The Guardian
An inventive duo who’ve spent nearly two years embroiled in authorized proceedings linked to a Sydney protest and hashish legal guidelines that they had all the costs in opposition to them.
The couple, who’ve been on bail for practically two years, have been awarded $2,750 every by a choose on Friday for a number of the authorized charges they incurred.
Artists Alec Zammitt and Will Stolk, along with a gaggle of activists beneath the banner “who’re we hurting?”, organized an illustration in Sydney on April 20, 2022 to assist reform round New South Wales steerage laws for medicinal hashish sufferers
The group projected pro-cannabis lights and pictures on the Sydney Opera Home and Harbor Bridge as a part of their protest, utilizing high-powered lasers at 4.20am, coordinated from inside a lodge room. Police went to the lodge and questioned Zammitt for about 40 minutes, he informed Guardian Australia. Stolk was additionally questioned.
In court docket on Friday, the prosecution withdrew its prices, and the duo's legal professionals pushed for prices.
Zammitt's legal professional, James Clements, argued that it was solely Zammitt and Stolk who have been being handled as suspects within the matter. Two girls have been additionally within the room at one level and there was a photographer exterior, the court docket heard.
Clements argued that the pair admitted guilt beneath the affect of a menace from Chief Insp Gary Coffey, the officer in cost. At a earlier listening to in August final 12 months, the Justice of the Peace, Daniel Reiss, thought of proof from the prosecution to be inadmissible beneath s84 of the Proof Act, because it was thought of that Zammitt was influenced by the specter of “oppressive conduct”.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/feb/09/sydney-opera-house-harbour-bridge-cannabis-protest-court-case-dropped-activists
