AUSTRALIA: Cut down to size - Logger faces jail term over historic trees
Copyright 2001
Sunday Mail (QLD)
October 7, 2001
By Melissa Ketchell
A QUEENSLAND timbercutter who allegedly cut down trees, including a 300-year-old black walnut, from a World Heritage-listed rainforest will be sentenced in Cairns after pleading guilty to stealing and destroying forest products.
Brett Dean Dempsey, 31, from Ravenshoe, is the first person to be prosecuted under the World Heritage Protection Management Act. The charge of stealing forest products carries a maximum $225,000 fine and up to two years' jail.
The charges relate to the disappearance of 25 rainforest trees in the Herberton State Forest in far north Queensland on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.
The trees were later found buried on the southern Atherton Tableland.
Despite damage to the timber by borers, the trees were sold for $45,000. The money has been used to try to rehabilitate the damaged forest.
The stolen trees also included silky oak and Queensland maple varieties.
Trees in the Herberton State Forest have been protected since rainforest logging was banned in the region in 1988.
Dempsey pleaded guilty to the charges in the Atherton Magistrates Court last week.
He said he was surprised at the interest in the case.
"We cut timber every day. It's just normal for us but logging is a dirty word these days," Dempsey said.
But he said he planned to spend a quiet night this New Year's Eve.
"Mind you we did give them the runaround," Dempsey said.
"They knew but couldn't prove it. In the end I bit the bullet because too many people were getting caught up in it."