What is funny about that story Sillygostly? This is horrific and tragic.  

'Give yourself up, Chris'
Dan Oakes, Leo Shanahan and AAP
June 20, 2007

THE alleged killer Christopher Wayne Hudson was a wanted man before Monday's triple shooting in Melbourne. Police said he was probably responsible for a shooting at a truck factory in the city's north a week ago.

Police said the Hells Angels bikie, 29, had an "extensive" criminal history and remained "very dangerous", as his distraught parents pleaded for him to give himself up peacefully.

Hudson's father, Terry, at a news conference on the Gold Coast, revealed he had spoken to his son by phone an hour after the shooting. "Dad, I love you," Hudson had told his father.

Terry Hudson pleaded yesterday: "Please, Chris, if you are watching this, surrender peacefully to the nearest police station to avoid any further conflict or injury, including yourself."

His voice breaking, Mr Hudson added: "Mate, we love you. Please give in. Give up."

Victoria's Police Commissioner, Christine Nixon, described Hudson as "out of control" after he shot dead Brendan Keilar, 43, a solicitor, and wounded a Dutch backpacker, 25.

Both men, widely praised as good Samaritans, had tried to stop Hudson attacking his girlfriend, Kaera Douglas, 24, a former Sydney model, who was also shot. Earlier, it is alleged, he viciously attacked her friend, Autumn Daly-Holt, outside a nightclub.

On her MySpace website, Ms Douglas paints herself as a party girl who loves movies, going out, being in love and "anything fast". Her webpage is emblazoned with Harley Davidson emblems and features dozens of snaps of her and friends, some in raunchy poses. She was in a serious but stable condition in Royal Melbourne Hospital last night.

Mr Keilar's widow, Alice, and his children, Charlie, 8, Phoebe, 6, and Lucy, 4, spent yesterday at their East Hawthorn home. Neighbours laid flowers at the fence. Mr Keilar's father, Harry, at Warrnambool, said: "[Anger] doesn't come into it with me. It's the loss of our son and the wife and children he's left behind. What happens to him [the killer] at this stage doesn't worry me one bit."

Brendan Keilar had recently bought a beach house at Point Lonsdale. A fortnight ago, the extended Keilar clan - including Brendan's five siblings - spent a long weekend there. "We all just had a wonderful weekend … something to remember," his mother, Moya, said. "The kids brought their rabbit and guinea pigs. He was very excited."

The family of the Dutch tourist were on their way to Australia yesterday and requested that his name not be made public.

By last night both cars linked to Hudson - a late model black Mercedes and a NSW-registered black Honda CRV - had been found, the former in the underground car park of an apartment block in Richmond. Ms Nixon confirmed Hudson had been wanted after shots were fired about 5am last Tuesday from a black Mercedes into the Scania truck company's headquarters at Campbellfield, near the Hells Angels' clubhouse on Melbourne's northern fringe.

Although Hudson was the probable culprit, Ms Nixon said there had been little possibility of catching him before Monday. "This is a big city, 3.5 million people. We're trying to find someone in it. We had resources focused on him, but we didn't find him."

Ms Nixon defended a police decision not to release a photograph of Hudson until late on Monday night, saying: "We might have had the wrong person."

Hudson was shot in the jaw and back in March last year during a brawl at a kickboxing tournament on the Gold Coast. A court heard it was payback for his defection from the Finks bike gang to the Hells Angels.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/give-yourself-up-chris/2007/06/19/1182019118052.html

Gunman 'ready to surrender'
Reko Rennie
June 20, 2007 - 12:14PM


Police are investigating "reports" violent Hells Angels bikie Christopher Wayne Hudson, the suspect in Melbourne's triple shooting, is about to surrender.

A national manhunt is under way for the 29-year-old Hells Angels member after he allegedly shot dead one man and injured two people in a peak-hour shooting rampage in Melbourne on Monday.

Victoria Police said they had heard a "rumour" that Hudson was about to hand himself in.

"That's a rumour going around and so we're getting numerous calls, but ... he hasn't made any contact with us or anything so we don't know where that has come from,'' a Victoria Police spokesman said.

"Police can confirm that at this time Hudson has not been in contact with police and has not turned himself in," the statement says.

'Dead man walking'

AAP reports: Hudson is a dead man walking, an expert on outlaw motorcycle gangs says.

But while his parents yesterday urged him to give himself up, Monash University's Arthur Veno said Hudson was "a goner".

Dr Veno, an expert on motorcycle gangs and former director of Monash's Centre for Police and Justice Studies, said Hudson had devastated the Hells Angels' reputation and they would be out for revenge.

Even if Hudson was arrested by police and jailed, he was not likely to survive in jail as both the Hells Angels and his former club, the Finks, had members behind bars who could get to him, he said.

"In that context, his future is very grim indeed," Dr Veno told AAP.

"He's a man on the run with nowhere to go.

"The best case scenario would be he'll just go 'missing', and the worst case scenario is a very nasty shoot-out somewhere.

