Infamous financial institution robber and fugitive Brenden James Abbott is searching for to have his detention declared illegal and can be suing the Western Australian authorities for wrongful imprisonment.
Forbes Kirby Attorneys, who act for the profession felony often known as ‘the Postcard Bandit’, filed judicial evaluation proceedings on Tuesday within the WA Supreme Court docket, searching for to invalidate Abbott’s jail sentence.
Abbott, 62, who escaped from Fremantle Jail in 1989, claims that sentencing legal guidelines launched in November 1996 don’t apply to him and that his WA custodial sentence lapsed whereas he was in custody in Queensland.
The notorious robber has an intensive felony historical past and earned his nickname by taunting police with postcards whereas on the run.
He’s additionally searching for to problem the constitutional validity of the legal guidelines, which require an inmate returned to jail after an escape to serve a further interval of imprisonment equal to one-third of the time they have been at massive, on high of the time that they had but to serve when escaping.
Infamous financial institution robber and fugitive Brenden James Abbott is searching for to have his detention declared illegal. Abbott is pictured left, with Japanese vacationer Masao Ayuda in Alice Springs in 1990
Abbott (pictured), 62, who escaped from Fremantle Jail in 1989, claims that sentencing legal guidelines launched in November 1996 don’t apply to him and that his WA custodial sentence lapsed whereas he was in custody in Queensland
Abbott claims the imposition of a sentence with out the intervention of a court docket ‘offends’ the strict separation of the judiciary and legislative arms of presidency at federal stage.
His attorneys say that the case could finally have to be decided by the Excessive Court docket.
Counsel for Abbott, Matthew Crowley, stated the actual query was ‘not whether or not we like Mr Abbott or not’.
‘Views will differ about that, identical to they did about Ned Kelly 150 years in the past,’ he stated.
‘The true query is the constitutional energy the state has to maintain individuals in jail after their sentences finish – with out trial, verdict, or sentence – even when they do not like them.’
Mr Crowley stated that if Abbott’s motion was profitable, it will imply that he had been falsely imprisoned in WA since as early as Might 2016.
Abbott is a most safety inmate at Perth’s Casuarina Jail, the place he’s serving a 14-year sentence for financial institution theft, a jail riot and escaping from Fremantle Jail in 1989.
He was extradited to Perth in Might 2016 after serving 18 years in Brisbane prisons, following his recapture in Darwin in Might 1998.
He had escaped from Sir David Longland Jail in Brisbane in November 1997, the place he was serving a sentence for financial institution robberies on the Gold Coast.
Abbott had been arrested on the Gold Coast in March 1995, five-and-a-half years after he escaped from Fremantle Jail and launched into a covert life as a fugitive, suspected of robbing banks in WA, SA and Queensland of as much as $5million.
Abbott is technically eligible for parole in WA in October 2026. However as a prisoner who has served greater than 25 years, however isn’t topic to a life sentence, his state of affairs is exclusive.
There’s a real prospect Abbott won’t ever be granted parole and will not be launched till his most time period expires in January 2033, which might be 34 years and eight months after his recapture in Darwin.
Abbott stays topic to a Excessive Safety Escort classification, which means that if he’s required to depart jail for causes resembling a court docket look or medical consideration, he could be topic to stringent safety measures.
Prisoners with such a classification are routinely detained in most safety, which implies they’re ineligible to be thought-about for switch to a self-care unit, or to take part within the jail’s resocialisation program.
The notorious robber (pictured) has an intensive felony historical past and earned his nickname by taunting police with postcards whereas on the run
Abbott is pictured below escort to the Brisbane Police watch-house after being denied bail on the Brisbane Magistrates Court docket on April 12, 2016
This program is mostly reserved for inmates serving life sentences.
The WA Corrective Providers Division’s protocol states that resocialisation packages for inmates serving fixed-term sentences are ‘typically discouraged, as usually they’re eligible to use for release-planning actions as a sentenced prisoner, if and after they obtain a minimal safety standing and placement’.
However Abbott can not obtain a minimal safety standing due to his classification and jail authorities insist he stays an escape threat, regardless of there being no escape makes an attempt since his 1998 recapture.
In 2017, he was sentenced to a concurrent five-year jail time period for the 1989 Fremantle Jail escape.
