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Ashbygate co-conspirator Karen Doane has gone to ground out of fears for her personal safety. Ross Jones considers who or what she might fear.
Karen Doane, James Ashby’s colleague and co-conspirator, has signed a statutory declaration alleging she fears at least one person wants to do her personal harm.
We know this, because the Federal electoral role shows Ms Doane’s residential address in Queensland’s Wide Bay electorate has been suppressed.
Now, the Australian Electoral Commission does not do this lightly. It takes more than a phone call or even a visit to the local Electoral Office — it requires a signed statutory declaration that you are in genuine fear for the physical safety for yourself or your close relatives before you can become a ‘silent elector’.
An elector must apply to the AEC, complete a Registration As A Silent Elector form and attach to this a statutory declaration compliant with the Statutory Declarations Act 1959. In other words, the person completing the declaration, in this case Ms Doane, agree they will be guilty of an offence under section 11of the Act if they state an untruth (make a false oath).
Ms Doane’s statutory declaration must have contained enough information for the AEC to grant this ‘silent enrolment’.
Is this a can of worms, or what?
We know there are some interesting characters around Mr Ashby and there are probably a lot more who had the brains not to text anyone even vaguely linked to him. We may never know about them — the unknown unknowns.
Could this be “Kojak”?
We do know there is the delightfully named Kojak in the texts.
A bit before 8am on Friday 13 April 2012, PR flack Anthony McClellan texted Mr Ashby asking if he’d managed to deliver the ‘info’ to Kojak. Mr Ashby replied he was about to do just that. Kojak and info. Who the hell is called Kojak?
We know about Paul and Jacqueline Nagle who run the Yeppoon-based labour hire company Lacoa Workforce. We know Mr Nagle informed Mr Ashby he had made a secure copy of a file he assured Mr Ashby he had not opened.
Anonymous, where are you?
Paul Nagle provided Mr Ashby with the telephone number of Simon Mouatt who now runs Simon Mouatt & Associates, a company that promises small law firms they will ‘get your business motor running’.
Up to February 2012, Mr Mouatt was employed by the Department of Defence, most recently as Assistant Director Operations (Policy). Mr Mouatt signed up to the army as an enlisted man in May 1995 and saw operational service in East Timor. His online CV notes
Control and direction of 6 Pl to achieve operational outcomes, including command of isolated posts, long range patrols and interdiction operations against Militia groups operating in East Timor.
Simon Mouatt
At about 8.57 pm on Thursday 12 April 2012, Mr Mouatt sent a one word text to Mr Ashby – ‘Acknowledged’. A few minutes later he texted: ‘ETA 10.25’. Mr Ashby replied he thought this was ‘brilliant’.
For some reason, Mr Mouatt seems to have been Mr Ashby’s caddie for the evening, and a little after 11pm he texted proudly ‘I have you (sic) bags at the front’. Mr Ashby texted ‘Thanks so much Simon’. Mr Mouatt gallantly replied ‘my pleasure’.
These characters are just the tip of the known knowns. You know how the rest of the saying goes.
I am not suggesting in any way that any of the knowns might be implicated in Ms Doane’s fears, which might themselves be real or imagined.
I am suggesting the possibility this whole affair will end in tears has just gone up a notch.
(Read IA’s full investigation into the James Ashby conspiracy by clicking here.)
Mal Brough moves in 2 doors down from Peter Slipper, January 2013.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
20 Comments
if there is a so called person wanting to harm you Doane then name them to police and do it now.
the whole thing is a farce and a beat up.
very murky indeed and if someone feels pressured or threatened exposure is the best defense.
it will only get worse- get out now while the going is good.
I would never trust someone who uses this language:
“Emotional Intelligence, Human Behaviour and Neuro-Leadership”
Flee now Karen!
Ashby has on record the matter of a “threat” to an announcer at a Newcastle(NSW) radio. Perhaps look no further?
Groan!!!!