"One way or another, he's going down. He's a dead man walking."

Dr Veno said Hudson was likely to be sleeping in cars and had probably already fled across the Victorian border, but there was no way he would have been able to escape overseas.

He said Hudson had a long record of violence against women and he was shocked the Hells Angels took him on as a member when he defected from the Finks.

The defection led to an attempt on his life at a kickboxing match in Queensland last year, he said.

Dr Veno said motorcycle gangs were under intense political pressure to clean up their images and the killing would damage their reputations.

"Now the club that takes him on is at the very forefront of an international attempt to define their club, the Hells Angels in particular, as organised crime entities, and at a time where we're facing an election year where fear politics is going to raise their head again," he said.

"In that context, this guy has brought such unbelievable heat on the club, he's completely blown any chance of the club itself preserving its image in a way that distances itself from any country where they have branded that club as a criminal entity."

Dr Veno also dismissed Federal Government calls to take outlaw motorcycle gangs off the streets.

"They have tried that in several countries ... and it made no dent on it whatsoever," he said.

"The clubs seemed to grow with all the wrong sorts of people. By attacking the clubs as a whole, it causes cohesion."

Dr Veno said the best way of removing the criminal element from such clubs was through self-policing.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/gunman-ready-to-surrender/2007/06/20/1182019165715.html

Quoted from SuziH

What is funny about that story Sillygostly? This is horrific and tragic.  

I think silly was chuckling at the stupidity of the parents.

Quoted from Paula

I think silly was chuckling at the stupidity of the parents.

Which I agree is amusing  

You got me.

Quoted from Sillygostly

lmao @ aquamonkey's story.

Sorry Silly, I misread who you were laughing at, please forgive me. You are Sillygostly and I am quite often, SillySuzi! Yes, the parents in Aqua's post must think that everyone came down in the shower that came after the one they came down in!

Quoted Text

Protesters rally on indigenous issues
Activists rallied in Sydney today in protest at Aboriginal deaths in custody and the Federal Government's plan to eliminate indigenous child sex abuse.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,21945466-1702,00.html

So they're protesting against eliminating child abuse.........?  

SA population growth highest in 15 years
Posted Fri Jun 22, 2007 5:00pm AEST

Bank SA and Access Economics have released a survey showing that South Australia's rate of population growth has risen, driven largely by immigration and fewer young people moving interstate.

Population growth is at a 15-year high.

Bank SA managing director Rob Chapman says migration is at a 30-year high.

"Our solid economy, job opportunities and housing affordability are all making SA a more popular place to live," he said.

The bulletin also says that better rainfall recently has seen rural commodity prices ease slightly.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/22/1959530.htm

Policeman appeals sacking over oral sex drug case
By Nicky Haydon

Posted 2 hours 6 minutes ago

Map: Brisbane 4000
A Queensland police officer who was sacked for having sex with a bikie associate and giving her information about a drug operation is seeking to have his dismissal overturned by the Supreme Court.

Former Gold Coast Senior Constable Peter Chapman was sacked in September last year for having oral sex with an associate of the Finks motorcycle gang.

He had also accessed confidential police files and passed on information to her about a drug dealer.

Chapman was originally fined $150 by an internal police disciplinary hearing but the Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) appealed against that decision, saying it was too lenient.

Chapman was then found guilty of all three charges by the Misconduct Tribunal and sacked.

At a judicial review of the case, Chapman's barrister argued the tribunal failed to consider all aspects of the case when coming to its decision.

Justice James Douglas will deliver his ruling in one month

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/23/1959743.htm?section=justin

Lends a whole new meaning to the term 'undercover', doesn't it?  

Quoted from aquamonkey

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,21945466-1702,00.html

So they're protesting against eliminating child abuse.........?  

No they are protesting against Howard's "plan" for getting rid of indigenous child abuse, can't you read? It is a racist policy and pure wedge politics to win the next election as proven by the timing of its release. There is no detail to it and already several major flaws have been found which won't make it work.

Did you know that as much of the aboriginal child abuse is carried out by white men (miners, truckies etc.) as are carried out by aboriginals, yet Howard's plan is going to get rid of the permit system that restricts access to aboriginal settlements and camps, thus making it easier for these men to get access to the children. Also easier for them to get access to aboriginal art (for on-sale ripping off the aboriginals, selling drugs into the communities and other criminal activities they commit.

This whole thing probably could have its own thread, and having literally read hundreds of articles and blogs on this over the last day or so I can only conclude this policy is an absolute travesty. when I first heard it I was incredulous but then as more news on it was released for the first time in my life I felt like crying over a government policy, that is how deeply this has affected me. I'm just stunned that a government, even a Howard one, could scoop this low to win an election. Tampa and children overboard were bad enough but this is really scraping the bottom of political decency.

Quoted Text

...is a racist policy...

howso?

