suburbs of
> Sydney", many witnesses in his courts seemed unable to speak a
> > sentence without "f---" in it.
> >
> > Mr Heilpern said that each day there were about 200 cases involving
> offensive language in NSW local courts. Aborigines accounted for
> > 15 times more of these offences than others, which affected their
> employment prospects.
> >
> > His comments came as the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics revealed that in
> the 12 months to June there had been more than a 37 per
> > cent increase over the previous year in offensive-language offences
> recorded by police.
> >
> > The head of the bureau, Dr Don Weatherburn, said he was concerned about
> the cost of court proceedings for offensive language. Giving
> > people a criminal record for a minor offence was no way to help them out
> of crime.
> >
> > The director of Sydney University's Institute of Criminology, Mr Chris
> Cuneen, said some police were ignoring instructions to use
> > summons, rather than arrest, for offensive-language charges. Mr Heilpern
> noted that the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in
> > Custody report said: "It is surely time that police learnt to ignore mere
> abuse, let alone simple 'bad language'."
> >
> > This material is subject to copyright and any unauthorised use, copying or
> mirroring is prohibited.
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Uproar to indifference: tracking the F-word
> >
> > Date: 01/09/99
> >
> > 1975 Graham Kennedy appeared to mouth it on TV, causing uproar.
> >
> > 1988 A magistrate, citing community standards, found the word not
> offensive in the case of a man who used it in a street brawl. Justice
> > Yeldham in the Supreme Court upheld his decision. 1991 Magistrate Pat
> O'Shane dismissed a charge against a man who called police
> > "f---ing poofters". She said using "collateral damage" to describe human
> casualties in the Gulf War was more offensive. Reversing the
> > decision, Justice Studdert said community standards had not slipped that
> far.
> >
> > 1993 Justice McInerney found that it was offensive that an Aboriginal man
> called out "F--- off, you white c---s ..." to a crowd. Justice
> > Dunford subsequently agreed.
> >
> > 1995 Justice Herron in the Police Tribunal found a sergeant's use of
> "f---" in a police office foyer was "probably not offensive". At
> > appeal, Justice Meagher agreed.
> >
> > 1999 Comedian Rob Sitch said to a woman on a late-night TV talk show, "Who
> the f--- are you?" Channel 10 reported little viewer
> > reaction.
> >
> > NSW Parents and Citizens Federation president Ms Bev Baker said the word
> "f---" was acceptable in her house, but "wog" was not. The
> > NSW Director-General of Education, Dr Ken Boston, considered f---
> unacceptable
> >
> > This material is subject to copyright and any unauthorised use, copying or
> mirroring is prohibited.
> >
> > [
> >
> >
> > *************************************************************************
> > This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without
> > permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment,
> > scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal
> > copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of
> > the copyright owner, except for "fair use."
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