Source : the age
Warning: Graphic content
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of former 2GB broadcaster Alan Jones’ indecent assault and sexual touching trial in the historic Downing Centre Local Court in Sydney.
Today, The Sydney Morning Herald’s chief investigative reporter, Kate McClymont, has been called to give evidence by the Crown.
Jones, 85, is standing trial on 19 counts of indecent assault and two counts of sexual touching without consent against five male complainants between 2003 and 2020. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and denies the alleged physical acts occurred.
All five complainants have now given evidence in court. The trial has heard McClymont spoke to three of the men when she was investigating allegations against the broadcaster, which culminated in a series of reports.
Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732) or the Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491.
The court is played another snippet from Kate McClymont’s interview with “C” in 2023.
The complainant said that when Jones touched him on his penis “it was never skin on skin” but over his clothing.
“He would go the grope?” McClymont said in the interview.
“He would go the grope,” the complainant replied.
McClymont agrees that these words ran prominently in her article reporting on the complainant’s allegations. She agrees the term groping was introduced by her.
“C” made an allegation about Jones touching him in the car while he was driving the then-broadcaster, the court has heard.
McClymont is played the recording of her interview with “C”, in which he told her about this allegation and said he would “just try and wriggle out”.
She said to him: “You’re driving, so you’re trapped?”
The complainant agreed with that characterisation: “Absolutely trapped.”
McClymont denies a suggestion by Gabrielle Bashir, SC, that she knew that this would be a key quote for her article.
Kate McClymont agrees that she organised to interview complainant “C” on September 21, 2023, and she made handwritten notes and recorded the audio of the conversation.
“Well, it’s actually a transcription service,” McClymont says of the recording. “The primary function is a transcription service run by AI. It has to [record it] in order to transcribe it.”
She agrees “C” gave her consent to do this, and that she spoke to “C” for over an hour.
Kate McClymont is being taken to phone records showing her contact with author and Herald columnist Peter FitzSimons, including on October 17, 2019.
In an email at 6.40pm that day with the subject line “Match report”, FitzSimons sent McClymont and another colleague summarising his recent conversations about allegations against Jones.
One man had been friendly and said he “finished with Jones on good terms”, the email said.
Gabrielle Bashir, SC, acting for Jones, put to McClymont that this was of no interest to her.
“Not of no interest,” McClymont says. “It did not advance our story.”
FitzSimons and McClymont spoke again on October 18, according to phone records.
The hearing has resumed after the morning tea break. The court hears that Kate McClymont emailed a then-colleague on October 16, 2019, after Peter FitzSimons sent her his notes of a conversation about a man now known as complainant “C”.
“We have another one,” McClymont wrote to her colleague.
McClymont agreed she forwarded the reporter FitzSimons’ contemporaneous notes.
Jones is writing today into a reporter’s flip top notebook with starched paper of such exceptional quality that the used pages stand up like a peacock’s fan on his lap.
In contrast to when his old rival and 2GB stablemate Ray Hadley was giving evidence, and he avoided eye contact, he studies McClymont carefully as she delivers her testimony, his pen poised.
NSW Local Court Judge Glenn Walsh allowed himself a small joke as he marked an exhibit 180 “for those who are darts fans”, he added, smiling about the room.
According to an AI-generated summary, 180 is the highest possible score a darts player can achieve in a single turn. Judging from the reaction in the courtroom, there is just one darts expert in court.
The Herald’s chief investigative reporter, Kate McClymont, and NSW Local Court Judge Glenn Walsh had a small interaction before the morning tea break.
“Ms McClymont, go and have a cup of coffee,” Walsh says.
The judge gives McClymont the standard direction not to speak to anybody outside the courtroom about the evidence while her stint in the witness box continues, and notes former 2GB broadcaster Ray Hadley had to run the gauntlet of reporters.
She promises to “ward them off” and quips, in a reference to Hadley’s wink towards the public gallery during his own testimony: “I won’t be winking.”
Kate McClymont does not agree that she spoke to Ray Hadley about Jones in October 2019, and says she believes it was author and Herald columnist Peter FitzSimons who spoke to Hadley at that time.
The court has heard that both Hadley and FitzSimons had interactions with complainant “C”, but McClymont says she did not know this complainant’s name until September 2023. She wrote about the allegations of “C” in December 2023.
McClymont is taken to phone records and agrees FitzSimons called her in the evening on October 15, 2019.
“Call if you can. Double bingo. See email please,” FitzSimons texted McClymont on October 15, 2019. “Source is obviously Ray Hadley. The [complainant is] calling me at 7.30[am].”
Kate McClymont says she does not recall “off the top of my head” a series of articles in August 2019 written by a former Herald colleague about advertiser boycotts of Jones’ 2GB program.
She agrees that in about September that year she was working with that reporter on a potential story about allegations of indecent assault against Jones, and that this was in relation to one of the former complainants in this case “and others”.
McClymont agrees with Gabrielle Bashir, SC, that the charges were later withdrawn in the trial in relation to that former complainant.
Kate McClymont is being asked about articles and columns written by current and former Herald colleagues in 2018 and 2019 about then-2GB heavyweights Alan Jones and Ray Hadley.
The court has previously heard that Hadley signed a “secret contract” in December 2018 to take over Jones’ breakfast radio slot from July 2019 and double his salary to $4 million.
During his own evidence earlier this year, Hadley told the court the contract fell through when the chief proponent of the deal, John Singleton, sold down his stake in Macquarie Media, then the owner of 2GB. However, he kept the increase in his salary.
Gabrielle Bashir, SC, puts to McClymont that a series of articles by a former colleague in 2019 “were questioning whether Mr Jones’ position as a broadcaster at 2GB was precarious”.
McClymont is asked to leave the courtroom during a legal argument, as is standard.
