An Australian far-right extremist has been sentenced to one month in jail for performing the Nazi salute in public.
In October Jacob Hersant, 25, became the first Victorian convicted of intentionally performing the salute in public.
Hersant appeared in the Melbourne magistrates court on Friday morning dressed in a navy blue suit.
Handing down his sentence, the magistrate, Brett Sonnet, said he considered the sentence to be “relatively lenient”. The maximum penalty for the crime is 12 months’ imprisonment and/or a fine of $24,000.
Sonnet said Hersant had taken advantage of the media, who captured the gesture on video outside court, to promote his beliefs.
But Hersant’s defence lawyer Timothy Smartt flagged that he would appeal against the sentence and indicated he would apply for his client to be bailed.
Sonnet said Hersant uttering “Australia for the white man” after he performed the salute sought to promote white supremacy and elevated the seriousness of the offence. Hersant’s gesture was “inherent to Nazi ideology”, the magistrate said.
“This court denounces Nazi ideology in absolute terms,” he said.
Before the sentence was handed down, Smartt said if his client was imprisoned it would be the “most crushing” sentence for performing the salute handed down in Australia. He pointed to previous convictions in New South Wales of people who had performed the salute and received fines.
He said his client’s non-violent act “does not justify sending a 25-year-old to prison”.
After sentencing, Hersant was accompanied out of the court room by security guard.
The court was previously shown a video of Hersant raising his arm to salute in front of journalists and camera crews outside the Victorian county court in October last year – days after Victorian laws banning the gesture came into effect.
He was then captured saying “nearly did it – it’s illegal now” and “Australia for the white man, heil Hitler”, before walking away.
During a pre-sentencing hearing last month, Smartt told the court Hersant was a family man, the full-time carer of his two-year-old son, and a far better person than the behaviour demonstrated in the video.
He argued that Hersant was a young person who was on track towards rehabilitation, arguing that the offending was at the lower end of the seriousness and a $1,500 fine was appropriate.
But the prosecutor, Daniel Gurvich KC, urged Sonnet to impose jail time and said the salute vilified minority groups. He said Hersant’s behaviour had been “calculated” and aimed to achieve “maximum impact”.
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