It is racist because it aims purely at aboriginals, disempowering them in a very authoritarian way. Howard plans to basically lord over nearly every aspect of their lives in ways he would and could never do with any white society. In fact this policy breaks many human rights laws and constitutional ones, which is why he had to implement it as an emergency measure just as he would for a major natural disaster.

Would you allow Howard to come in and force invasive compulsory medical checks on all children under 12 in your suburb, including your children?

Also what has compulsorily acquiring aboriginal land got to do with stopping child abuse, as has getting rid of the permit system which will allow open slather into these communities by all and sundry? An interesting point was also raised in a blog that it just happens that some of the land Howard will compulsorily take from the aboriginals he has earmarked in the past as likely sites for nuclear waste repositories.

There are some other nefarious aspects to the policy that need to wait for the detail to clear up, but it does appear that the minimum wage and other work related laws will be done away with in these areas as well, meaning that these people can be employed at below standard wages and conditions.

One of the authors of the report Howard is supposedly acting upon has come out against Howard's policy in a big way. Out of 96 recommendations in that report Howard has ignored all but two, and it just so happens that most of the recommendations he is ignoring are ones that ask for support mechanisms, infrastructure and additional empowerment to the communities be implemented. Isn't it also telling that dozens of similar reports have crossed Howard's desk in the last 10 years, from one very similar when John Herron was first made Indigenous Affairs minister and implemented his abysmally failed "Practical Reconciliation" policy. Mal Brough has also spectacularly failed in his big stick approach and attempts to forcibly take Aboriginal land and hand it over to private ownership and developers.

Two years ago a very similar report came out of Western Australia and that State government asked Howard to act immediately on many of the same recommendations made in this latest report. Of course he wasn't looking down the barrel of a failed election at that time and didn't need it as a wedge.

This knee jerk look at me I'm such an authoritarian leader has wedge politics written all over it and I'm just glad so many are seeing it as this. I know in the long run it will work for Howard and that most Australians will see this as Howard being a decisive leader and it will most likely win him the election now. But it doesn't take away from the despicable act it is.

He used the false spectre of boat people willing to kill their own children to get into Australia to win an election, and the false spectre of boat people infiltrated with terrorists invading this country using Tampa, and now he is using the spectre of the plight of aboriginal children. That is the reality of it.

http://blogs.usyd.edu.au/elac/2007/06/abuse_of_indigenous_children_i.html

If the government, any government,  did nothing, it'd be racist too.  Damned if you do, damned if you don't.  So, what do you propose be done about the situation?

More opinions on this issue...

Child abuse response not racist, says Indigenous leader
Posted 5 hours 18 minutes ago
Updated 3 hours 10 minutes ago

The chairwoman of the National Indigenous Council, Sue Gordon, has defended the Federal Government's plans to take control of Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory.

Ms Gordon worked alongside the federal Minister for Indigenous Affairs Mal Brough on the plan, which includes bans on pornography and alcohol, and compulsory health checks for Indigenous children.

She told ABC Radio's AM program that people who think the plan is racist should keep in mind it is an emergency response to a crisis in Indigenous communities.

"There are pockets of Aboriginal people in different communities who commit the offences, but these measures are going to benefit all those Aboriginal people," she said.

"Because one thing that doesn't get mentioned in all the arguments is the constant violence that Aboriginal people have to put up with in those communities."

But the Leader of the Democrats, Senator Lyn Allison, says the Federal Government's plan is heavy handed.

She says Prime Minister John Howard should be putting more money into education in Aboriginal communities.

"But it seems the Prime Minister likes to come in over the top like a great white knight and assume, or at least try, to persuade people that it's the Commonwealth that has the answers - I don't think he does," she said.

"I think he's cherry-picked some of these recommendations and they are largely punitive and very, very short term."

Ms Gordon says the plan will also target non-aboriginal sex offenders who prey on young Indigenous victims.

"Next week on the agenda of the inter-governmental committee, the Australian Crime Commission - they're going to formally have this issue put before them and then they'll be able to start investigating, identifying and locating perpetrators," se said.

"This is right across Australia black, white and brindle - no-one's saying they're all Aboriginal."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/06/23/1959803.htm

Sue Gordon has always been a Howard apologist and this was the reason she was put on the stacked Howard Indigenous Council. She has always agreed with every Howard indigenous policy, even when they have spectacularly failed like Mal Brough's attempt to get aboriginals to privatise their land and do away with land rights. It was not her that wrote the report, or any of those that proceeded it, and it is very telling that one of the authors of the report has come out against Howard's reaction to it.

Why hasn't Sue Gordon come out about the 94 recommendations in the report that Howard has ignored?

Let's wait for the details of Howard's policy and see if he puts into place all the support services needed to back up his big stick attack on the aboriginal communities? So far the reaction from those communities has ranged to incredulous, amused and defiant. Nearly all agree that things like the banning of alcohol are already doomed to failure. In fact the great majority of the communities singled out are already voluntarily grog free and as the report plainly stated but Howard has conveniently ignored, the abuse is carried out equally by those who are sober or drunk, and by those who are black or white.