Emran Dad,33 – who in 2012 pleaded guilty to child sex and procurement offences for paying teenage girls in state care for sex,and to have sex with other men – was arrested on Tuesday in the Melbourne suburb of Dandenong and charged with three counts of making contact with a child,using email,TikTok,Instagram and live-streaming,all without reporting the use to the police.
The release of criminal detainees has been called into question by the Federal Opposition,after a third was arrested.
Following his arrest,the Coalition moved a motion for the Senate to immediately vote on Labor’s new preventative detention laws in the upper house as politicians feuded over the consequences of the landmark High Court decision overturning the legality of indefinite immigration detention.
The new laws will allow the government to refer criminals freed from immigration detention to judges to decide if they still pose a risk to the community and should be locked up again.
“I would’ve thought the fact that we’ve now seen three of these individuals either arrested or charged with new offences would have underlined the importance of passing this legislation as quickly as possible to keep the community safe,” Labor minister Murray Watt told the Senate ahead of the vote.
After the vote,a government spokesperson said Labor looked forward to the opposition’s support in passing the bill swiftly in the lower house. “We did not choose this - but we are getting on with the job of fixing it,” the spokesperson said.
The Coalition wanted an amendment requiring the government to publish the reasons for releasing every person as a result of the High Court decision,but the opposition ultimately backed the government’s latest emergency measures.
The bill is expected to be passed in the lower house on Thursday.
Lawyer Karen Sheridan said Melbourne man Dad had indicated he intended to apply for bail when his case was next heard on December 14.
Having represented Dad since before he was detained,Sheridan said she had been in regular contact with him during his detention.
The Coalition is calling for the federal government to take action after a man released from immigration detention was accused of indecent assault.
She said her client had “a number of issues” including being diagnosed with an intellectual disability. “It has been a struggle for him,” Sheridan said.
Dad’s arrest came a day after another former detainee,violent sex offender Aliyawar Yawari,faced an Adelaide magistrate on two charges of indecent assault,and another released detainee was charged with possessing cannabis.
Former Coalition attorney-general Christian Porter revealed his own office “was always alive to the narrowness of the majority” in Al-Kateb,the 2004 judgment that allowed the Commonwealth to indefinitely detain foreigners if they had no hope of being deported.
Documents tabled in the Senate showed Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus had allowed the Human Rights Commission to intervene in the most recent case while the Coalition had twice refused to allow the independent body to mount arguments in immigration cases before the High Court.
Defending his own decision to muzzle lawyers for Australia’s human rights watchdog from intervening in a separate 2019 High Court case challenging indefinite detention,Porter said he had been committed to doing everything he could to uphold that precedent.
“Authorising another Commonwealth agency to argue against that decision was considered to be a very bad idea,” Porter told this masthead on Tuesday.
Earlier,Dreyfus said it was not possible to legislate to lock up all former immigration detainees released following the High Court’s November 8 ruling,as Labor prepares new laws to to return some of the worst offenders to custody.
In his statement,Dreyfus said the government was unable to consider a former detainee’s criminal history when they were released.
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said legal advice made clear they could not consider a detainee’s criminal history when releasing themAlex Ellinghausen
“Following the High Court decision and reasons in the NZYQ matter,it is not legally possible to legislate to require the detention of all of the NZYQ-affected individuals on community safety grounds,” Dreyfus said.
In 2012,Victorian County Court judge Barbara Cotterell sentenced Emran Dad to three years in prison after he pleaded guilty to paying children in state care for sex,on one occasion in 2008 trading a packet of cigarettes for sex with a 13-year-old girl.
On another occasion in 2012,police sprung Dad near his car,which he was using to pimp a teenage girl for sex with a 24-year-old man.
“You acknowledge that you were to be paid for this service,” Cotterell said during her sentencing remarks.
In March 2012,Dad recruited a 17-year-old to have sex with men for money,arranging appointments via Facebook or phone before driving the girl to jobs.
“During your record of interview,you admitted that male clients contacted you to arrange for these services and you would then contact the girl and organise a meeting. These meetings occurred at private premises,motels,or in vehicles,or secluded locations,” Cotterell said.
The Coalition used Senate question time to attack the government on Dad’s alleged breach of conditions.
“Why was there no preparation,why were there no contingencies,why couldn’t your government make plans to keep Australians safe?” Shadow foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham asked Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong.
She in turn accused the opposition of focusing on a political fight instead of working with the government.
“Let everyone remember,this is the group,this is the party that voted against strengthening the visa conditions and the criminal penalties associated with it because they are always about the political fight,they are never actually about fixing the problem,” she said.
With Alex Crowe
Support is available from the National Sexual Assault,Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732) or the Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491.
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