Bob Brown’s lawyers want trespass charges against him and fellow activists dropped following an incident during an anti-logging protest near Snow Hill on Tasmania’s east coast last year.
Brown, Kristy Lee Alger and Karen Lynne Weldrick were arrested for allegedly trespassing while attempting to protect the nesting habitat of the critically endangered swift parrot in the state’s Eastern Tiers on November 8.
In the Hobart Magistrates Court on Tuesday, lawyers argued that there is ‘no valid case’ against Brown and requested the court drop the charges.
Their argument is based on the claim that the legislation used by Forestry Tasmania to arrest the trio was invalid for this purpose.
The activists each face a single count of trespass to which they have pleaded not guilty.
The court heard that a swift parrot nesting tree was cut down after the arrest over safety concerns, with Brown viewing it as “act of official vandalism and spite”.
“Whatever the outcome on this legal question, I maintain that the logging where I was arrested, at Snow Hill, was illegal,” Brown said outside the court.
“It was part of the destruction of habitat which is sending the swift parrot, as well as other Tasmanian native species, to extinction.”
All three will reappear before Magistrate Jackie Hartnett on Wednesday morning.
