A woman from NSW has been caught attempting to cross the border into Queensland by hiding in the boot of a car on a tow truck.
Police say the 49-year-old had been denied entry into Queensland on two previous occasions, at the same border crossing in Goondiwindi.
She was found during a search of the boot at the crossing.
Police intercepted the tow truck around 4:00pm on Thursday and directed the male driver to open the boot of the sedan, which was in the tray of the truck.
The woman was discovered hiding underneath blankets and furniture stuffed in the boot.
In bodycam footage provided by police, officers can be heard asking the woman to exit the vehicle.
Later in the interaction, he asks the woman if she knows she's not allowed in Queensland.
The woman, her face blurred and audio muted in the footage, appears to shake her head no.
He replies: "Can I ask you, if you didn't know that, why you were hiding in the boot?"
The woman was then put into a police vehicle and taken to Boggabilla in NSW.
She was fined $4,135 for failure to comply with a COVID-19 Border Direction.
Queensland currently has a hard border in place with NSW due to that state's record COVID-19 cases and the dominance of the highly infectious Delta variant.
The hard border is likely to remain in place until at least the end of October.
NSW recorded 1,029 new cases of COVID in the latest reporting period, the highest daily increase in Australia since the beginning of the pandemic.
