‘Deliberate act’: Man flies into Qld via ACT from NSW hotspot
Three alleged border hoppers have been charged or slapped with hefty fines after Queensland police found them trying to sneak into Queensland after visiting COVID hotspots. In one case, a man went to extreme lengths to cover his tracks.
Police & Courts
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Queensland police have caught three alleged border hoppers and slapped them with fines or charges after failing to declare they’d travelled to a coronavirus hotspot.
A 22-year-old Weipa man has been slapped with a fine for trying to avoid Queensland’s tough restrictions on travellers from known coronavirus hotspots by travelling from NSW to the ACT and flying from there to Cairns Airport.
Speaking at a press conference this morning, Assistant Commissioner Steve Gollschewski said police allege the man deliberately drove from Sydney to the ACT on August 2 to fly into Cairns because he was frustrated with the restrictions and wanted to go to work.
He was intercepted at Cairns Airport yesterday and failed to declare he’d been in Sydney - a declared hotspot.
He was immediately placed in hotel quarantine and issued a fine.
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Meanwhile, a man, 63 and woman, 68, have been charged for failing to comply with the Queensland Border Direction and fraud after they allegedly travelled through the Goondiwindi police checkpoint with false declarations on July 27.
Police detained the couple in Nanango yesterday after receiving information about the alleged breach and the pair were placed in mandatory hotel quarantine outside the South Burnett area.
They’ve been issued with notices to appear in Richlands Magistrates court.
Mr Gollschewski confirmed that the two people were found to have made a false statement on their border declaration passes.
“Can I highlight to the community these are very serious offences,” he said.
The shocking new cases comes as Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced the state’s borders would now be shut to all travellers from NSW and the ACT, declaring them “hot spots”.
Mr Gollschewski said all travellers arriving at Queensland’s borders from NSW, the ACT and Victoria would be stopped and turned around unless they had exemptions under the incoming rules.
The new breach comes a day after it was revealedthree men had travelled to Victoria and allegedly failed to disclose so on their border declaration.
A man and a woman dining at a Korean restaurant at the same time as at least one of the women were also infected, sparking a nursing home scare, as the woman works at the Bolton Clarke aged care home at Pinjarra Hills.
Mr Gollschewski said the vast majority of people had been doing the right thing.
But he said there was “clearly” a small number of people purposely doing the wrong thing.
“While those numbers are small, the risk is too high,” he said.
“The message to all the other people who don’t qualify for the exemption, don’t come,” Mr Gollschewski said.
He said a number of investigations had been sparked by public tip-offs.
“Clearly the community has had enough of this,” he said.
Ms Palaszczuk said stronger regulations were needed because “we cannot put Queenslanders at risk”.
“We have seen people deliberately flouting the law to gain entry into Queensland,” she said.