Lawmaker Guilty of Rape Quits Moments Before Expulsion Vote

An Australian state lawmaker and convicted rapist, who is in jail awaiting his sentence, quit his seat Friday moments before a vote scheduled by his former colleagues to eject him. Gareth Ward, an independent member of parliament in New South Wales state, earlier refused to resign despite his July convictions by a jury for sex crimes against two young men. He failed in a legal bid Thursday to stop his peers taking rare action to expel him.

• Ward, 44, sexually assaulted a political staffer after a parliamentary event in 2015 and abused an 18-year-old at the politician's home in 2013. His sentencing on one count of sexual intercourse without consent and three counts of indecent assault is scheduled for September, the AP reports.

• In a bizarre and unusual episode for Australian politics, Ward refused to resign even after his bail was revoked last week following the convictions. He said he planed to appeal and to keep his seat from jail in the meantime, prompting derision from his peers. He faces a prison term of up to 14 years.
• State Premier Chris Minns said Friday that Ward should have quit sooner, the BBC reports. "If you're convicted of some of the most serious charges, sexual assault in New South Wales, you can't sit as a serving member of parliament drawing a parliamentary salary," Minns said."How can you represent your community from behind bars in Cessnock?"

• As lawmakers assembled to oust him from Parliament Friday morning — a measure expected to draw cross-party support—Ward wrote to the speaker of the house tendering his resignation. He would have been the first lawmaker to be expelled from the lower house of the state parliament for "unworthy conduct" since 1917.
• Leader of the House Ron Hoenig told reporters it was "shameful" that Ward had taken so long to quit. "I would have thought being a convicted rapist is enough infamy without going down in history as both a convicted rapist as well as the first person in a century to be expelled," Hoenig said. He slammed Ward for filing "vexatious litigation" in an effort to block his expulsion, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reports.
• Ward had held the seat of Kiama since 2011, first with the center-right Liberal Party and then as an independent after he quit the group when the charges against him emerged. His constituents reelected him in 2023, despite his 2022 suspension from Parliament awaiting trial.