Shane Bowden border breach: Magistrate says form ‘stupid’

Former Finks bikie Shane Bowden was fined just $750 for lying on his border pass about having coronavirus after a magistrate said the form was “stupid” and “confusing”.

Shane Bowden arrives at court in Southport. Picture: Tertius Pickard.

A FORMER Finks bikie who lied on his border pass about having coronavirus was fined just $750 after a magistrate said the form was “stupid” and “confusing”.

Shane Scott Bowden pleaded guilty in the Southport Magistrates Court on Thursday October 1 to making a false statement on his border pass.

Bowden was fined just $750 - far less than the $4004 he would have had to pay if he had just been fined for the breach.

Magistrate Joan White muttered, after seeing the border pass form: “It’s stupid.”

She shook her head as she read through the form.

“If it was a different situation I think the ticketable amount was appropriate,” she said.

“I can understand how he has been somewhat confused.

“I find it confusing.”

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Shane Bowden (right) arrives at court in Southport. Picture: Tertius Pickard

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The question which Magistrate White said was confusing read: “Do you currently have COVID-19 or in the last 14 days have you been a cleared case of COVID-19?”

Magistrate White said it would be better if the question was split into two.

“I think these types of offences are quite serious, we live in troubled times and people have to do the right thing” she said.

“I can understand that it was somewhat confusing for you and I can see exactly why.”

No conviction was recorded.

Prosecutor Paula Cavanaugh told the court Bowden had tested positive to coronavirus on August 5 when he was in Melbourne.

He was tested in hospital when being treated for an infected wound on his knee.

She said he was cleared of the virus on August 21 but the next day tested positive.

“He was not contagious,” she said.

Former bikie Shane Bowden at the Voco Hotel in Surfers Paradise during quarantine. Picture Glenn Hampson

Ms Cavanaugh said six days later Bowden filled out the border pass form saying “he had not been cleared of COVID-19 in the previous 14 days.”

If Bowden had declared on his border pass he had only been cleared of the coronavirus seven days earlier he would have blocked from entering Queensland.

He arrived in Brisbane on August 31 and was immediately taken to hotel quarantine in Surfers Paradise.

Defence lawyer Jason Jacobson, of Jacobson Mahony Lawyers, said Bowden was still recovering from his knee injury and had only read the first part of the question.

“It is a bit of double-barrelled question,” he said.

Bowden attended court wearing a knee brace and needed to sit throughout the sentencing.