User talk:203.217.39.91/sandbox

I'm creating this version of the Salim Mehajer article to illustrate to a few people that it is actually perfectly reasonably written. It is taken from the following version and includes the information about his companies and his automobile offences. It's most definitely not a violation of the Biographies of Living People policy, and it's definitely not an example of "obsessiveness". And the section that lists Salim's companies references an article in The Australian that (call me crazy!) listed all of the companies they could find that were associated with Salim Mehajer. Gasp!

I think the thing that annoys me the most is the accusations of violating the BLP policy. There seems to be an idea that you shouldn't write about the egregious things that someone has done. As an example, Salim was in court to answer charges that he intimidated Bruce Herat. Herat alleged that Mehajer swore at him and threatened his family. Salim said he would never use bad language, and this the court had to accept, but not necessarily because they believed him. In fact, the judge said something magistrates only do when they feel that someone is getting away on a technicality and feel on balance it was likely the allegations were true: he made the point that if the security cameras in the car park were working it could well have been a different judgement he gave. Then he extended the Apprehended Violence Order (AVO) by 12 months.

Now I have been told that due to Biographies of Living Persons I should not quote the secondary sources that quoted what was said in the trial. Yet that's ridiculous. If that was the case, then I couldn't even write about the trial. Here's the issue: the trial was widely covered in the Australian media, across all newspapers and TV news reports. It was reported in the rather more left-leaning Sydney Morning Herald, but also in The Daily Telegraph which definitely leans to the right of the political spectrum. It was covered by The Guardian (leftish) and The Australian (rightish). And it was covered by ABC News, which is really centre despite what those to the right may think :-) they nearly all quoted from it, and when they didn't I found that they all put their own slant on what was allegedly said. In all cases, in my view, they made what Mehajer said much, much worse than what he did say in the situation. You see, when I quoted his comment, whilst it was shocking, you sort of can see that if he did say it then it was because he was pissed and wanted to salve his wounded pride. But then, he said he didn't say it and would never have said it as he doesn't use that language. Even me saying it like this is worse than just quoting him, it is, after all, what ultimately got him off. No, in this case the better option was to quote the alleged victim and then quote Salim. I think we can safely say that the average reader is intelligent enough to work out for themselves what they believe, we don't need to massage it for them and we certainly don't need to go further than what the court said, given he didn't get off scott free but had his AVO extended by another 12 months. And it would not be right to avoid explaining it, because then it really looks like we are hiding something which looks like favouritism to Mehajer and favouritism is rarely if ever helpful to someone looking to salvage their reputation. Especially in his country of birth, Australia.

I also feel I need to point out that Mehajer is a public figure. In fact, the surprising thing to me is that the less notable figure in all of this, Bruce Herat, wasn't what the BLP Warriors focussed on and his name remained in the text. It's almost as if they hadn't actually read the text of the BLP policy...

Next we come to the section on his traffic infringements, violations and frankly dangerous driving. I have a section that explains that he has had numerous infringements, and I'm quite specific about it. Why? Because he is a public figure in a position where this sort of information is actually an important thing to know about; he was, after all, the deputy mayor of a City Council that has major problems with hooning - including, I note a touch wryly, in his own street. It is also important, however, to know that some of the infringements are more severe than others. There are plenty of good, normally law-abiding citizens I know who have done an illegal U-turn. But most of them have not done a burnout in their local street (well, not on purpose).and most people I know in NSW who get 5 speeding fines in a short period of time would have lost their license for at least three months, if not longer.

Mehajer is now 30. In 2008 he was younger, but not by that much. Yet he was found guilty of malicious damage in a road rage accident. There were those who argued that it was irrelevant, but I feel this is an unusual position to take. Mehajer pled not guilty to this charge and has never apologised for his behaviour. He later admitted he damaged the much older man's car, and he does not seem to understand that's not an acceptable way to handle oneself - especially one who has expressed the desire to reach the greatest office in Australia! And it's helpful to know that he was indeed capable of an act of aggression bad enough he was convicted of malicious damage. Yet that entire section was taken out.

And then we get to the exhaust issue. For those who seem to want a balanced article, they sure have done their darnedest to make Mehajer look completely bad, because the exhaust issue was a rare case where Mehajer was indeed the victim. Mehajer's wife Aysha collected his new and rather expensive Mercdes Benz car. No crime there. As she was driving it home, she was pulled over by the police who defected the car and forced her to walk home. However, their reasoning was entirely arbitrary and even Mercedes Benz was willing to write a letter pointing out the side exhaust was fully compliant with the law. The police thought do too - they dropped the charges. And knowing that this is what they did, then it he reader may have a bit more sympathy for Mehajer when he was caught driving his Ferrari unlicensed and unregistered, was advised not to keep driving but did so anyway, was caught and then taken to court.

