The controversial founder of Australia's anti-immigrant One Nation party has won an appeal against her conviction for electoral fraud 11 weeks after she was jailed for three years, it is reported.
Three judges on the Queensland Court of Appeal unanimously upheld Pauline Hanson's appeal and quashed her conviction, said Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio. But the judges did not immediately give reasons for overturning the conviction.
Hanson, a former fish-and-chip shop owner who stormed into Australian politics in 1996 railing against Asian immigration and handouts to Aborigines, had been found guilty of fraudulently registering One Nation in the state of Queensland.
Prosecutors had accused Hanson of passing off a list of 500 supporters as genuine, paid-up members of One Nation to register the party and apply for electoral reimbursements.
One Nation co-founder David Ettridge (58), found guilty along with Hanson, also had his conviction overturned.
Hanson (49) grabbed world headlines in 1996 after she warned against Asian immigration in her maiden speech as an independent member of the federal parliament.
She used her sudden political fame to form far-right One Nation, which rode a groundswell against an Asian influx and special treatment for Australia's downtrodden Aborigines to win a million votes in a 1998 election.
But Hanson lost her own seat in the national parliament in 1998 and has been in the political wilderness ever since.She left One Nation last year, leaving the party plagued by in-fighting, to concentrate on her looming court cases.