Prominent nationalist activist Joel Davis will fight a racial vilification charge laid over a protest against the influence of Jewish lobby groups in Australian politics outside NSW Parliament last year.
Mr Davis, 31, appeared at Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court on Wednesday where he pleaded not guilty to “publicly inciting hatred on the grounds of race to cause fear” in relation to a speech he made at the rally involving 67 then-members of the now-disbanded National Socialist Network.
During his speech, where he stood in front of a banner reading “Abolish the Jewish lobby”, Mr Davis criticised the NSW government for bringing in new “hate speech” and anti-protest laws after a “pressure campaign” from Jewish lobby groups, and said the Anzacs “did not fight for a multicultural police state”.
NSW Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon told parliament on March 26 a review had found the protest, which was peaceful and pre-approved by police, did not breach any laws, but Mr Davis was charged in early May after the rally was mentioned at Australia’s ongoing Royal Commission into Anti-Semitism and Social Cohesion.
The day before Mr Davis was arrested, Peter Wertheim, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, which has frequently lobbied for stronger “hate speech” laws, told the anti-Semitism inquiry the demonstration should never have been approved by police.
“A person of colour could have passed by, a person wearing Jewish religious clothing or Muslim religious clothing,” Mr Wertheim told the Royal Commission.
“The risk to public safety that that would have constituted seemed to me to be a gross error of judgement.”
NSW Police said after the arrest the investigation was “undertaken by the Security Investigation Unit, Counter Terrorist and Special Tactics Command, who sought legal advice in relation to the public assembly and content of the speeches”.
Mr Davis remains on bail and will face court again in July over the protest, while a second case involving separate Commonwealth charges of “using a carriage service to menace, harass or offend”, for which he has already spent 133 days in custody on remand, was adjourned to the same date.
He is yet to enter a plea to the carriage service charges, which relate to an alleged Telegram post where he allegedly urged his followers to “rhetorically rape” federal Teal MP Allegra Spender in response to comments she made on social media calling for him to be jailed over the Jewish lobby rally.
Mr Davis is also facing nine Victorian “hate speech” charges over alleged podcast comments and an election stunt, and is also fighting a South Australian Nazi symbol charge over a belt buckle with an eagle, and is due in court in both states in coming months.
The NSW racial vilification offence, which Mr Davis was protesting against, came into effect in August after being brought in by Premier Chris Minns early last year, and carries a maximum penalty of two years’ imprisonment.
In February Sydney father Brandon Koschel, 31, was jailed for one year with a non-parole period of nine months after becoming the first person convicted under the new laws for an Australia Day speech where he called Jews the “greatest enemy to the nation”.
His sentence was reduced to 10 months with a six-month non-parole period on appeal, and NSW District Court Judge Tanya Smith noted in sentencing that the laws were created in response to a spate of anti-Semitic incidences in Sydney and “recognises the harm of hate speech and its potential to escalate into violence”.
The November 8 rally also resulted in the deportation of South African civil engineer Matthew Gruter, who had his visa cancelled by immigration minister Tony Burke after he was identified by far-left extremist activists working with Nine Newspapers and ABC News.
Header image: Left, right, Mr Davis at the rally (supplied).
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