Which leads me to my next point: the article is very clear what he was charged with. It does not embellish. But it also does not shy from the fact that he has been found guilty of automobile related offences and almost every time the magistrate has elected to not record the conviction. I leave the reader to work out whether the law has been fair, and I do so by fairly explaining what he has done. Each time I only reference reliable, verifiable sources. I try to include multiple sources where I can. But it would not be neutral to skip the charges laid against him, and it is far from fair to not be specific what the offences were. As it turns out, Mehajer has lots of minor offences (at least in my mind) but also some fairly egregiously major offences he has managed to wriggle out of. On one occasion he has used section 10 of the Crimes Act to avoid possible jail time, which would presumably have disqualified him from his role as deputy mayor. Should I not note this? He was found guilty, but once again avoided a major penalty by avoiding having his conviction on his official record. But an official court record is not necessarily an official record of what actually happened - the law is blind, after all. I think it's within the interest of the reader to know that he was found guilty but not punished. The reader can make up their own mind whether justice was done. They read about it in the press anyway, so better they read it in a neutral medium like Wikipedia than something like The Daily Telegraph, which often distorts facts for its own purposes.

Another curious issue is that I was pinged on the section that shows all the companies he is associated with. I had temporarily put them in a lost, but had intended to covert this to a table. For some reason, because I included the ABN and ACN of each company I was accused of providing trivia and making the article "unbalanced". In fact, the editor went so far as to say that because I had gone to the trouble of looking up the company numbers I had sourced my material from a primary source. And yet... each of the companies I list has a link to a secondary source. I include the ABN and ACN of the companies as a courtesy to the curious reader who would like to verify the information about each company. You see, you can - if you so desire! - follow the link to ASIC's website and purchase a company extract report, or a company historical extract report to get more information about the company. It includes things I can't really include on Wikipedia, like the residential addresses of directors and secretaries. If you are determined to get this information, you'll get it regardless - this information is available to anyone for a small fee!

It was also claimed that no newspaper in the "tens of thousands" of articles had bothered to put together such a list. I don't think that editor actually bothered with looking at the citations on many of the companies, otherwise they would have clicked on this article from The Australian newspaper. Have a look for yourself, it's a list of all the companies Salim Mehajer is associated with - just not as complete as mine! And it is important information to have. Salim Mehajer runs many, many companies and when his dealings become dicey he switches his directorship to someone else. At one point he switched all but two companies to his wife, Aysha. And he ran what he claims was a not-for-profit for the good of the youth of his city, but used it to finance self-aggrandising advertisements in his local paper. Not only is that so,etching I know ,any would find immoral, but it's not technically legal to do so as under the Corporations Act a not-for-profit can only be run to fulfill its constitution, and even then it is not allowed to directly reimburse or distribute funds for the sole purpose of its members or management. That's a big no-no and the ATO would probably take a very dim view of such behaviour. And, aside from the factvthatvyounare essentially stealing from your fellow citizens, you really do not want the tax office taking a dim view of you...

So, read the current version, then read this version. I'll let you work out which is the most balanced and reliable! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.217.39.91 (talk) 23:42, 15 May 2016 (UTC)

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Salim Mehajer (born 12 June 1986, also known as Selim) is a licensed builder, property developer and former deputy mayor of the now suspended Auburn City Council, which is situated in the Greater Western Sydney region of New South Wales, Australia.

Early life and education
Mehajer was born in Sydney as the third-eldest of eight children to Lebanese immigrants Amal and Mohamed Mehajer. He grew up in the Auburn area and was educated at the local primary school before attending Trinity Catholic College, Auburn for the majority of his high school years. Mehajer finished his final years at Arthur Phillip High School in Parramatta and subsequently studied at Western Sydney University, graduating with a Bachelor of Housing degree in April 2010. Mehajer was featured in an advertisement in the Auburn Review, paid for by the not-for-profit Australian Community Association &mdash; of which Mehajer was the Director and President at the time &mdash; in which it is claimed he also attained a Masters of Environmental Systems, Markets and Climate Change. However, although he enrolled in an environmental engineering course at the ­University of New England (UNE), a spokesperson from UNE stated that he never completed it.

