Over-wrought prison sentence for climate protestor … United Nations dismayed … Premier reading from a law n’ order script … “Way of life” under assault … City street closed for a state government hoedown … Protests should be “convenient” … Max Shanahan reports 

Deanna ‘Violet’ Coco has been jailed for 15 months – and denied bail ahead of her appeal – under legislation passed earlier this year in a spasm of tabloid-inspired illiberalism. 

Hence, Dominic Perrottet and the NSW government have kept their promise to “throw the book” at climate protestors with the aim of suppressing protest rights and securing “our way of life”. 

In April, Coco and her co-conspirators stopped a hire truck in one southbound lane of the Harbour Bridge, blocking traffic for 28 minutes while they protested against climate inaction. 

Coco was charged under now notorious Roads and Crimes Legislation Amendment legislation, which had whizzed through parliament and gained assent within two days, less than two weeks prior to her offence. 

On Friday (December 2), she pleaded guilty to seven charges at the Downing Centre in front of Madge Allison Hawkins, who sentenced the beleaguered activist to 15 months in prison with a non-parole period of eight months. A fine of $2,500 was thrown in for good measure. 

In addition to imposing an example-setting sentence, HH was not inclined to grant bail to Coco ahead of an appeal against her sentence set down for March. This earned the ire of defence solicitor Mark Davis:

“It’s just extraordinary to me. You always get appeals bail unless you’re a violent offender and you haven’t abided by the terms of your bail. In the months she had been on bail she had done everything – always attended court.” 

Following her arrest, the East Lismore resident had been subject to unusually harsh bail conditions. For three weeks, she was prohibited from leaving her apartment except for emergency medical assistance or to attend court. 

Later, this was amended to a curfew allowing her to leave her property only between 10am and 3pm. 

Madge Hawkins’ sentencing remarks were balm to the ears of law n’ order zealots. Coco “let the entire city suffer …” 

“You do damage to your cause when you do childish stunts like this. Why should [people] be disrupted by your selfish emotional actions?”

Premier Dom Perignon followed up on Monday (December 5), judging the sentence as “not excessive” and “pleasing to see”.

“If protestors want to put our way of life at risk, then they should have the book thrown at them and that’s pleasing to see.” 

Happily it turns out that Coco is the neice of Alister Henskens, the NSW minister for skills and a lawn order enthusiast. 

Putting aside concerns about democratic decay, the erosion of fundamental rights and so forth, it’s a sad failure of ambition that Sydneysiders’ “way of life” can be defined as the right to a smooth-running Harbour Bridge lane.

The Perignon continued: 

“The clear message here, and it is a clear lesson – everyone has the right to protest, but do so in a way that doesn’t inconvenience people.” 

This latest outbreak of law n’ order earned a rebuke from the UN, which increasingly having to concern themselves with NSW’s privileged ignorance of democratic rights. 

Clément Voule, the UN’s special rapporteur on freedom of association and peaceful assembly, said: 

“I am alarmed at a NSW court’s prison term against climate protestor Deanna Coco and refusal to grant bail … Peaceful protestors should never be criminalised or imprisoned.”

The criticism wasn’t able to rouse the loyal Opposition. NSW Labor leader Chris Minns said he did not regret supporting the laws: 

“At the end of the day, you’re talking about a situation where mass protests were shutting down half the city and in a repeated fashion.” 

“I think most people would appreciate that even in free societies there’s a context and a set of circumstances [and] when you inconvenience literally hundreds of thousands of people as often as possible in consecutive days there will be legislative action in relation to that.” 

On the same day that Coco was jailed for inconveniencing Sydneysiders, the NSW government shut down George Street and the light rail in the city for almost 24 hours to make way for a $70 per head “American-inspired dining experience event” – George Street Hoedown. 

“I can’t get to fucking work,” said one punter online.