As it happened: Brisbane on Friday, May 3

Former high-profile Brisbane lawyer Michael Bosscher has been charged by federal police for allegedly trafficking more than 120 kilograms of cocaine from Victoria to New South Wales disguised as frozen chicken.

The Australian Federal Police will allege former Brisbane lawyer Michael Bosscher was involved in an attempt to transport cocaine from Melbourne to Sydney in a van loaded with frozen chickens.Credit: Australian Federal Police

The Australian Federal Police alleged Bosscher, 55, from Brisbane’s south-western suburb of Wacol, was involved in the alleged attempt to transport the drugs from Melbourne to Sydney in a van loaded with frozen chickens in 2022.

Bosscher was scheduled to appear in the Brisbane Magistrates Court on Friday, charged with trafficking in commercial quantities of controlled drugs.

Thanks for joining us today. This is where we’ll leave our live updates for today, but we’ll be back on deck Tuesday after the long weekend.

Until then, here are a few of today’s top stories:

CCTV footage of the moment North Lakes mother Emma Lovell was fatally stabbed in a violent home invasion has been shown to a court, with a judge to consider whether the crime was particularly heinous when sentencing a teenager.

Emma Lovell (centre) died in hospital after the stabbing at her house in North Lakes, where an accused (left) was led into a police vehicle by officers the morning after.Credit: Brisbane Times, Nine News, Facebook

Traffic modelling on the Queensland government’s proposed Gympie Road Bypass Tunnel must be released before a decision is handed down because a poorly planned tunnel could increase road congestion, the RACQ has warned.

Authorities have found a car believed to belong to one of the Perth brothers missing in Mexico, burnt out on a property near where they had last camped. A woman and two men, all Mexican, have been arrested in relation to the disappearance of the three men.

Opposition leader Peter Dutton has pledged a royal commission into domestic violence if one is required to unearth the evidence to end men’s violence against women, particularly in Indigenous communities.

The Woman in Black ran in London’s West End for 33 years, only closing in March 2023.Credit: Justin Nicholas

Australia, the United States, Japan and the Philippines have made a show of strength against China’s growing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific, announcing a plan to increase joint military exercises and boost four-way defence co-operation.

Theatre’s most successful ghost story The Woman in Black is enjoying a life after death in a macabre national tour (currently playing at QPAC) starring John Waters and Daniel MacPherson.

A wild Sumatran orangutan has appeared to treat a wound with medicine from a tropical plant – the latest example of how some animals attempt to soothe their own ills with remedies found in the wild.

Queensland Premier Steven Miles has joined the chorus of music and political identities mourning the announcement that Fortitude Valley institution The Zoo will be closing its doors later this year.

Asked if the government could in any way intervene on the closure, Miles was pessimistic, saying it was a “private sector transaction” that came amid a “really challenging” time for the local music and hospitality economy.

But he said state industry development association QMusic were investigating any possible last-resort measures to keep the venue afloat.

“I know QMusic, the peak music organisation, is working on it and looking at what they can do,” Miles told ABC Radio.

“The Zoo is part of the fabric of our city, so I’d love to see it stay.”

It was announced on Wednesday the 500-capacity venue, upstairs at Ann Street’s Shannon’s Buildings, would close on July 8.

After significant changes to the rules surrounding how lobbyists interact, and record those interactions with Queensland politicians came about only this February, further tweaks are now being investigated.

Lobbyists must declare any contact with “opposition representatives” – defined as the Opposition Leader and staff, or the Deputy Opposition Leader – on behalf of their clients within 15 days.

Further tweaks to lobbyist powers are being investigated.Credit: Robert Rough

The requirement does not include the broader shadow cabinet, despite applying to government ministers and their staff, along with councillors and public sector officers.

Premier Steven Miles raised this as an issue in parliament on Thursday, after the newly established shadow cabinet diary publication scheme showed LNP transport spokesman Steve Minnikin met with lobbyists and their clients on two occasions in March.

“I’ll ask for advice from the Integrity Commissioner about whether those regulations should be changed,” Miles told journalists today.

Queensland Labor’s efforts to spruik the new $1000 energy bill rebates for all households have kicked up a gear today, with ministers, MPs, candidates and other supporters out across the state in person and online.

Premier Steven Miles was obviously among them, popping up for a media conference in the bayside Brisbane suburb of Brighton with the party’s recently appointed candidate to replace retiring former minister Stirling Hinchliffe at the October election: Bisma Asif.

Miles, who has been foreshadowing a big cost-of-living boost in the pre-election June budget, said while there would be other measures, the $2.5 billion splash “is the big one” and was that important they needed to get it out before the budget.

“We do have advice that this is the most responsible way to deliver that kind of assistance because it reduces energy prices and is counter-inflationary,” he said, also getting quizzed about a Together Union-backed text message campaign promoting the rebates.

