State of New South Wales v Richardson (Preliminary) (No 2) [2023] NSWSC 794

Supreme Court New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation: State of New South Wales v Richardson (Preliminary) (No 2) [2023] NSWSC 794 Hearing dates: 30 June 2023 Date of orders: 7 July 2023 Decision date: 07 July 2023 Jurisdiction: Common Law Before: Campbell J Decision: (1) Under s 24(5) Terrorism (High Risk Offenders) Act 2017 (NSW) order that: (a) a qualified psychiatrist and a registered psychologist be appointed to conduct separate psychiatric and psychological examinations (as the case may be) of the defendant and furnish reports to the Supreme Court on the results of those examinations within 3 weeks of the date fixed for the examination; and (b) the defendant is directed to attend those examinations. (2) Under s 27 of the said Act, the defendant is subject to an Interim Supervision Order commencing today, 7 July 2023 for a period of 28 days. (3) Under s 29 of the said Act, the defendant is to comply with the conditions set out in Schedule A to the summons filed on 15 June 2023 for the duration of the order. (4) Access to the Court's file in this proceeding may be permitted to a non-party only with the leave of a judge of the Court and after prior notice to the parties so as to allow them an opportunity to be heard prior to access being granted. Catchwords: HIGH RISK OFFENDERS — preliminary supervision — interim supervision orders — whether plaintiff complied with s 24(2) disclosure obligation — defendant never convicted of an offence involving an element of infliction of physical violence — defendant disputes that he is a convicted New South Wales terrorism activity offender — plaintiff relies on records said to demonstrate the defendant was developing a plan to commit murders of persons of certain races, in particular Aboriginal men who are middle aged — consideration of Corner Report — views if proved could constitute support for violent extremism — potential ideologies associated with white supremacy and ultranationalism may be attributed to the defendant at final hearing — the documents if proved indicate a plan to commit racial driven murders — conditions for supervision imposed Legislation Cited: Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) Crimes (Serious Sex Offenders) Act 2006 (NSW) Mental Health Act 2007 (NSW) Terrorism (High Risk Offenders) Act 2007 (NSW) ss 10, 20, 24, 24, 25-27, 29, 50 Cases Cited: Attorney General for New South Wales v Tillman [2007] NSWCA 119 Hardy v State of New South Wales [2021] NSWCA 338 State of New South Wales v Alam [2020] NSWSC 295 State of New South Wales v Cheema [2020] NSWSC 876 Texts Cited: E Corner and H Taylor, Testing the Reliability, Validity, and Equity of Terrorism Risk Assessment Instruments (ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods, 2022) T Cubitt and H Wolbers, Review of violent extremism risk assessment tools in Division 104 control orders and Division 105A post sentence orders (Australian Institute of Criminology, 2022) Category: Principal judgment Parties: State of New South Wales (Plaintiff) Marc Stephen Richardson (Defendant) Representation: Counsel: S Callan SC with A Zheng (Plaintiff) E Kerkyasharian with D Bhutani (Defendant)