At the beginning of this week, inside a claustrophobic courtroom in one of Sydney’s busiest courthouses, former broadcasting giant Alan Jones revealed how he planned to combatively fight 22 indecent assault and sexual touching charges.
The allegations, spanning almost two decades, relate to six men. Jones’s barrister, Gabrielle Bashir SC, told the court on Monday that Jones was himself targeted by media rivals “looking for a story”.
“[Peter] FitzSimons was looking for a story, and so was Kate McClymont,” Bashir said of two Sydney Morning Herald journalists. Bashir then alleged that fellow shock jock Ray Hadley “wanted to destroy” Jones. Hadley wanted to “tear him apart”, the barrister told the judge-only trial.
“Rivalry, treachery, double-dealing, money, hatred, desperation, opportunism and more” were at the “heart of this case”, Bashir told Downing Centre local court in an opening statement that pulled no punches. Jones has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
Sign up for the Breaking News Australia emailAlso in the defence’s line of fire was the credibility of the six complainants, some of whom met Jones when they were young sports stars.
The first alleged victim to be cross-examined by Bashir, complainant J, gave evidence via video link. But just a few hours into her examination, media reporting was halted by an interim non-publication order (NPO).
The NPO was issued after the crown prosecutor complained to the judge, Glenn Walsh, that the cross-examination was going too far regarding J’s credibility. It should be ruled inadmissible, the prosecutor, Georgina Wright, told the court. The NPO was lifted late on Thursday afternoon.
‘I don’t want anything from this’
Bashir this week argued in court that J’s allegations, that he was indecently assaulted nine times in his late teens, were all a “concoction” – a “fabrication”.
The defence barrister alleged the complainant was motivated by money.
Bashir told the court J went to the police not long after he lost his job as a police officer for assaulting someone at a pub. J had fallen on “extremely hard times”, the court was told.
Bashir was challenged by the judge as to the relevance of J’s financial problems before the NPO was made.
“A complaint like this, if successful, is a stepping stone to civil proceedings. I will be putting that to him,” Bashir told Walsh.
When the suppression order was lifted on Thursday, the prosecutor told the judge she was confident the questioning had stayed within the boundaries of what’s allowed under section 103 of NSW’s Evidence Act and the “credibility rule”.
J admitted to some inconsistencies between his police statement and the evidence he gave in court. But he insisted, over days of cross-examination, that the alleged indecent assaults were not concocted – or fabricated. Nor was he motivated by money, the complainant told the court.
“I’ve been clear on this,” J told the court. “I don’t want anything from this. I won’t accept [money].”
J had earlier said during evidence-in-chief that he was in court because, as a teenager, he’d been “unable to say no”.
“I’m a father now, and I’m a proud father, and I want to teach my [child] right from wrong, and what [Jones] was doing was wrong,” he told the court.
“I know that it was wrong, and if there were other people out there, I had to come forward and tell my side of the story. I don’t want money, I don’t want anything out of this. I just want justice for what happened, and that’s why I’m here.”
‘Number 1, struggle street’
J had, until two years ago, never told authorities about what Jones allegedly did to him when he was a promising sports star two decades ago.
He said during his evidence on Monday that he saw on the news in 2024 that Jones had been arrested on indecent assault charges.
“I watched it all unfold,” J told the court. “I Googled the police station, and they gave me a detective’s number.”
Bashir, the defence barrister, alleged that J read details of other complainants in the news before concocting his own. “No,” J repeatedly stated.
He was asked if he had seen articles written by McClymont about other alleged victims.
“I’m not sure who that is,” he said of the Sydney Morning Herald’s investigative reporter. J insisted he didn’t have a subscription to that newspaper or any other.
J first met Jones when he was 14 or 15 and the media giant “praised” his sporting ability and approached him for an interview on 2GB. He was from a single-parent family and lived in Sydney’s western suburbs. Jones would later introduce his protege as coming from “Number 1, Struggle Street”.
J told the court that when he was a teenager, Jones allegedly gifted him a silver Nokia phone so they could keep in contact. He gifted him a car and began paying him a fortnightly stipend that increased to $1,200 a fortnight so J could focus on his training, the court heard. J initially gave evidence that he was gifted the car when he was 17, but under cross examination, he agreed he was 18.
J also told the court the payments continued for almost a decade and totalled at least $110,000.
J said the first time Jones assaulted him, he was in his late teens and visiting Jones’s Circular Quay apartment, and Jones pecked him on the lips.
Later that year, J was driven to a meeting with Jones by his coach, who the court heard was excited to meet the ex-Wallabies coach. But Jones insisted the coach wait downstairs in the car. J told the court that Jones kissed him while he was in the apartment – the second alleged indecent assault.
J told the court he didn’t tell his coach about the kiss when he returned to the car because he felt he’d “lose everything”.
“I come from a small family, and I was getting everything handed to me, and it was a wonderful life, the car, the payments,” he said.
“And I’d be embarrassed; I would have to tell my friends and family. I am not inclined that way towards other men, and I didn’t want anyone to know.”
The alleged incidents escalated to Jones allegedly squeezing his penis in the car while he was driving him to his Fitzroy Falls property.
J said during the visit, Jones told him after dinner to “go and have a shower and come out wearing a robe and nothing else”. Later, J said that Jones allegedly came into his guest bedroom in a robe.
J told the court he was groped on the bum in an “aggressive” way and that Jones wiggled his naked body into the teenager so their penises touched.
The incident ended with the pair masturbating next to each other on the bed.
“I thought it was the quickest way to make it over and done with, and that’s what happened,” J said.
On Friday, the defence barrister said J’s account of the alleged assaults at Fitzroy Falls did not make sense because he was young and fit – and he could have pushed the older Jones away.
She said he invented details of the incident about Jones’s penis not being fully erect and “not very big” to “humiliate” and “smear” the former media titan.
J told the court he tried to avoid invitations from Jones thereafter. He said he visited Jones’s apartment in Sydney with the intention to “stand up to him” but froze.
“I didn’t think anyone would believe me,” he told the court. “I thought if I did stand up to him, I’d have to lose everything … I’d lose my athletics career. It upsets me now that I didn’t.”
The trial, scheduled to run for four months, continues on Tuesday with J returning to the witness stand for a sixth day.
