Grace Tame’s abuser and disgraced former teacher Nicolaas Ockert Bester has briefly faced court charged with menacing, harassing, or causing offence to the high-profile advocate via Twitter.
Nicolaas Ockert Bester has not yet entered a plea to three counts of using a carriage service to commit the offences, dating back to April 27, July 27 and August 28 this year.
According to court documents, Tasmania Police has alleged Bester committed the offences by making public social media posts on Twitter “in relation to and directed to Grace Tame”.
Tame reported the allegations to Tasmania Police earlier this year, and the convicted paedophile’s Twitter account, @nicobester3, has since been suspended.
Grace Tame reported several social media posts allegedly made by Nicholaas Bester to Tasmania Police earlier this year. Picture: NCA Newswire/Gary Ramage
On Monday, Bester, 70, appeared in the Hobart Magistrates Court with his lawyer Todd Kovavic, who asked for an adjournment without plea.
Outside court, Bester faced a media scrum of photographers and camera crew in heavy rain as he and his lawyer used umbrellas in an attempt to shield their faces from view.
Earlier this year, Tame, the 2021 Australian of the Year, alleged she’d dealt with continued threats and harassment from Bester, taking to Twitter to provide screenshots from his Twitter account.
Tame alleged Bester had harassed her online by referring to her childhood email address and an old Facebook login in place of her name.
Bester was jailed in 2011 for sexually abusing Tame during 2010 while teaching at St Michael’s Collegiate, with Tame then a Year 10 student.
Bester was convicted of sexually abusing Ms Tame when she was a Year 10 student. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage
He was again jailed in 2016 for making child exploitation material by bragging about his crimes on Facebook, describing the abuse of Tame as “awesome”.
In 2019, Bester gained a PhD from the University of Tasmania, with funding from a scholarship, despite being banned from the university’s campuses.
Tame’s highly-anticipated book, The Ninth Life of a Diamond Miner: A Memoir, was released on September 27.
Bester, who is on bail over the fresh allegations, will return to court on January 31.