October 15, 2013
Bikies convicted of serious criminal activity in Queensland will serve 15 years of extra jail on top of sentences they receive for specific offences as part of the State Government crackdown on motorcycle clubs.
Office bearers will face an extra 25 years on top of their initial sentence.
Details of the State Government’s “Vicious Lawless Association Disestablishment Bill” were revealed in State Parliament today.
The extra punishment is mandatory and cannot be reduced by the sentencing court.
The maximum imprisonment for brawling in public – the offence of affray – will be increased from one year to seven years, with a mandatory six months’ jail.
Offenders’ bikes will be confiscated and crushed.
Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie told State Parliament today it would also be an offence for bikies to gather in groups at certain locations, promote or recruit.
The new offences, which will carry a mandatory minimum six month jail term (and a maximum of three years are:
- Knowingly gathering in groups of three or more members in a public place (including riding)
- Going to banned locations (eg. clubhouses)
- Promoting or recruiting for the organisation.
Bikies would also be banned from owning, operating or working in tattoo parlours.
Mr Bleijie said the Bail Act would also be amended to make it almost impossible for bikies to get bail while awaiting the hearing of charges.
The State Government will house its bikie prisoners in an ultra-secure facility at Woodford Correctional Centre where they will be monitored 24 hours a day.
In prison, bikies will face:
- Restricted hours out of their cell (potentially as little as one hour a day)
- Increased drug testing
- Frequent, proactive cell searches
- Only one hour non-contact visits with family members per week
- No TVs in their cells
- No access to gymnasium facilities
- All phone calls, other than to legal representatives, will be monitored by intelligence staff
- Mail to be opened, searched and censored.
Mr Bleijie said motorcycle gang members posed significant risks, even when behind bars.
“Make no mistake, if you do the crime, you will most definitely do the hard time,” he said.
Mr Bleijie said the reforms would also strengthen Queensland’s crime fighting bodies and courts.
“We will give the Crime and Misconduct Commission unprecedented powers to haul in CMG members and question them for intelligence gathering purposes. If members don’t co-operate, they face mandatory jail time,” Mr Bleijie said.
“If they don’t answer questions during coercive hearings by the Crime and Misconduct Commission, they face mandatory jail time for contempt. If they refuse again, they get more jail time.”
Mandatory jail terms for contempt are:
- First offence – at the Supreme Court’s discretion
- Second offence – 2½ years’ jail
- Third offence – five years’ jail
Premier Campbell Newman said the anti-bikie gang laws were the toughest in the world.
“They are not designed to contain the gangs or manage them. They are designed to destroy them,” he told the Courier-Mail newspaper.
[UPDATED]
