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Veteran Australian broadcaster and former Wallabies coach Alan Jones has been charged with sexually abusing eight males over twenty years.
The 83-year-old was taken into custody at an condominium in Sydney’s Circular Quay early on Monday morning, as detectives from the New South Wales (NSW) Police Child Abuse Squad searched the property.
Mr Jones faces 24 fees for offences allegedly dedicated between 2001 and 2019, together with 11 counts of aggravated indecent assault.
Mr Jones is certainly one of Australia’s most influential media figures, and has beforehand denied allegations of abuse, first printed by The Sydney Morning Herald in 2023.
He has been granted conditional bail, and can face courtroom on 18 December.
NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb mentioned officers had been working “tirelessly” on what has been a “very complex”, “protracted” and “thorough” investigation.
She added that police count on different alleged victims might come ahead, as usually occurs in circumstances like this.
“There’s no such thing as a matter that’s too old to be investigated,” she mentioned at a press convention.
“There is no better time to come forward than now and you will be listened to, and we will take your matter seriously.”
A former trainer, Mr Jones coached Australia’s nationwide rugby union group between 1984 and 1988, earlier than pivoting to a radio profession.
He additionally, at occasions, labored as a speechwriter and advisor for Liberal Party figures – together with former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser – and launched a number of failed bids to symbolize the social gathering in each state and federal politics.
A staple of Sydney airwaves on native station 2GB for many years, Mr Jones juggled these duties with TV commentary gigs earlier than he retired from full time work in 2020 citing well being points.
The broadcaster is a polarising determine, for years boasting one of many nation’s greatest audiences however usually courting controversy.
He made headlines in 2012 for suggesting that then-Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s father had “died of shame”, and in 2019 confronted a large advertiser boycott after saying somebody ought to “shove a sock” down the throat of New Zealand’s chief on the time, Jacinda Ardern.
Mr Jones has additionally been efficiently sued for defamation many occasions.
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