An aboriginal woman has been spared jail for assaulting far-left indigenous senator Lidia Thorpe outside the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Ebony Jan Bell, 29, was identified for the first time on Friday after a suppression order applied for by Ms Thorpe preventing the media from reporting on the case was lifted, although the reason the gag order was made still cannot be revealed.
Bell claimed she carried out the attack because of a comment by Ms Thorpe disrespecting her mother, and the Melbourne Magistrates Court heard that while the women had never met, their families knew each other.
She was given a 12-month community corrections order instead of jail and fined $300 by Magistrate Jill Prior, who said she had taken into consideration that Bell suffered from “intergenerational trauma”, ABC News reported.
The sentence also covered a violent attack on a pub security guard, who Bell knocked to the ground and kicked in the head while on bail for assaulting Ms Thorpe and two of her friends in May 2024.
“You need to get some help around this,” Magistrate Prior told Bell in sentencing, and ordered her to undergo treatment for anger management and drug and alcohol addiction to address her “triggers”.
The court heard Ms Thorpe had just left an indigenous-themed “Dreamtime at the G” AFL game between Essendon and Richmond when she had a “verbal altercation” with Bell at about 10pm.
Bell then followed Ms Thorpe and punched her twice in the head and once in the jaw, punched a male friend of the senator, and pulled the hair of another woman who was trying to break up the fight.
Ms Thorpe suffered soreness to the head and face, numbness in her fingers and nerve pain around her shoulder, and said the attack had “long-lasting” impacts, including trauma which was compounded by not understanding why the attack occurred.
Bell’s lawyers told the court their client made a “bad choice” because Ms Thorpe had made a comment about her mother that was “incredibly distressing”, but Ms Thorpe has denied making the comment.
In a statement after the sentencing Ms Thorpe claimed she “consistently advocated against a prison sentence” for Bell, and that she hoped speculation about the incident would now end.
“I also want to reiterate that I had never met this person before the incident. I had no idea who they were,” she said.
“From the beginning, I have asked for the privacy of everyone involved to be respected.
“I will not make a full recovery from my injuries, however I want to move on from this and will not be commenting further.”
Outside court Bell also said she was relieved the case was over, but when asked whether she wanted to apologise to the senator, replied “no”.
Ms Thorpe, who was originally elected as a member of the Greens, has a long history of anti-Australian activism despite being less than 50% indigenous, and in 2024 interrupted a speech by King Charles at Parliament House by yelling “give us our land back”.
Ms Thorpe’s father is a White Australian who has previously said he is disappointed in how she has abandoned her English and Irish heritage, and her mother is also only part aboriginal.
At her swearing-in ceremony in 2022 she disrespected Queen Elizabeth II by adding “the colonising” before her name in the Oath of Allegiance, but was forced to back down and later recited the pledge accurately.
She has also made controversial comments about the Australian flag, praised an aboriginal arson attack on Old Parliament House, has openly admitted “infiltrating” parliament, and wants White Australians to pay reparations to aboriginal people.
Header image: Left, Ebony Bell (left, in yellow and black Richmond scarf) and Lidia Thorpe (right, with back turned). Right, Bell pulling the hair of one of Ms Thorpe’s friends (Melbourne Magistrates Court).
