{"id":41877,"date":"2026-07-01T02:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-01T02:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/41877\/"},"modified":"2026-07-01T02:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-01T02:28:09","slug":"canberra-man-pleads-guilty-to-performing-nazi-salutes-in-public-and-using-white-supremacist-stickers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/41877\/","title":{"rendered":"Canberra man pleads guilty to performing Nazi salutes in public and using white supremacist stickers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">A Canberra man has pleaded guilty after performing Nazi salutes at two suburban shopping centres and placing white supremacist stickers over Indigenous and multicultural signs at the Australian National University (ANU).<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">WARNING: This story contains offensive content.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Zachery James Hook, 19, pleaded guilty in the ACT Magistrates Court to making a Nazi salute in public between October and December last year, and behaving offensively on Commonwealth premises between August and September.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The then 18-year-old was initially <a class=\"Link_link__kR0xA Link_link__5eL5m ScreenReaderOnly_srLinkHint__OysWz Link_showVisited__C1Fea Link_showFocus__ALyv2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2025-12-26\/teen-zachery-hook-charged-nazi-salutes-canberra\/106179974\" data-component=\"Link\" data-uri=\"coremedia:\/\/article\/106179974\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">charged with six offences after a joint police operation<\/a>, including investigators from the National Security Investigations team, raided his Weston home on Christmas Eve.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Four of the charges were withdrawn following the guilty pleas.<\/p>\n<p>Stickers targeted First Nations students, court documents say<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">According to court documents, Hook went to the ANU campus twice in August and September 2025 carrying stickers bearing slogans including &#8220;National Socialist Network&#8221;, &#8220;Australia for the white man&#8221; and &#8220;White revolution is the only solution&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The National Socialist Network is <a class=\"Link_link__kR0xA Link_link__5eL5m ScreenReaderOnly_srLinkHint__OysWz Link_showVisited__C1Fea Link_showFocus__ALyv2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-05-15\/neo-nazi-group-banned-in-australia-under-hate-laws\/106686260\" data-component=\"Link\" data-uri=\"coremedia:\/\/article\/106686260\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a Neo-Nazi group that was banned earlier this year under the Australian government&#8217;s hate speech laws.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">He placed the stickers over signs for the Tjabal Indigenous Higher Education Centre, a support and gathering space for First Nations students and staff, as well as on a cabinet and door inside the university&#8217;s Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) department building.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The agreed facts state that one sticker advocating that Australia should belong to &#8220;the White Man&#8221; was placed over a poster encouraging multiculturalism and cultural appreciation, and on a collage promoting themes of decolonisation and the experiences of First Peoples.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"ACT Magistrate Court\" class=\"Image_image__5tFYM ContentImage_image__DQ_cq\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/fe82c6dcc48e85cb75d0a6ae9c62e2d7.jpeg\" loading=\"lazy\" data-component=\"Image\" data-lazy=\"true\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"Typography_base__sj2RP FigureCaption_text__zDxQ5 Typography_sizeMobile12__w_FPC Typography_lineHeightMobile20___U7Vr Typography_regular__WeIG6 Typography_colourInherit__dfnUx\" data-component=\"Typography\">Zachery James Hook will face sentencing later this year. (ABC News: Matt Roberts)<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The agreed facts also outlined two separate occasions on which Hook performed a Nazi salute in public.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">On October 5, Hook put up a poster reading &#8220;White Man Fight Back&#8221; at the O&#8217;Connor shops.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">After members of the public removed the poster as well as another from a nearby bus stop, Hook confronted one woman and asked why she was taking them down.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">&#8220;It&#8217;s not scary, it&#8217;s just people loving their own kind&#8221;, Hook told her.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">As he walked away, Hook stopped, performed a Nazi salute and used an anti-Semitic slogan.<\/p>\n<p>ACT politician approached at Canberra shops<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">On December 12, Hook approached ACT Labor MLA Caitlin Tough at the Chisholm shops after recognising her from social media and attempted to engage her in a discussion about multiculturalism.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">After she tried to end the conversation, the agreed facts state Hook performed a Nazi salute and repeatedly used an offensive slogan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The prosecution said Hook&#8217;s conduct involved &#8220;the dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority or racial hatred&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">The court heard the Nazi salute offence carries a maximum sentence of five years in jail, but a mandatory minimum sentence of 12 months&#8217; imprisonment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">However, the sentence can be served in the community through an intensive corrections order.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Defence lawyer Sam Collett told the court Hook had no prior criminal history and would be assessed for an intensive corrections order.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph___QITb\">Hook remains on bail and will return to court for sentence in September.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Canberra man has pleaded guilty after performing Nazi salutes at two suburban shopping centres and placing white&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41878,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4817,22,21,2184,1109,1957,3920,5116,33096,33097],"class_list":["post-41877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-act","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-canberra","tag-court","tag-hate-speech","tag-hearing","tag-local-stories","tag-nazi","tag-salute"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41877"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41877\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}