She had been "difficult to manage", with the result that the trial had taken longer than it needed to, but it had been on track to finish last Thursday. Teresa van Lieshout's tilt at Canning was launched with a colourful YouTube appearance. Credit:YouTube He said Ms van Lieshout had attended the morning session on Thursday but had not returned after an adjournment for the afternoon session, despite a court officer phoning her on a mobile number she had provided. "I asked for the call to be made on the off chance there might have been a misunderstanding," he said, though he added that he considered that unlikely. "I was advised she was refusing to return to court, unhappy with the way proceedings were conducted, presumably on the same grounds as she had expressed during the trial, which was that all those involved in the prosecution were Nazis and fascists," he said.

"So it was clear to me that she was making an informed and conscious decision not to return to court as a form of protest."



The arrest warrant was to lie until today in the hope of resolving the matter quickly but he said it was impossible to imagine any explanation for her non-appearance other than "a deliberate refusal to attend, no doubt in her mind as a conscientious objection to submitting to the laws everyone else is bound by." Ms van Lieshout, a Mundijong resident, is running as an independent for the federal seat of Canning in Perth's south-east after MHR Don Randall's death in June, with other candidates including the Liberals' Andrew Hastie, Labor's Matt Keogh and the Greens' Vanessa Rauland. She told Fairfax Media on Monday she was not a thief and the charges were the result of a "big group of men" meeting to have her jailed because she "refused to give money to the government." Ms van Lieshout's previously voiced objections to government fines may have been what she was referring to. She said on the phone after her non-appearance that she would not be handing herself in to police, as she had done nothing wrong.

"Don't be ridiculous," she told the Mandurah Mail. "I'm going to fight publicly for the next 30 years for all the political and government men to be jailed, including the magistrate Young." Ms van Lieshout refused to reveal her whereabouts, or even if she was still in Western Australia. "I could be in China," she said. "I don't care, I want them all jailed - all the magistrates, all the judges."

The Australian Electoral Commission cannot disqualify Ms van Lieshout from running for a seat in Federal Parliament unless she is convicted of and sentenced for a crime attracting a penalty of a year or more in prison. As the September 19 byelection approaches, the Mandurah Mail has reported that despite Ms van Lieshout listing her occupation as teacher on AEC nomination forms, her registration was cancelled in April. Ms van Lieshout then took to Facebook to accuse the Mandurah Mail of being "male dogs", "idiots", "malicious", "nutcases", and "dickheads". "You trash me, I'll trash you, you evil cowardly lying slanderous violent pro liberal/labor govt fascist Nazi stealing, torturing, murdering dogs [sic]," she wrote. Ms van Lieshout told Fairfax Media on Monday afternoon that the WA government had cancelled her teacher registration to "destroy" her political pursuits.

"It's got nothing to do with teaching, nothing to do with children, what the government and I have been fighting about," she said. "I've got a master of education, I have a teaching business called Expert Educational Services WA, registered with [the Australian Securities and Investments Commission] and I do private teaching because of my political interest. "My master of education is specialised in leadership and management at Notre Dame University and I have also written and published four books of non-fiction. "I am a highly educated and intelligent person ... on social media I get abused a lot and I defend myself. Sure I should be more disciplined but it's difficult when it's so violent and personal." Mandurah Mail staff arrived at the office on Monday morning to find 13 abusive voicemails from Ms van Lieshout awaiting them, including the statement "this means war".

They informed local police. Late last month Ms van Lieshout released a bizarre YouTube clip of herself dancing in her living room to announce her candidacy. It was not the first time Ms van Lieshout had taken to YouTube to announce her political campaign. Before the Vasse byelection in 2014, she released a clip of herself in a black bikini fishing on a beach. The Palmer United Party endorsed her candidacy for the seat of Fremantle in the 2013 federal election but dumped her 12 days later for not toeing the party line.

She went on to represent the Australian Protectionist Party in the election and polled just 0.24 per cent of the vote (205 votes). Ms van Lieshout has previously run unsuccessfully in several elections including the 2013 state election in the seat of Willagee, where she polled 1.8 per cent of the vote (361 votes) as an independent. With Kate Hedley, Mandurah Mail Follow WAtoday on Twitter