Reporter dragged into fraudster’s widower ‘shove’ case
Miklos Bolza |
An exclusive interview with a woman claiming to have been shoved by the husband of deceased fraudster Melissa Caddick has turned into a headache for one journalist.
Hair stylist Anthony Koletti is accused of shoulder-barging 73-year-old Julie Brandon and knocking her to the ground at a cliff-side reserve in Vaucluse in Sydney’s prestigious eastern suburbs in July 2025.
In September of that year, Ms Brandon arrived home from dog training to find Daily Mail reporter Candace Sutton waiting to interview her.
“She caught me off guard,” Ms Brandon told Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court on Friday.
“I chatted to her, I probably shouldn’t have.”
Koletti, 44, was in court as he fights a charge of common assault in relation to the incident.
Ms Brandon was recalled to give further evidence on Friday after the hair stylist’s lawyer Zali Burrows became aware of the Daily Mail article.
Ms Burrows argued the interview depicted a different version of events than what was alleged to have happened.
She grilled Ms Brandon of inconsistencies between her police statement and what Sutton had written in her article, including which shoulder was allegedly barged into.
“If I said left instead of right, I don’t understand why,” Ms Brandon said.
“You can ask me again and again, and I will tell you it was my right shoulder.”
She disputed changing other details, such as Koletti allegedly “circling back” after a few minutes instead of returning around half an hour later.
Ms Brandon previously admitted pressuring her then-friend Ericka Van Aalst to make a statement to police about what she saw in the park.
But on Friday, she stood by quotes in the Daily Mail article that it was Ms Van Aalst who told her to go to police.
“This is all an invention now?” Ms Burrows asked.
“Oh, it is not,” the dog trainer replied.
Ms Brandon and Ms Van Aalst took photographs of the man – alleged to be of Koletti – as he walked away from them after the incident and then returned half an hour later.
In a police interview played to the court on Thursday, Koletti admitted he was the man in the pictures but said he did not see anyone get knocked over or fall to the ground.
Ms Van Aalst previously said her then-friend had threatened to break off the friendship if she did not make a statement with police, saying she could lose a lot of money.
On Friday, Ms Brandon denied suggestions from Ms Burrows she had sought money for talking with the Daily Mail.
She testified she hadn’t wanted to cause trouble for Koletti over the alleged assault.
“I wouldn’t want a person to lose his job over something like that,” Ms Brandon told the court.
Sutton has promised to search for notes taken of the interview and provide them as possible evidence but told police prosecutors there was no audio recording.
She will give evidence when the hearing resumes in August.
Koletti’s wife Melissa Caddick, a self-styled financial adviser, vanished in 2020 and is presumed dead after defrauding $23 million from family and friends.
AAP