Previously secret state-funded surveys released in February showed cost of living pressures were the biggest issue for voters, and these types of bills were seen as a state responsibility – so much so that Labor has been specifically tracking public awareness of the last round of energy rebates.

With significant focus on government responses to domestic violence this week, we’re now more than a year into staggered national efforts to hire 500 frontline support workers into 2025.

Of that, states and territories have been given individual funding for set numbers of roles. A total of 200 were supposed to be employed in each of the current, and past, financial years, with another 100 in 2024-25.

Premier Steven Miles and Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath at Sunday’s gender violence rally.Credit: Tony Moore

But as of March, only 17 full-time equivalent workers had been brought on board, with federal crossbench MPs urging Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to “break the logjam” as advocates say funding for salaries alone is not enough.

There has also been patchy information coming from some states and the federal government on exactly where the process is at.

Asked at a media conference on Friday, Queensland Premier Steven Miles said “we’ve been allocated 111 of those [roles to fill] and we’ve contracted 56”.

A worker remains in hospital after a collision with a forklift at the Brisbane Markets yesterday.

The woman, who works for one of the businesses operating at the site in Rocklea, was treated at the scene before being taken to hospital.

The markets said it was being treated as a serious incident that they were investigating along with Work Health and Safety Queensland, and the woman’s employer.

“We extend our well wishes to her and her family,” the markets’ managing director Andrew Young said in a statement.

“BML considers the safety of everyone working at the Brisbane Markets site to be our top priority and reinforces to all businesses operating on our site the importance of adhering to safe work practices.”

The moment Queensland mother Emma Lovell was stabbed to death has been shown to a court, with CCTV revealing how she and her husband desperately tried to protect themselves and their daughters during a violent Boxing Day home invasion.

Ms Lovell, 41, died after suffering a stab wound to the chest during the break-in just before midnight, while her husband, Lee, 43, was stabbed in the back.

Emma and Lee Lovell. Emma was killed and Lee injured during the confrontation at their home.

Police charged two 17-year-olds over Lovell’s death.

In a Supreme Court hearing for one of the teenagers, who this year pleaded guilty to murder, burglary, malicious act with intent, and assault occasioning bodily harm, black-and-white footage from the Lovells’ CCTV cameras was shown.

The footage, from a camera angled towards the Lovells’ front door, depicted the teenagers stealthily and slowly entering the home, before emerging seconds later, fighting with the Lovells.

Read more.

Carmen Hartwich is just the seventh person in the world to earn the title of master of bourbon – and the first female.

As our food and culture editor Matt Shea reports, she received her certification early last week after a gruelling 18-month undertaking, culminating in a judging process on the Isle Raasay in Scotland.

Carmen Hartwich has been named Australia’s first master of bourbon.Credit: Markus Ravik

“It hasn’t sunk in yet,” Hartwich, 34, says. “I’ve had so many people amping me up. Especially in this industry, it’s so hard not to get imposter syndrome. I haven’t had to introduce myself as a master of bourbon yet. Maybe at that point it will sink in.”

Read more.

After the Queensland government yesterday released a new plan for Woolloongabba allowing for 75-storey towers, one planning expert says we should “cool our jets” before getting anxious about rapid changes to the inner-city.

Ross Elliott, the director of the Suburban Futures think tank, says nothing will happen overnight, especially with the current high cost of construction.

“We’re talking in this plan of 14,000 dwellings potentially over 40 years,” he told 4BC this morning. “It’s a very long-term picture – nothing is going to happen tomorrow or the next year.

“I’d be surprised with the current state of construction economics and market reality if there’s a single tower built by the Olympics.”

He suggests the area will be redeveloped at a pace like what’s happened in the Newstead and Teneriffe area, where an increase in density has been “going for 30 years and still going”.

In the meantime, he urged Brisbane planners to invest policy thought – and capital – in suburbs further from the CBD, naming Caboolture, Chermside, Cleveland and Springwood as among the locations that needed significant precinct plans.

Former high-profile Brisbane lawyer Michael Bosscher has been charged by federal police for allegedly trafficking more than 120 kilograms of cocaine from Victoria to New South Wales disguised as frozen chicken.

The Australian Federal Police will allege former Brisbane lawyer Michael Bosscher was involved in an attempt to transport cocaine from Melbourne to Sydney in a van loaded with frozen chickens.Credit: Australian Federal Police

The Australian Federal Police alleged Bosscher, 55, from Brisbane’s south-western suburb of Wacol, was involved in the alleged attempt to transport the drugs from Melbourne to Sydney in a van loaded with frozen chickens in 2022.

Bosscher was scheduled to appear in the Brisbane Magistrates Court on Friday, charged with trafficking in commercial quantities of controlled drugs.