A 15-month jail sentence imposed on a climate protester who blocked one lane on the Sydney Harbour Bridge with a truck has been quashed.
Deanna “Violet” Coco, 32, was issued with a 12-month conditional release order on Wednesday after district court judge Mark Williams heard she had been initially imprisoned on false information provided by the NSW police.
Coco and three others drove a Hino truck on to the Harbour Bridge in morning peak hour on 13 April, 2022, as part of an environmental protest against climate inaction for Fireproof Australia.
Climbing on to the roof of the vehicle alongside Alan Russell Glover, the pair lit orange flares and livestreamed the protest.
Two others, Karen Fitzgibbon and Jay Larbalestier, sat on the ground in front of the truck and superglued their hands to the roadway.
On Wednesday, Williams heard an appeal by Coco of the 15-month jail sentence imposed in the local court last December.
He noted police had included a “false fact” and a “false assertion” in their case against Coco that an ambulance with flashing sirens and lights had been impeded from crossing the bridge to an emergency because of the protest.
Crown prosecutor Isabella Maxwell-Williams unsuccessfully argued Coco should be incarcerated because of her lengthy history of illegal protest which included supergluing herself to an intersection in St Kilda as part of the Extinction Australia group.
She said the protest was not peaceful, in that it affected many hundreds of Sydneysiders and put the community as well as the activists themselves in danger.
The judge noted that these past matters had all been dealt with through fines or bonds without any convictions.
He also said she had showed remorse for her actions and was channelling her diagnosed climate anxiety into productive community work such as volunteering to help flood victims in Lismore.
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With the jail term quashed, Coco remains convicted for two charges of resisting police and using an unauthorised explosive.
At the same time, Williams heard an appeal by Glover, now 61, of an 18-month community correction order.
The judge quashed convictions for Glover and imposed a 12-month conditional release order, hearing that this was his first criminal offence and the charges had resulted in him being stood down from working as a volunteer firefighter.
The court heard Glover was a man of “considerable bravery” having risked his life battling the 2019/2020 Black Summer bushfires.