Jones’s alleged victim feared being ‘crushed in court’
Adelaide Lang and Tom Wark |
An athlete allegedly did not tell his mother he was repeatedly indecently assaulted by Alan Jones because he feared being called a liar and crushed in court.
He is one of six men who allege the veteran broadcaster kissed, groped, or subjected them to sexual misconduct between 2003 and 2020 across Sydney and the NSW Southern Highlands.
Jones, the 85-year-old former king of Sydney’s airwaves, pleaded not guilty to 22 charges of indecent assault and sexual touching without consent against the men, who cannot be identified for legal reasons.
The former athlete, the first complainant to give evidence in Jones’s marathon fight against the claims in a NSW Local Court, wrapped up six days in the witness box on Tuesday.
He said he had not told his mother about the alleged indecent assaults before going to the police in 2024 because he was not prepared and thought she would push him to come forward.
“I thought exactly what’s happened here (would happen),” he told the court on Tuesday.
“I would be called a liar and I would be crushed in court and no one would believe me.”
When the allegations were aired in newspapers in 2023, his mother had asked him whether the shock jock had been inappropriate with him.
After initially lying, the athlete came clean to his mother after he reported Jones to police in 2024 and they indicated they would contact her, the court was told.
The initial statement to his mother had been the correct version, Jones’s barrister Gabrielle Bashir SC suggested to him.
“You told her the truth then when you said nothing happened,” she said on Friday.
“Alan Jones never kissed you indecently … (he) never indecently touched you.”
“Yes, he did,” the athlete replied.
During three gruelling days of cross-examination, he accepted inconsistencies in his statements, but insisted he was doing his best to recall events from two decades ago.
In one instance, the athlete told police Jones pulled his underpants all the way down to his ankles before indecently assaulting him, but he later admitted they were only a quarter of the way down his legs.
The athlete has repeatedly denied lying about the allegations to humiliate Jones or for his own financial gain after falling on hard financial times.
“I don’t want anything other than proper justice from this matter,” the athlete said.
“I’m not after any of his money.”
Jones had bought the athlete a phone, a car, and paid him a weekly stipend of up to $600 for nine years so he could focus on sport, the court was told.
The athlete said Jones did not explicitly threaten him with cutting off financial payments for not following through on sexually charged requests.
But he allegedly feared the powerful broadcaster’s influence.
Jones, who won the coveted breakfast timeslot more than 200 consecutive times before his 2020 retirement, is charged with nine indecent assault offences against the athlete who is more than four decades his junior, all of which he denies.
The veteran broadcaster – dressed in a grey jacket and navy slacks – was seen chatting to one of his lawyers and smirking after the athlete completed his evidence on Tuesday morning.
He has been seen scribbling notes and paying close attention to the athlete’s testimony.
The hearing continues before Judge Glenn Walsh.
1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)
National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028
AAP