A 22-year-old activist has been sentenced to 12 months in prison for his part in the protests that interrupted the Hunter region’s rail network.
Eric Serge Herbert was sentenced to the years’ sentence in Newcastle Local Court, with a non-parole period of six months.
He was charged with causing obstruction to a railway locomotive and attempting to hinder working mining equipment.
According to court documents, Herbert still lives with his parents and has previous with protesting – he has charges for similar offences across Australian states in past years.
Just several months ago, he was fined almost $3,000 in relation to charges like risk and safety of another by climbing a building and use of intimidation to unlawfully influence a person.
Until Herbert, the climate activists had received things like fines or community corrections orders, so his imprisonment is worrying for his fellow protestors.
Protestors in Australia don’t often get prison time due to the act of protesting being protected by the law. Different states are allowed to enact their own approaches, however, which is the case with Herbert’s sentence.
The climate activist group Blockade Australia, who Herbert was a member of, described the police action as “repression.”
“This is a matter of concern for everybody that expresses dissent to the current political system and to politics in this country in whatever form,” their spokeswoman Hannah Doole said.
“This is a young person who is fighting for their life, fighting for all life on the planet. And they have just been sentenced to six months no parole. 12 months imprisonment is an outrage.”
BREAKING: Sergeio, 22, has been sentenced to 12 months in prison, 6 months no parole, for direct action at the world's biggest coal port.
He said: “We’re taking our future back. When Australia decides it’s going to destroy it’s people through ecocide, the people will rise up”. pic.twitter.com/TZVKt8v6Kc— Blockade Australia (@BlockadeAus) November 22, 2021
