As it happened: Brisbane on Friday, July 4

Thanks for joining us today for our live updates – we’ll be back on Monday morning with more live coverage of Brisbane and beyond. If you’re just catching up, here are some of the big stories that made headlines today.

After more than 150 route changes came into play on Monday, several services were forced into detours through key busway stations on Friday. However, the city’s new network and Metro line have received a passing grade from commuters and workers.

More than $3 million in cash and valuables have allegedly been stolen from elderly Chinese women in a spiritual blessing scam organised by an overseas syndicate, as police search for at least 50 fraudsters after a man was arrested at Brisbane Airport on Friday.

A former boat skipper has been jailed in Brisbane for trying to meet up with a 13-year-old boy to have sex after offering him a PlayStation device in exchange.

The first reported case in NSW of Australian bat lyssavirus – a rare disease that has been found in Queensland and closely related to the notorious rabies – resulted in the death of a man in his 50s this week, several months after his exposure to the infection.

What’s now often regarded as Brisbane’s best sushi restaurant may have opened in 2021, but not to owner Simon Gloftis’ original specs. Now, after a facelift, Sushi Room is complete.

It was mostly quiet through the exclusive streets of Clayfield this week – but just days earlier, flashing sirens and homicide detectives swarmed the streets, slicing through the gentle holiday buzz following reports of a brutal stabbing.

Former champion golfer Greg Norman is among those to have lost their seat on the 2032 Brisbane Olympic organising board, after the Queensland government passed laws to shrink the body to “streamline” decision-making.

Broncos NRLW superstar Tamika Upton has declared Reegan Hicks is in line to produce a breakout campaign, as the club seek to bounce back from their preliminary final exit last year.

A 21-year-old from Toowoomba has been charged with more than 120 counts of supplying dangerous drugs after police rounded out a months-long drug trafficking investigation on Monday.

The 21-year-old was one of two men charged with a collective 130 offences earlier this week in connection with a suspected methylamphetamine trafficking ring.

Police have charged a 21-year-old Toowoomba man in relation to a suspected drug trafficking ring operating from March this year.Credit: Queensland Police

Police said they had located the accused through a mobile phone seized earlier this year during a raid at Dalby, during an investigation into drug trafficking and supply across a six-week period across March, April, and May this year.

The second man connected to the alleged drug supply ring, aged 36 from Dalby, stood accused of three offences and was expected in Dalby Magistrates Court on August 19.

A string of three armed robberies on Wednesday in Toowoomba has led to the arrests of a 19-year-old man and 16-year-old girl yesterday.

Police said the pair first drew attention about 7am on Wednesday when, armed with a machete, they stole a white Renault Kangoo from a 39-year-old man on Ruthven street, in central Toowoomba.

The pair were again reported to police when they were seen allegedly attempting to break into two vehicles a suburb over, in Centenary Heights.

The 29-year-old owner of a Mitsubishi Triton parked at a Debra Street property reported the 19-year-old and 16-year-old to police about 10 minutes later.

He said he confronted the pair while they were searching his vehicle, after which they threatened him with a hammer and took his keys. Both the 39-year-old and 29-year-old were not physically uninjured.

Police located the two vehicles at a property in Wilsonton Heights, on Toowoomba’s north side, and arrested the 19-year-old man and 16-year-old girl.

The pair was charged with 15 offences in total, and both were remanded in custody.

The 19-year-old was expected to reappear in Toowoomba Magistrates Court on August 28, and the 16-year-old was due to appear in Toowoomba Children’s Court on July 4.

Queensland Premier David Crisafulli could be forced to spruik New South Wales tourism if Queensland does not win next week’s Origin decider in Sydney.

Speaking at a business lunch in Brisbane today, Crisafulli revealed details of this year’s State of Origin bet with his NSW counterpart, Chris Minns.

“I’m not a big fan of the whole I’ll-wear-the-jersey-and-different colour,” he said, of earlier bets between premiers that the loser wear the winning state’s jersey,” he said.

