The defamation case brought by alleged war criminal Ben Roberts-Smith against Nine Entertainment’s papers has seen the former soldier admit to all kinds of stuff that most other people would probably keep to themselves.
Roberts-Smith is suing over a series of reports in The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age (now owned by Nine, which also owns PEDESTRIAN.TV) and The Canberra Times into alleged war crimes in Afghanistan. The allegations include a number of unlawful killings in Afghanistan as well as things like bullying other soldiers.
Roberts-Smith claims the reports are defamatory of him and have tarnished his reputation. The former SAS soldier says he served his country lawfully and with honour, while the newspapers say they told the truth in all stories.
Because of this, Melbourne barrister Matt Collins wrote in the SMH that the case is “a war-crimes trial masquerading as defamation action.”
However, while giving evidence that he wasn’t responsible for any alleged war crimes, Roberts-Smith ended up admitting to a whole bunch of other weird stuff.
The case has been adjourned due to Sydney’s lockdown, so in the meantime, here’s a look back on all the things Roberts-Smith has admitted to doing (or witnessing) so far.
He owns two glass replicas of the infamous prosthetic leg
One of the most shocking allegations made against Roberts-Smith was that he killed a suspected Taliban member in an alleged war crime and then that SAS soldiers removed his prosthetic leg as some kind of war trophy. Photos of soldiers drinking out of the prosthetic leg back at their base made headlines around the world.
Roberts-Smith denies that he committed a war crime, and also denies that he ever personally drank from the prosthetic leg.
However, he did admit to owning not one, but at least two glass replicas of the leg with the words “2 Squadron” engraved in the side.
“Everyone in the squadron was given one,” Roberts-Smith added while under cross-examination.
He also admitted to cheering on other soldiers while they were drinking out of the real prosthetic leg.
Every day now I have a moment where I learn my requisite horrifying Ben Roberts-Smith fact and then my brain almost implodes from the force of remembering that this is HIS defamation case. He is the PLAINTIFF here.
— Not a Whorehouse, a Whorehome (@fairy_godslut) June 23, 2021
SAS soldiers shot at two stray dogs on separate occasions
During the trial, Roberts-Smith has mentioned at least two separate occasions where he says his then-SAS colleagues shot at dogs over in Afghanistan.
This was apparently some kind of preemptive tirade against at least two of 21 former SAS officers who will eventually be called to give evidence against him.
On June 10 he told the court that one of his SAS colleagues at the time, known only as Person 2, crashed their vehicle into the side of a cliff because they had been aiming their gun at a stray dog.
“Person 2 saw a stray dog walking down the road and he pulled his pistol out and started trying to engage the dog,” he told the court.
“He then crashed the vehicle into the side wall of the road, which is effectively a cliff.”
Then, on June 11, Roberts-Smith told the court one soldier was stood down after they shot at a dog. The bullet apparently ricocheted and hit another soldier in the ass.
[Ben Roberts-Smith calling the judge] hey mate, it’s Ben. Yeah I know it’s the weekend but here’s some other stuff I’ve done
— Dave (@Mesut_Ausil) June 26, 2021
He routinely burned laptops with petrol
During cross-examination, Roberts-Smith told the court that he burned his own laptops with petrol on multiple occasions.
The former soldier asked why his hard-drive was burned in 2018 as investigations into his activity were ramping up.
“Because if you don’t get rid of a hard drive, all of the data on the hard drive, all of your personal financial information, all of your passwords, all of your photos, can typically be pulled off it,” he said.
“If I’m not going to trade a computer in, then I always destroy the hard drive. It’s just the nature of knowing how people take things off your hard drive.”
He added that he also burned laptops in 2010 and 2021.
“Ben Roberts-Smith has admitted” should be a Cards Against Humanity card
— Erin Riley (@erinrileyau) June 24, 2021
He hired a private investigator to spy on his ex-girlfriend at an abortion clinic
Part of the allegations against Roberts-Smith include an alleged affair he had with a woman known only as Person 17.
Roberts-Smith denied seeing Person 17 while he was still married to his former wife, and said they met in the month following his separation. He and this new woman ended up seeing each other over seven months.
However Roberts-Smith told the court that he decided to end the relationship when Person 17 said she was pregnant. Following this, he said he hired retired policeman John McLeod to spy on her at a Brisbane abortion clinic.
“Mr McLeod had put himself forward to me as a private eye so I assumed it would be quite simple,” Roberts-Smith said.
“I felt I was being manipulated and I didn’t feel the situation transpiring was real.”
Roberts-Smith was also accused of punching Person 17 in the head in 2018 at a hotel room in Canberra. Person 17 filed a police report two months after the alleged incident, but Roberts-Smith denies the accusations of domestic violence, which are part of his defamation trial.
The case at the Federal Court in Sydney was adjourned on Tuesday because Sydney’s lockdown has prevented witnesses from showing up. The hearing is set to resume on July 19.
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