cuchulainn
October 31, 2003, 12:47 PM
from the Courier Mail
http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,7733309%255E3102,00.htmlGun lobbyist's sights on $8m claim
Glenis Green
01nov03
GUN rights campaigner and dealer Ron Owen will pursue an $8.2 million claim against both the state and federal governments following his historic victory against firearms fraud charges in a Gympie court this week.
Both humbled and buoyed by the win, he intends to proceed with his legal action, which he filed in Brisbane's Federal Court in April 2001, in the wake of the national weapons buy-back scheme.
He is claiming $8,248,361.09 for goods he alleges the Commonwealth and Queensland governments received from him in the buyback project, but refused to pay for.
His claim, on behalf of his family company Omeo Way Pty Ltd (trading as Owen Guns), alleges the governments failed to pay him compensation on just terms, paid others significantly greater prices for certain items, failed to adequately supervise the gun buy-back scheme in Queensland and failed to ensure he was not discriminated against.
Mr Owen's barrister Frank Martin, who successfully argued the case which led to his acquittal by a Gympie District Court jury on Tuesday, said the claim had been set down for hearing in Brisbane halfway through next year.
Mr Owen, who has always maintained that the repeated firearms charges brought against him have been a vendetta because of his outspoken stand against the governments' tough gun laws, now intends to turn the tables on his accusers.
He has spent more than 3½years researching his $8.2 million claim, preparing 2000 pages of evidence, much of it compiled from the buy-back scheme's own computer records. It is understood Mr Owen bought up many of the old government computers used during the scheme and employed a computer expert to retrieve data which had not been effectively removed from the hard drives.
Finding some of the supposedly deleted records was apparently as simple as pushing an undelete key.
Mr Owen's frequent stands against the system have included him arguing the Magna Carta in his defence, publishing the addresses and photographs of the homes of politicians on his website, organising a Freedom Rally to choke Brisbane's business heart and claiming he was holding "dirt files" on high profile political figures.
In 1997 he was fined $1500 for publishing banned articles in Lock Stock & Barrel , the gun-enthusiast magazine he publishes as president of the Firearm Owners Association of Australia. The articles described how to make gunpowder and adjust a machine-gun's firing mechanism.
In his recent three-week trial Mr Owen was charged jointly with Margate gun dealer and associate Tony Cleaver with 56 charges that they knowingly and fraudulently certified a quantity of handguns as permanently inoperable, even though they could still be restored to full working order.
The trial came almost three years after he was first committed on 181 such charges.
Fifteen of these charges were then tested in a District Court hearing last year only to be quashed by legal argument before going to trial, with the subsequently reduced 56 charges eventually proceeding to trial.
Mr Owen said last year that he was confident of beating the charges, describing them as "an abuse of power" and "obviously a vendetta".
Mr Martin said this week that he could not believe that Mr Owen had been charged under the criminal code and not the Weapons Act.
He said a three-week trial and considerable public expense could have been avoided if it had not been left to presiding Judge John McGill to give a clear ruling on the interpretation of the relevant section of the Weapons Act relating to intent to defraud.
© Queensland Newspapers
http://www.thecouriermail.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,7733309%255E3102,00.htmlGun lobbyist's sights on $8m claim
Glenis Green
01nov03
GUN rights campaigner and dealer Ron Owen will pursue an $8.2 million claim against both the state and federal governments following his historic victory against firearms fraud charges in a Gympie court this week.
Both humbled and buoyed by the win, he intends to proceed with his legal action, which he filed in Brisbane's Federal Court in April 2001, in the wake of the national weapons buy-back scheme.
He is claiming $8,248,361.09 for goods he alleges the Commonwealth and Queensland governments received from him in the buyback project, but refused to pay for.
His claim, on behalf of his family company Omeo Way Pty Ltd (trading as Owen Guns), alleges the governments failed to pay him compensation on just terms, paid others significantly greater prices for certain items, failed to adequately supervise the gun buy-back scheme in Queensland and failed to ensure he was not discriminated against.
Mr Owen's barrister Frank Martin, who successfully argued the case which led to his acquittal by a Gympie District Court jury on Tuesday, said the claim had been set down for hearing in Brisbane halfway through next year.
Mr Owen, who has always maintained that the repeated firearms charges brought against him have been a vendetta because of his outspoken stand against the governments' tough gun laws, now intends to turn the tables on his accusers.
He has spent more than 3½years researching his $8.2 million claim, preparing 2000 pages of evidence, much of it compiled from the buy-back scheme's own computer records. It is understood Mr Owen bought up many of the old government computers used during the scheme and employed a computer expert to retrieve data which had not been effectively removed from the hard drives.
Finding some of the supposedly deleted records was apparently as simple as pushing an undelete key.
Mr Owen's frequent stands against the system have included him arguing the Magna Carta in his defence, publishing the addresses and photographs of the homes of politicians on his website, organising a Freedom Rally to choke Brisbane's business heart and claiming he was holding "dirt files" on high profile political figures.
In 1997 he was fined $1500 for publishing banned articles in Lock Stock & Barrel , the gun-enthusiast magazine he publishes as president of the Firearm Owners Association of Australia. The articles described how to make gunpowder and adjust a machine-gun's firing mechanism.
In his recent three-week trial Mr Owen was charged jointly with Margate gun dealer and associate Tony Cleaver with 56 charges that they knowingly and fraudulently certified a quantity of handguns as permanently inoperable, even though they could still be restored to full working order.
The trial came almost three years after he was first committed on 181 such charges.
Fifteen of these charges were then tested in a District Court hearing last year only to be quashed by legal argument before going to trial, with the subsequently reduced 56 charges eventually proceeding to trial.
Mr Owen said last year that he was confident of beating the charges, describing them as "an abuse of power" and "obviously a vendetta".
Mr Martin said this week that he could not believe that Mr Owen had been charged under the criminal code and not the Weapons Act.
He said a three-week trial and considerable public expense could have been avoided if it had not been left to presiding Judge John McGill to give a clear ruling on the interpretation of the relevant section of the Weapons Act relating to intent to defraud.
© Queensland Newspapers