The Queensland flag flying over the Sydney Harbour Bridge following an earlier premiers’ State of Origin bet.Credit: Dean Lewins/AAP

“The losing premier has to do a tourism ad for the other state and I can just see the handsome Chris Minns in his budgie smugglers in Cairns – I can just see it now.

“And I have no desire to stand in front of the Sydney Harbour Bridge to tell people it’s great, so yeah – go Queensland!”

Premier David Crisafulli has announced a bid to host the next Quad meeting, paving the way for US President Donald Trump to visit the Sunshine State.

Addressing an American Chamber of Commerce lunch in Brisbane on Friday, coinciding with US Independence Day, Crisafulli said Australia would be the next host of the leaders’ summit and he wanted Queensland to be front and centre in planning.

Along with Trump, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would host his Indian and Japanese counterparts Narendra Modi and Shigutu Ishiba at the security summit.

It would be the first time Air Force One landed in Queensland since 2014, when Barack Obama attended the G20 summit.

Brisbane’s bus commuters began the week with more than 150 route changes and closed it out facing detours through key busway stations at Cultural Centre, South Bank and Mater Hill.

Translink advised commuters about 8am today that ventilation issues in the inner-south’s busway tunnels had forced most services out of tunnels and onto streets in Buranda and Woolloongabba.

Metro services, however, remained unaffected.

If you’ve caught a bus this week, we’d like to hear your judgment on the overhaul.

Two teenagers, aged 14 and 18, have been charged with dangerous driving after a roughly 30-kilometre joyride in an allegedly stolen vehicle from Logan to Pimpama last night.

Police spotted the white Mazda 3 on Wembley Road, at Logan Central, shortly before 9pm, and tracked it until it reached Pimpama – where officers had laid out tyre spikes – about an hour later.

The Mazda 3 had been reported stolen from a carpark on Eastern Road, in Browns Plains, between 7pm and 8pm.

The two passengers, a 14-year-old Logan Central boy and 18-year-old Alberton man, abandoned the car and fled by foot. Police tracked the pair with a helicopter and dog squad, and arrested them a short time later.

They were charged with five offences, including unlawful use of a motor vehicle and possession of dangerous drugs.

The 14-year-old was expected to appear in Southport Children’s Court today, and the 18-year-old was due at Southport Court on July 17.

The Brisbane Roar has avoided extinction, with the club’s CEO claiming its debt to the Australian Taxation Office will be cleared within days.

The ATO had applied to have the club wound up in the Federal Court, with a hearing due to be heard today.

The club is owned by the Indonesian-based Bakrie Group, which took over the then-champions – led at the time by Europa League-winning coach Ange Postecoglou – 13 years ago.

Brisbane Roar chief executive Kaz Patafta.Credit: Chris Hyde/Getty Images

Yesterday, Roar chief executive Kaz Patafta said the matter had been resolved and the club was in full preparation for the 2025-26 season.

“I’m pleased to say that the matter with the Australian Taxation Office will come to a conclusion in the coming days with the debt to be cleared in full,” he said.

“I want to sincerely thank our loyal members and fans who continue to stand by the club. I also want to thank our ownership group, one of the longest-lasting in the A-League, who have been vital in supporting the club in this matter.

“The matter has taken longer than expected due to the historical debt accruing under the previous management team at the club, and we are pleased it is about to be behind us.”

The Premier has slammed the state’s DNA testing backlog, as delays of more than a year continue to hold up cases in courts across Queensland.

With the head of state-run forensic testing lab suspended last month after contamination was uncovered in the lab, Premier David Crisafulli said the continuing backlogs highlighted the “unmitigated mess” the system had become.

“It potentially means that rapists and murderers are walking the streets when they should be detained, and that should send a shiver up the spine of every Queenslander,” Crisafulli said in a press conference in Cairns yesterday.

“Our commitment is to make sure the lab is cleaned and reopened … we are also putting out additional resources from other labs to be able to break the back on that backlog.”

The state announced plans in May to outsource testing to private-sector labs as it caught up on demand, at an estimated cost of $50 million over two years.

It estimated at the time that up to 60 sets of human remains, more than 660 rape and sexual assault kits, and over 10,000 major crime samples had yet to be tested.