A continuing detention order that kept him behind bars after his sentence expired at the end of 2020 due to community safety concerns is scheduled to end on Saturday.
The Opposition has slammed the Government for not fighting to keep him behind bars.
“Three years ago, he was deemed a risk and should be continually detained - the risk environment has not changed, if anything, it’s got worse,” Opposition immigration spokesman Dan Tehan told Sky News.
“This is not someone who did some minor things, he is Australia’s most notorious terrorist.”
But part of the reason the Commonwealth opted for a supervision order over a continuing detention one was a report buried by the Department of Home Affairs under the former coalition Government coming to light.
It found the methods used to assess the future risk a person poses to the community were no better than flipping a coin.
Benbrika’s lawyers did not have access to the report when the initial order was made in 2020, which they branded adverse to the administration of justice.
Victorian Supreme Court Justice Elizabeth Hollingworth has chastised the Government for failing to explain why it buried the report, calling the fact it wasn’t disclosed to the defence “a disgrace”.
The Commonwealth decided to apply for a supervision order after Benbrika’s legal team seized on the report to challenge the veracity of the detention order he was under.
The Commonwealth had tried to have the Algerian-born terrorist deported when his sentence expired after then Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton stripped his Australian citizenship in 2020.
It was reinstated by the High Court in November after it ruled the coalition’s laws were invalid, which effectively stopped any bid to deport him.
Benbrika was arrested and convicted over plots to attack Melbourne landmarks in 2005, including the AFL grand final at the MCG.
- AAP