Political career
Mehajer ran as an independent member of the Legislative Assembly for Auburn at the 2011 New South Wales State election. He was subsequently investigated by the Election Funding Authority of New South Wales for failing to declare electoral spending and political donations but, as he was not elected, no action was taken against him. In 2012 he was elected as an independent councillor for the City of Auburn, and was subsequently elected as deputy mayor. In 2014 the Division of Local Government conducted an investigation into Mehajer's pecuniary interests and suspended him from civic office for a month for failing to disclose his business and property interests.

Automobile incidents
On 8 February 2008 Mehajer was involved in an incidence of road rage. Mehajer alleges he was travelling in John St, Lidcombe when another driver started beeping and sticking his middle finger up at him, apparently due to his work ute's low speed. The other motorist claimed that he was confronted when he merged into the same lane as Mehajer. The driver alleges that Mehajer got out of his ute when he stopped at a stop sign, yelled abuse towards him and started hitting the roof of his Toyota Corolla. The motorist then says he drove off but was followed by Mehajer and when they again stopped at a set of traffic lights Mehajer got out of his ute, yelled, punched and kicked his car. In a police statement, later tendered to court, Mehajer admitted to yelling at the other motorist and punching his car, however he claimed he was provoked when the motorist poked him with an umbrella. Mehajer was charged by police with maliciously damaging the other motorists car, assault and dangerous driving. The charges were heard at Bankstown Local Court in July 2008, where he pleaded not guilty to all three charges. He was found guilty of the malicious damage charge, but the charges of dangerous driving and assault were dismissed. He was sentenced to a one-year good behaviour bond and the conviction was not recorded.

Mehajer was involved in a serious car crash on 17 January 2012 when he lost control of his Ferrari 612 Scaglietti at the crest of The Boulevarde in Lidcombe and ran over two women before colliding with a wall. The two women were rushed to Westmead Hospital where they underwent surgery for serious leg and pelvic injuries. They were released from hospital after spending a month in recovery. Mehajer was convicted of negligent driving on 23 October 2012 at Burwood Local Court where he had his license disqualified and was sentenced to 150 hours of community service by magistrate Brian Maloney. The magistrate noted that Mehajer's statement to police differed from his testimony in court but that Mehajer had not been speeding or driving in a reckless manner. Instead, the magistrate found that Mehajer's inability to control such a powerful car caused him to "[make] bad choices and it ended in catastrophe". Mehajer appealed and in September 2013 the conviction was overturned. After his acquital, Mehajer took out an advertisement in the local newspaper The Auburn Review headed "VICTORY over negligent driving" and which declared that "Right is right, even if everyone is against it, and wrong is wrong even if everyone is for it. It's every man's business to see justice done." The two injured women later sued him in 2014 and Mehajer reached a settlement with them in early October 2015, agreeing to pay AUD$1.72 million which was paid by his insurers, NRMA.

Mehajer has had numerous convictions for traffic offences. His list of conviction include: using a mobile phone whilst driving, performing an illegal burn out, driving whilst viewing a distracting Visual Display Unit, running a red light, disobeying a stop sign, performing an illegal U-turn, breaking the speed limit on five seperate occasions and driving his car on the wrong side of the road on one occasion. On another occasion he drove without showing his P plate correctly and refused to show his driver's license. Mehajer had his driver's license suspended in March 2010, which he attempted to appeal but was unsuccessful. He was charged with negligent driving in 2012, but this was dismissed on 26 October 2012 in Parramatta Local Court. Mehajer's wife Aysha was served a defect notice for a supposed exhaust system issue coming from his Mercedes-Benz G63 AMG 6x6, mainly because the police believed a side exhaust did not comply with Australian standards. Mehajer claims the car was brand new, and that the police cancelled the car's registration and forced Aysha to walk home. Mercedes Benz sent a letter to Mehajer that refuted the claims that the exhaust violated the standards and he prepared to challenge the infringement notice, but police dropped the matter before it could go before the court.

On 24 October 2015, Mehajer was pulled over by police at 10:50pm after they noticed him erratically driving his Ferrari along Canterbury Road in Punchbowl. There it was discovered he was not carrying his license and the car was not registered. He was instructed by the police not to drive it any further but drove it anyway, and 25 minutes later was again pulled over by police who issued him with a field court attendance notice. Mehajer claimed on Facebook he was being targeted by police who were trying to "tarnish" his name, and implored them to "PLEASE go out there and target Real criminals and leave me alone". He appeared before Bankstown Local Court magistrate Michael Connell in January 2016 and was fined $200 for driving without a license, found guilty of driving an unregistered vehicle but was not convicted after the court granted him leave under section 10 of the Crimes (Sentencing Procedure) Act 1999.

