Charges dismissed
against alleged bikies detained under Queensland's anti-association laws
Posted 18 minutes ago
RELATED STORY: Gold Coast police arrest five suspected
Victorian bikies
MAP: Southport 4215
Charges have been dismissed against five alleged bikies detained under
Queensland's anti-association laws.
The men were arrested while buying ice-cream when they were on holiday
in Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast last year.
Police offered no evidence against the men during the hearing at
Southport Magistrates Court.
Bane Alajbegovic, Dario Halilovic, Kresmir Basic, Darren Haley and
Daniel Lovett, from Dandenong in Victoria, were charged with being a
participant in a criminal organisation and being knowingly present in
public places with two or more people who are participants in a criminal
organisation.
None of the men were in court for the hearing but outside court, the
solicitor for some of the men, Bill Potts, described the laws as a
political stunt.
"Their only sin, their only crime, was to buy an ice-cream in a public
place - the great controversy here was whether it was going to be choc
top or vanilla," he said.
"There was no crime, there was no planned crime - all these people were
doing was walking down a street and for two of them, sitting in a closed
and locked hotel room when the police charged them with these offences."