True= Go public, inform Police.
Otherwise, given Ms Doanes proven disregard for the rule of Law and due process of the law, and apparent lack of integrity, it may well be that an over egged Statutory Declaration to the Electoral Commission to avoid public scrutiny, is well within her personal ethical and moral ambit.
OR could it be fellow comment writers that she was duped by Ashby and his mates. Reading the stuff I have read seems to me a likely explanation.
The LNP will do anything to get into power and so I would be afraid. God I am afraid of Tony Abbot and what he could do to this country.
“I am the Authority now” What arrogance. Cut her a little slack. I seriously think she was made a fool of by experts.
Why would Karen Doane’s safety be under threat? What has she done, that we know of, that would warrant that?
If she really has been threatened, has Ashby also been threatened?
Why would “unknowns” who can orchestrate massive fraud for public consumption and still remain unknown, do something like that and risk exposure?
I wonder if this is a beat up that somehow will become finger pointing without substantial proof at Labor or Labor affiliates.
Or perhaps I can’t keep up with the plots anymore.
Thank you IA and roll on The Guardian in Oz. What a field day they can have, like IA, with the amount of rubbish that has been happening here for such a long time.
Look she is in it up to her neck they all are. And if this is their way of getting out of the real questions they will use it, that’s how this grubby mob do their filthy business. She and all her mates should not be given any protection at all they should be scriutinised by the people of Australia and only then if they are not participants in a conspiracy to overthrow the duly elected government of Australia they can then start legal action against their accusers. Don’t you think it is all bit one sided what theses conservatives bang on about they are so precious, but in the real world look what they are doing to Slipper, Thompson and Gillard. Theses grubby LNP operatives including the MSM and the ABC are a disgrace. This is not what we do in Australia if you want to do this the fck
The last words were to be fuck. Sorry hit the pad.
About time Ms Doane decided to tell Federal Police investigators all the truth about this criminal conspiracy and entered into a proper witness protection program. It might make a few LNP people and their fellow travellers very nervous…and we, the people, deserve the truth.
No, the strategy here is poor Karen is the victim of some BAD labor person threatening her, & all for her bringing that BAD Slipper to account.
I can’t stand the non-ethics of these LNP scum.
Friggin’ double groan!!!
I do hope the lid comes off the can of worms and the worms find their way to the maggots that orchestrated this grubby vicious campaign, namely Abbott, Pyne, Brough and Julie Bishop.
I agree with you Rastus. It’ll be strategy to go crying to the media somewhere down the track and say it’s labor party harassment.
Ross Jones may well be on to something.
Without trawling back through Ashbygate, I seem to remember when it all started to hit the fan, various key Queensland LNP figures distanced themselves from Ashby and Doane.
A report claimed that Doane had said that she wasn’t going to take the fall for anyone. (It is possible AFP or associated figures applied heat over the theft of Slipper’s Diary notes.)
That suggested she might be the first to jump or crack. Maybe someone is making sure she doesn’t.
Hillbilly political shenanigans, with federal implications.
who would you say has more to gain with doane out of the picture
Mark Dreyfus might stir things up a bit now.
Has anyone seen or heard from her? is she still alive and well? how do you know she hasn’t been harmed already?
Miss Doane, please tell someone you can trust if you are reading the 1A, and who better and safer to tell than them or Margo Kingston , so please listen to people who cares for your welfare.
I would have said go to the police but can you trust them since they arrested Craig Thompson, stripping him down , For what!!!!!
There are dangerous people out there and Tony Abbott is one of the many .
He has already got one victim put in Jail Pauline Hanson, now it looks as if he will claim his second Victim in Craig Thompson.
This filth won’t stop at anything. interesting Brough has moved in 2 doors up from Slipper.With Kresta blinds in between. Perhaps they are supplying Brough with “protective insulation blinds” because someone is.
More front than Myers.
Just waiting for the big Exclusive in the MSM! Yeh, sure.