… and saving a bloody lot of time and money!

As mentioned more or less weekly in recent times, the longest chapter in my upcoming and latest loss-leading book (below) will be Waiting for the Axe to Fall.

It’s now two months on since the learned, fair, just and totally professional District Court judge hearing my appeal against a Magistrate’s Court conviction for speeding in a school zone declared that his judgement wouldn’t take long and he’d hand down his decision in a few days, certainly no later than Friday April 17, four days after the appeal hearing just the Monday before, April 13.

So here is my draft of another section under that forever-expanding Waiting for the Axe to Fall…. chapter. My print costs grow by the week!

4.30pm Friday 12 June 2026

Reposition the camera and everything will be FINE!

The District Court registry has just closed for another week, marking a full eight weeks since the District Court appeal judge said that he would give his reasons for dismissing my appeal. Yes, I’m still the glass-half empty sort of imbecile who thought taking on the well-oiled and ruthless machinery of the judicial state was a good idea.

Thought this milestone might be the time to let you all know of some wise – well, I thought it was wise! – advice I gave the judge and the chap for the state’s top cop beside me at the start of the appeal hearing back in early April.

To get things started, have another captain’s at the image above …

Bur before I do. Seeing this whole thing is probably very unusual in that I am sharing this judicial journey of mine online as I share drafts of my pending loss-leading book online. And I want to make it perfectly clear that I believe that uploading material to the court of public opinion is not meant – and won’t – sway His Honour from doing his very, very, best to ensure justice is done in what’s turned out to be a remarkably interesting case. I have no desire to affect his deliberations in any way. Indeed, I think it would be insulting to even consider His Honour could be swayed by draft sections such as this one.

So here’s what I told the appeal court way back when. And I didn’t even mention that I was regarded as a very competent multiskilled reporter/photographer in my first journo job at Queensland Country Life. Took some great photos at country shows and on farms whenever I remembered to take the dust cap off and load my Roli-flex with film!

I’m sure it’s not rocket surgery to tell the court that the remote camera image on the day I allegedly put private school kids in mortal danger was taken at ground level and not high up on a lightpost or some such thing.

And logic follows that it is most likely protected from public malfeasance by being inside a locked vehicle.

So here was my heart-felt suggestion: why not place the camera so it would have taken the Subie’s picture after it had passed the 40km/hr sign? I wouldn’t have even bothered checking the minutiae of the law; if I was happy that the nose of my Subie was 0.00005mm past that sign, I would have paid the fine straight away. Simples? Surely the cops have considered the option?

As we all know now, including those who have continued to turn these pages, the because I took a calculated guess and assumed it would be the only police photo (well, apart from the number plate closeup) of what happened that day to end up in the lower-court police brief, my desire to stick with the process remained strong. Simple logic again. If Water Street west only had one camera poking its lens at it that day, there’s no way a remote camera operator could swear that ALL speed signs were visible and adequate unless he or she walked the street with a notepad and a camera of their own.

I’ve made it clear at both the lower court and the appeal court that I’m battling away on behalf of all Queensland motorists because I have reacted in exactly the right way to being lied to and gaslit, bluffed and bullied in a bid to make me do the right thing and cough up. The letters from Queensland Revenue and the Remote Camera Safety Office that confirmed the camera operator’s certificate did indeed exist have driven my way forward.

And it truly has been fired up further by the Police Commissioner’s counsel at appeal arguing that the certificate never existed in the first place! I have never wavered from my view that the certificate existed then and now, and that it was falsely sworn which makes it a breach of Queensland Public Service ethical behaviour standards and possibly a criminal offence by a police employee.

All together once more: You couldn’t make this shit up!!

PS: For what it’s worth, my legal adviser AI at least once if not less than twice found there were no remote speed cameras anywhere along Water Street on one day at least. Just my luck, hey? Not picking a day like that to be puttering along Water Water street.

Don Gordon-Brown

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