Sovereign spiral: Surprising past of ‘window smash’ mum

Courts have slapped a number of restrictions on a ‘sovereign’ mum after police smashed her window during a traffic stop this week.

The online history of so-called ‘sovereign citizen’ Helen Delaney shows how the everyday mum went from a business coach to being dragged from her car by police in little over two years.  

On Wednesday, Helen Delaney, 52, was filmed repeatedly refusing to acknowledge Highway Patrol’s authority before she was eventually dragged from the vehicle.

A Highway Patrol officer was recorded asking Delaney, who refused to wind her window down further than the tiny gap she left, for her driver’s licence.

“I’m not in your jurisdiction,” Ms Delaney said.

“Yes, you are,” the officer responded.

Delaney and her passenger gave a barrage of reasons why they didn’t need to comply.

The pair argued they were not in the officer’s jurisdiction, that there was no Queen to give orders, and that they were “travelling”, not driving.

After three minutes of negotiation, the officer smashed the window with his bare hands and dragged Delaney out, all while copping a foul-mouthed spay from her male passenger.

The Coffs Harbour traffic stop landed Delaney in court on Thursday

Police said Ms Delaney was initially wanted on two outstanding arrest warrants for domestic violence-related offences but copped further charges relating to the roadside run-in.

She was charged with outstanding warrants, driving an unregistered vehicle, driving an uninsured vehicle, refusing to produce a driver’s licence, state name or address, and refusing or failing to submit to a breath test.

Coffs Harbour police were forced to break the window to arrest Helen Mary Delany, 52, who was allegedly wanted on two outstanding arrest warrants for domestic violence-related offences.

She was charged with a range of offences.

She was granted bail after appearing at Coffs Harbour Local Court on Thursday on the condition she reports to Ballina police three days a week.

She was banned from driving any vehicle and must comply with the apprehended violence orders she is alleged to have breached and cannot enter six NSW towns.

But until the pandemic, Delaney’s social media channels show nothing that would suggest such radical views.

Her feeds showed family, travel and wildlife snaps from around the country and a fleeting fascination with multi-millionaire US business influencer Grant Cardone.

In 2020, she briefly became a “sales and business coach”, pushing Cardone’s methods.

In September 2021, Delaney’s interests seemed to take a radical swerve following an Instagram post lamenting the Covid-19 vaccine and vaccine passports.

By November, she was posting from freedom protests against the Victorian and New South Wales governments in Sydney and Melbourne.

Helen Delaney became a sales and business coach in 2020.

“No more tyranny and suffering. Today Sydney gave it a huge no thanks! Thank you Bruce (Shillingsworth) and Luke (Simpson), for sharing and for your leadership,” she wrote in one post.

Delaney was present at a December 2021 rally at Canberra’s Old Parliament House, which saw fires cause $4 million in damage to the building. Delaney had no involvement in those fires.

The protesters had gathered there before the 50th anniversary of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy, a protest against successive governments’ approach to Indigenous issues, established on Australia Day in 1972.

Protesters were reportedly not associated with the embassy.

Helen Delaney was present at a demonstration where $4 million damage was caused to Old Parliament House

Her feeds since and up until Wednesday’s arrest heavily feature anti-government and Indigenous rights activists Luke Simpson, who she often spoke to on Zoom, and the likes of David Oneeglio, a major anti-vaccine, anti-government and anti-lockdown voice during the pandemic, who was once mentioned in an online article penned by “sovereign” cop killer Garreth Train.

Helen Delaney is a keen follower of major anti-government activist David Oneeglio.

Helen Delaney and anti-government, indigenous rights activists Luke Simpson (Bottom right).

Dr Harry Hobbs, an influential constitutional and human rights lawyer who lectures at the University of Technology Sydney, recently told Andrew Bucklow’s I’ve Got News For You podcast that the Sovereign Citizen movement, which has roots in the US, lures people in a number of ways.

“They’re also people who, just for whatever reason, have a sense that they don’t really like authority, like government, like police – And they might read some of this or come across some of this material and think that sounds reasonable,” he said.

“You find that a lot of people get sucked into it through YouTube videos and through Facebook videos. So that’s really where it’s quite strong at the moment.”

Kaz Ross, lecturer in humanities at the University of Tasmania and researcher into far-right extremism, recently penned in The Conversation: “Until COVID-19, the main threat (to sovereign citizens) seems to have been in committing road offences.”

“More recently, actions protesting measures aimed at limiting the spread of COVID-19 have been linked to the sovereign citizen movement.”