The Sydney gang rapes were a series of gang rape attacks committed by a group of up to 14 youths led by Bilal Skaf against Australian women and teenage girls as young as 14, in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia across several days in 2000. The crimes, described as ethnically motivated hate crimes by officials and commentators, were covered extensively by the news media, and prompted the passing of new laws. In 2002, the nine men convicted of the gang rapes were sentenced to a total of more than 240 years in jail. According to court transcripts, Judge Michael Finnane described the rapes as events that "you hear about or read about only in the context of wartime atrocities".
Jelena Dokic is an Australian tennis commentator, studio analyst and former professional player. Her highest ranking as a tennis player was world No. 4, in August 2002. She won WTA Tour events on all surfaces during her career.
Nicole Camille Richie is an American television personality, fashion designer, and actress. She came to prominence after appearing in the reality television series The Simple Life (2003–2007), in which she starred alongside her childhood friend and fellow socialite Paris Hilton. Richie's personal life attracted media attention during the series' five-year run and thereafter.
Schapelle Leigh Corby is an Australian woman who was convicted of smuggling cannabis into Indonesia. She spent nine years imprisoned on the Indonesian island of Bali in Kerobokan Prison. Since her arrest Corby has publicly maintained that the drugs were planted in her bodyboard bag and that she did not know about them. Her trial and conviction were a major focus of attention for the Australian media.
The Bali Nine were a group of nine Australians convicted for attempting to smuggle 8.3 kg (18 lb) of heroin out of Indonesia in April 2005. The heroin was valued at around A$4 million and was bound for Australia. Ringleaders Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were sentenced to death and executed on 29 April 2015. Six other members, Si Yi Chen, Michael Czugaj, Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen, Matthew Norman, Scott Rush and Martin Stephens, were sentenced to life imprisonment and another, Renae Lawrence, to a 20-year sentence but was released after the sentence was commuted in November 2018. The Indonesian authorities reported on 5 June 2018 that Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen had died of stomach cancer.
Gordon Richard Nuttall is an Australian former politician who represented Sandgate in the Queensland Parliament from 1992 to 2006. He was a member of the Labor Party and served as a minister in the Beattie Ministry from 2001 to 2005. In 2009 he was found guilty of corruptly receiving secret commissions during his time in office and jailed for seven years. In 2010, he was found guilty of five charges of official corruption and five charges of perjury and, ultimately, jailed for an additional seven years, the longest jail term for corruption handed to a Commonwealth politician. He was released on parole in July 2015.
Dragan Vasiljković, nicknamed Captain Dragan is a convicted war criminal and the former commander of a Serb paramilitary unit called the Knindže or during the Yugoslav Wars. In 2005, prosecutors in Croatia accused him of committing war crimes during the wars. A warrant for his arrest was subsequently issued by Interpol.
Abdul Nacer Benbrika, also known as Abu Bakr, is a convicted criminal, currently serving an Australian custodial sentence of fifteen years, with a non-parole period of twelve years for intentionally being the leader and a member of a terrorist organisation. Benbrika was one of 17 men arrested in the Australian cities of Sydney and Melbourne in November 2005, charged with being members of a terrorist organisation and of planning terrorist attacks on targets within Australia. Benbrika is alleged to be the spiritual leader of the group. All 17 men pleaded not guilty. On 15 September 2008 Benbrika was found guilty as charged and subsequently sentenced.
The overthrow of Slobodan Milošević began in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia after the general election on 24 September 2000 and culminated in the downfall of Slobodan Milošević's government on 5 October 2000. As such, it is commonly referred to as the 5 October Revolution or colloquially the Bulldozer Revolution, after one of the most memorable episodes from the day-long protest in which a heavy equipment operator charged the Radio Television of Serbia building, considered to be symbolic of the Milošević regime's propaganda.
Lara Worthington is an Australian model and media personality. She is known for appearing in the 2006 Tourism Australia advertising campaign So where the bloody hell are you?. Her own reality television series, Being Lara Bingle, premiered on Network Ten in June 2012, ending after one season.
Dušan Đokić is a Serbian former footballer.
Craig Robert Thomson is an Australian former trade union official and a former politician implicated in the Health Services Union expenses affair.
Damir Dokić is the father and ex-coach of the former professional tennis player Jelena Dokic. He gained notoriety for being involved in various unpleasant and violent incidents.
The 2007 hitman case is an Australian criminal case involving Steven Wayne Spaliviero and Swede Charlotte Karin Lindström. Lindström is so far the only one sentenced for the crime. Spaliviero served 11 years in prison and was released October 2017, but was never charged for the hitman case. The hitman case has been widely reported by media in Australia and Scandinavia.
The Comanchero Motorcycle Club is an outlaw motorcycle gang in Australia and South East Asia. The Comancheros are participants in the United Motorcycle Council of NSW, which convened a conference in 2009 to address legislation aimed against the "bikie" clubs, their poor public image in the wake of several violent clashes and ongoing biker wars, and defusing deadly feuds such as the Comancheros' battles with the Hells Angels. The sincerity of these efforts to defend the battered image of the clubs has been met with skepticism.
Roxana Saberi is an American CBS News correspondent and former Miss North Dakota pageant winner. In 2009, she was held prisoner in Iran's Evin Prison for 101 days under accusations of espionage. She subsequently wrote a book about the experience.
Catholic sexual abuse cases in Australia, like Catholic Church sexual abuse cases elsewhere, have involved convictions, trials and ongoing investigations into allegations of sex crimes committed by Catholic priests, members of religious orders and other personnel which have come to light in recent decades, along with the growing awareness of sexual abuse within other religious and secular institutions.
Timothy Raymond Mathieson is an Australian hairdresser and the former domestic partner of Julia Gillard, the Prime Minister of Australia from 2010-2013. Mathieson entered the public spotlight when they partnered in 2006 while Gillard was deputy leader of the Australian Labor Party. His relationship with Gillard ended in 2021.
