‘Lying little rats’: Courtroom drama before Grace Tame’s abuser Nico Bester flags possible plea change

Grace Tame’s abuser Nicolaas Bester might be about to change his plea in an online harassment case – in which he allegedly targeted the former Australian of the Year on Twitter.

Bester outside Hobart Magistrates Court last year. Picture: Linda Higginson

The disgraced former Hobart teacher who sexually abused Grace Tame may be about to change his plea over more recent allegations he harassed her on Twitter.

Nicolaas Ockert Bester, 71, who has pleaded not guilty to his charges, appeared in the Hobart Magistrates Court on Thursday with a new lawyer, Fabiano Cangelosi.

Mr Cangelosi said Bester intended to proceed to a sentence indication hearing.

A sentence indication is when a magistrate gives an indication of the type of sentence that would be imposed if a defendant pleads guilty, or changes their plea to guilty.

Mr Cangelosi said Bester had also made an application for Legal Aid, and asked for an adjournment of several months while a report was prepared.

Magistrate Chris Webster heard concerns from a lawyer about the “lack of progress” in the case, which has been repeatedly delayed since the matter first reached court in December 2022.

Nicolaas Bester leaves the Hobart Magistrates Court on Thursday. Picture: Chris Kidd

“This has been up five or six times,” Mr Webster said.

Bester, who is currently on bail, will return to court on April 19 before the magistrate who originally heard the matter, Andrew McKee.

Bester’s brief administrative hearing on Thursday was not without some level of drama.

Before Mr Webster entered the court, Bester spoke to the journalists sitting in the court media gallery.

“One, two, three, four, five, six of you – lying little rats.”

He continued muttering more comments before a police prosecutor told him: “don’t make any comments”.

“Why not?” he replied.

“Because it’s disrespectful,” the prosecutor said.

Grace Tame with her partner Max Heerey at one of Bester’s previous court appearances. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

The former St Michael’s Collegiate teacher, through his former lawyer Todd Kovacic, previously pleaded not guilty in March 2023 to three counts of menacing, harassing or causing offence to Tame via public social media posts on Twitter, the platform now known as X.

The charges relate to alleged conduct on April 27, July 21 and August 28, 2022.

Tame reported the allegations to Tasmania Police the same year, with the convicted pedophile’s Twitter account, @nicobester3, since suspended.

In April last year, Bester said he had suffered a “medical episode” that would delay proceedings.

In 2011, Bester was jailed for sexually abusing Tame in 2010, when he was a 58-year-old teacher and she was a 15-year-old school student.

He was sent back to prison in 2016 when he made child exploitation material by bragging on Facebook that his abuse of Tame was “awesome”.

Tame helped change Tasmanian laws for child sexual abuse survivors, including the right for them to publicly tell their stories, and was ultimately named Australian of the Year in 2021.

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