LONG-time Brisbane pro-life activist Graham Preston, expects the police to knock on his door at any moment and take him to jail for unpaid fines relating to his sit-ins in front of abortion clinics.
The father of seven (pictured) said he could be spending at least seven months in jail for unpaid fines totalling about $7500.
This is despite the remission of more than $4500 of fines by the previous Governor of Queensland after a successful court challenge against police actions moving him on from abortion clinics.
Mr Preston said, having spent more than a total of eight months in custody on four different occasions since he started the protest actions in 2002, “jail is no longer an unknown quantity for me”.
In fact he’s been surprised to find considerable support for his anti-abortion stance amongst his fellow prisoners on these occasions.
“One time I was really worried was when this big rough-looking Irishman tapped me on the shoulder and said: ‘Are you the fellow who’s in here for opposing abortion’,” he said.
“Despite fearing the worst, I told him I was. ‘I just want to shake your hand’, he said”.
Mr Preston, a member of Protect Life, said a warning from a government department had turned up in the mail stating “in big black letters” if he had not started to pay all outstanding fines by July 14, he would be taken into custody.
He said his conscience would not let him pay the fines, which had resulted from trying to block mothers from entering an abortion clinic to “kill their babies”.
“My actions were completely non-violent and I believe have achieved the desired result,” Mr Preston said.
“For example, one of the women who worked at an abortion clinic said on oath in one court case that potential clients who came to the abortion clinic on the days I was there hadn’t gone through with their appointments.
“Neither had they made new appointments.
“No doubt the witness said this to make me look bad, but I was delighted to hear my actions had this impact.”
Police response to his actions at the clinics varied.
“Sometimes they would arrest me within two minutes of arriving,” he said.
“On other occasions they waited for quite a while before acting.”
Mr Preston said 14 convictions had been recorded against him before the first win in court, which came about in an unusual way.
“Once when I was in jail I received advice from a lawyer who was doing time for fraud,” he said.
“He told me a line of defence I could take which queried the right of the police to tell me to move on from premises used for abortion.
“Police had been defining these premises as a shop which was clearly not right.
“In other words the move-on order was not valid.”
At this point Mr Preston appealed to the Governor to have all fines remitted.
“At the beginning of this year, I received final word from the Governor’s office that I was still to pay $7500 worth of fines,” he said.
“It’s taken until July for the authorities to act and I’m expecting the police to turn up any time to take me to jail.”
Mr Preston said his wife and seven children – aged six to 23 – were “solidly behind” his decision although his imprisonment would be “a big challenge for them all”.
“My six-year-old daughter still doesn’t fully understand, and I don’t really want her to at her age,” he said.
“I don’t want her to know that people are killing babies.”
The activist sees his situation as just “another step on the way to trying to do what any person would if they saw somebody was about to be killed”.
“I’m familiar with the prison system; it’s not such a heavy burden to be facing this – I’m just getting on trying to live as normal a life as possible in the meantime.”
