Russell Street bomber Craig Minogue upset at being denied tarot cards, Aldi catalogue
RUSSELL Street bomber Craig “Fatty” Minogue claims “bastard” jailers refused to give him Tarot cards and an Aldi catalogue posted to him by family.
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RUSSELL Street bomber Craig “Fatty” Minogue is crying “victim” after being denied access to tarot cards and an Aldi catalogue sent to him in jail by a family member.
Minogue claims “administrative bastardry and abuse of power” by Barwon prison authorities has hindered his “new found interest in the spiritual and religious aspects of Paganism”.
Following the lead of fellow lifer Paul Steven Haigh — the state’s worst serial killer — Minogue has gone to the Supreme Court over access to the tarot cards.
Minogue, 55, has spent the past 31 years behind bars for the 1986 blast outside the Russell Street Police Headquarters that killed 21-year-old Constable Angela Taylor and injured 22 others.
He claims he was denied access to two sets of tarot cards and a 47-page Aldi specials catalogue sent to him by a female family member in July.
He was, however, allowed to keep two books in the package titled Pagan Ways Tarot and A Visual Key to Symbols and Their Meaning.
Bizarrely, a month after being refused access to the cards even after asking prison authorities to overturn the decision, Minogue was allowed to purchase two packs of Tarot cards as part of his monthly “special spend”.
In an affidavit, the self-represented killer says he has no choice but to launch legal action because he believes the rights of prisoners to correspondence by letter under the Prisons Act and, under the Charter of Human Rights, to not have one’s correspondence unlawfully or arbitrarily interfered with are being systematically ignored as part of a deliberate policy.
“People who support me outside the prison were outraged that my letter had been censored by the stopping of the Tarot cards which they had purchased, but that then the prison allowed me to purchase the cards; this action was seen as administrative bastardry and abuse of power,” his affidavit says.
Minogue claims the letter says the items were to “help you keep your mind off other happenings” and the sender told him in a later telephone call that the catalogue had been intended to help him “keep in touch with the real world and show what good value (Aldi) is”.
Just day’s after Minogue’s letter arrived, the Herald Sun revealed Haigh, who is serving six life sentences without parole for seven murders, had filed a writ alleging a decision by the Barwon Prison governor to deny him a deck of tarot cards is unreasonable, and shows “meanness of spirit and a prejudice against Paganism”.
Haigh argued the decision was a breach of his right to religious freedom as he needs the cards as part of his Pagan religious practice. He asked the court to overturn the ban and for a declaration of his right to practise a religion of his choice, that Paganism and using tarot cards meets the test of a religious activity, and that the decision to bar him from possessing tarot cards was therefore unreasonable, unjustified and unlawful.
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Minogue, who calls himself “an academic by occupation, but a prisoner for the time being” wants the court to overturn the decision not to give him the tarot cards and catalogue, arguing the decision breached his right of “freedom of expression” under the Charter.
He also seeks various declarations, including that his right as a prisoner under the Corrections Act to correspondence can only be limited in a justifiable and necessary manner under law; that the definition of a letter includes accompanying articles; and that these can only be censored where there is an unauthorised article or substance that could pose an immediate danger or that are prescribed in the Act as unauthorised or controlled items.
Minogue was awarded a PhD in applied ethics, human and social services by La Trobe University in 2012.
Last year he became eligible for parole, but public outcry when it was revealed he had applied for release saw Premier Daniel Andrews introduce retrospective laws stripping anyone convicted of killing a police officer of the right to parole.
A corrections spokeswoman said it was not appropriate to comment on the matter at it was before the courts.