Wedding
In 2015, Mehajer came to public prominence in Australia and overseas after his marriage to his fiance Aysha (formerly April Amelia Learmonth ) was widely publicised in the media. The media focussed on Mehajer's manner of arrival, which involved flying in one of four helicopters then proceeding to the wedding in a fleet of luxury sports cars, and for his wedding video which was widely shown on media sites in Australia. He was later fined $220 for the unauthorized shutdown of Frances Street in Lidcombe and for distributing a fake flyer warning residents that their cars would be towed if they were not cleared from the street. Auburn City Council released a statement from their General Manager, Mark Brisby, clarifying that no authority had been given for a full closure on Saturday the 15th August, but they had issued a road occupancy license to allow for filming from between 8am to 12pm. The statement emphasised two way access was to be maintained at all times and that no obstruction to residents or pedestrians was to be allowed. A petition on Change.org calling for Mehajer's sacking from Auburn City Council over his wedding and other alleged wrong-doings was created in August 2015 and attracted over 4,000 signatures.

Intimidation charges and acquittal
Mehajer was accused of threatening personal trainer Bruce Herat in October 2015 after a disagreement at a gymnasium. Mehajer was subsequently charged with intimidation by police and had an Apprehended Violence Order (AVO) taken out against him. The AVO prohibited Mehajer from entering Herat's workplace, Anytime Fitness Gym in Burwood. According to Herat, Mehajer told him "Who the f..k are you to talk to me? What gives you the right to tell me how to use this machine? ... I am going to find out where you live motherf..ker, and I am going to kidnap your children." Mehajer's response in court was that "Those words don’t exist in my vocabulary. Maybe when I was in primary school." However, The Australian noted that during his wedding he stated, in front of reporters and TV cameras: "What’s up Channel 9 viewers? This is how you do a wedding. Floyd Mayweather, you got no chance over me, motherf..ker". The charges were dismissed by the magistrate Alexander Mijovich because the security camera had been broken in the council car park, where the alleged confrontation occurred, and he had no way of knowing for certain that Mehajer had threatened Herat. The magistrate did, however, increase the AVO that prevented Mehajer from approaching Herat by a further 12 months.

Nine News interview
In October 2015, Mehajer appeared on Nine News with his wife, and from a lectern gave an interview with a reporter. In the interview, he said "I would like to start off by being in state, federal and I'd like to make my way up to the very top spot. That would [be] my dream come true" and denied claims that he was part of a group of six councillors who were accused of banding together to push through development applications. Reaction to the interview ranged from it being called a "bizarre stage-managed spectacle" by The Huffington Post, to criticism from radio host Ray Hadley in an interview with the Today show's host Karl Stefanovic, who burst into hysterical laughter after viewing the interview for the first time.

Associated companies
Salim Mehajer and his family has been associated, in one way or another, with a variety of companies, either as a director, secretary or in some other function. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) is reportedly conducting a review of the companies. A list of known companies are:


 * Sydney Group Pty Ltd (, ACN 154 021 002)
 * SM Project Developments Pty Ltd (, ACN 130 968 811)
 * SM Engineering & Construction Pty Ltd (, ACN 132 853 153, Liquidated)
 * SM Engineering & Constructions (sole trader, )
 * SM Engineering & Construction (NSW) Pty Ltd (, ACN 164 405 109)
 * SM Engineering & Construction Services Pty Ltd (, ACN 164 334 276)
 * S.E.T. Services (, ACN 151 314 439)
 * Sydney Constructions & Developments Pty Ltd (, ACN 147 549 102)
 * Sydney Project Group Pty Ltd (, ACN 155 827 295)
 * Sydney Construction Group Pty Ltd (, ACN 114 931 743)
 * Australian Community Association Pty Ltd (ACN 150 648 936)
 * Mehajer Bros Pty Ltd (, ACN 155 093 977)
 * Advanced International Developments (, ACN 165 691 850)
 * Skypoint Towers Pty Ltd (, ACN 167 719 959)
 * Mehajer Law Group Pty Ltd
 * Mehajer Bros Auto Pty Ltd
 * Mehajer Consolidated Pty Ltd
 * Mehajer Holdings Pty Ltd (, ACN 601 957 662)
 * Sydney Building Constructions Pty Ltd (, ACN 064 430 280)
 * Sydney Building Developments Pty Ltd
 * Oz Buildings & Constructions Pty Ltd