Ben Roberts-Smith

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Ben Roberts-Smith

VC MG
Ben Roberts-Smith-2015.jpg
Roberts-Smith in 2015
Born (1978-11-01) 1 November 1978 (age 46)
Perth, Western Australia
AllegianceAustralia
Branch Australian Army (1996–2013)
Australian Army Reserve (2013–2015)
Years of service1996–2015
Rank Corporal
Unit 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (1997–2003)
Special Air Service Regiment (2003–2013)
Battles / wars International Force East Timor
War in Afghanistan
Iraq War
Awards Victoria Cross for Australia
Medal for Gallantry
Commendation for Distinguished Service
Spouse(s)
  • Emma Groom
    ​
    ​
    (m. 2003;div. 2020)​
Relations
Other workChairman of the National Australia Day Council (2014–2017)
General manager of Seven Queensland (2015–2023)

Benjamin Roberts-Smith (born 1 November 1978) is an Australian former soldier who served in the Australian Army. He is a recipient of the Victoria Cross for Australia, the highest award for gallantry in battle that can be awarded to a member of the Australian Defence Force. In 2023, he was found in a civil defamation trial to have committed murder and other war crimes while deployed to Afghanistan.

Contents

Roberts-Smith joined the Australian Army in 1996 at the age of eighteen. In 1999, he was deployed twice to East Timor. In 2003, he was selected to serve in the elite Special Air Service Regiment (SASR). In 2004, Roberts-Smith was deployed to operations off Fiji as part of Operation Quickstep. In 2005 and 2006, he served as part of Security Detachment Iraq. Roberts-Smith was deployed to Afghanistan on six occasions during 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010 and 2012. In addition to the Victoria Cross For Australia, Roberts-Smith was awarded a Medal for Gallantry in 2006 and a Commendation for Distinguished Service in 2012. These honours made him one of Australia's most highly decorated soldiers, and he was once regarded as a national hero.

After his discharge from the Australian Army in 2013, Roberts-Smith was awarded a scholarship to study business at the University of Queensland. In 2015, Kerry Stokes appointed him as Deputy General Manager of the regional television network Seven Queensland. He was later promoted to General Manager of Seven Brisbane, a role from which he temporarily stepped down in 2021 to focus on his defamation action against Nine Entertainment. Following the outcome of the defamation trial in 2023, Roberts-Smith resigned from Seven West Media.

In October 2017, Roberts-Smith's conduct in Afghanistan came under scrutiny after reports that he had killed a teenager he suspected of spotting his patrol. In August 2018, he commenced defamation proceedings against media outlets that had published allegations that he had committed war crimes and bullied other soldiers. In June 2023, Justice Anthony Besanko dismissed the defamation case, ruling that the media outlets had established, to the standard required in Australian defamation law, that Roberts-Smith murdered four unarmed Afghans and had broken the rules of military engagement. An appeal to the Full Court of the Federal Court —heard over ten days, beginning on 5 February 2024—was unanimously dismissed on 16 May 2025. The High Court of Australia refused an application by Roberts-Smith for special leave to appeal on 4 September 2025 and ordered him to pay the defendants' costs.

Early life, family and education

Roberts-Smith was born on 1 November 1978 in Perth, Western Australia. He is the elder son of Sue and Len Roberts-Smith. Len is a former justice of the Supreme Court of Western Australia, Army Reserve major general and judge advocate general of the Australian Defence Force. [1] [2] : 22  Ben's brother, Sam, is an opera singer. [3]

In journalist Nick McKenzie's biography of Roberts-Smith, Crossing the Line, it was alleged that Ben developed a reputation for intimidating smaller students at school. [2] : 23  He played rugby and basketball in high school, winning the best and fairest in his final year. [4] He graduated from Hale School in 1995. [5]

Military career and honours

Early career

Roberts-Smith enlisted in the Australian Army in 1996 at age eighteen. After completing basic training at Blamey Barracks in Kapooka, he underwent initial employment training at the School of Infantry at Lone Pine Barracks in Singleton; and from there, Roberts-Smith was posted to the 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) in Holsworthy, all in New South Wales. Initially part of a rifle company, he subsequently became a section leader in the Direct Fire Support Weapons Platoon. [6] With 3 RAR, Roberts-Smith was deployed twice to East Timor in 1999, including as part of the International Force East Timor. [6]

After completing the Special Air Service Regiment (SASR) selection course in 2003 and the SASR reinforcement cycle, Roberts-Smith was initially posted to 3 Squadron at Campbell Barracks in Perth. [2] : 24-25  While in 2 Squadron, he was a member of training and assistance teams throughout Southeast Asia. [6] He took part in preparations to evacuate Australian citizens from Fiji in 2004 (Operation Quickstep) and was part of personal security detachments in Iraq throughout 2005 and 2006. [6]

Afghanistan

Roberts-Smith at his Victoria Cross for Australia investiture ceremony Corporal Ben Roberts-Smith VC investiture.jpg
Roberts-Smith at his Victoria Cross for Australia investiture ceremony
Ben Roberts-Smith and Mark Donaldson at Roberts-Smith's investiture ceremony Ben Roberts-Smith and Mark Donaldson in 2011.jpg
Ben Roberts-Smith and Mark Donaldson at Roberts-Smith's investiture ceremony
Roberts-Smith's medals on display at the Australian War Memorial Ben Roberts-Smith medals December 2011 (cropped).JPG
Roberts-Smith's medals on display at the Australian War Memorial

Roberts-Smith was deployed to Afghanistan on six occasions, in 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010 and 2012. [6] [7]

Medal for Gallantry

On 31 May 2006 Roberts-Smith was a scout and sniper in a patrol [a] whose aim was to establish an observation on the mountain Koran Ghar, overlooking the Chora Pass in Uruzgan Province, as part of the 2006 Dutch/Australian Offensive. [7] [10] : 5  Besides Roberts-Smith, members of the patrol comprised two junior soldiers who would be referred to as "Person 1" and "Person 2" in a later defamation proceeding, a British sergeant from the Special Boat Service, an American special forces radio operator and Sergeant Matthew Locke. [10] : 5  On 2 June, the post became the focus of the Anti-Coalition Militia force's attempts to identify and surround it. In one instance, the militia attempted to outflank the position, and Roberts-Smith was one of two members of the patrol who were required to move out of their secure position and kill the enemy combatants. Two members of the militia later attempted to attack the post from a different position and Roberts-Smith also killed them. [7]

Roberts-Smith then identified that the post was vulnerable and made the decision to divide the patrol and take a position in which he could more readily utilise his sniper rifle. While separated, he then identified 16 Anti-Coalition Militia advancing towards the post. Roberts-Smith used his rifle to stop their advance while under fire. After being joined by another member of his patrol, he was able to hold off the militia until air support arrived. The Australian War Memorial states that Roberts-Smith's actions while under "fire and in a precarious position, threatened by a numerically superior force, are testament to his courage, tenacity and sense of duty to his patrol". [7] During the battle, Person 1's gun had jammed and he was unable to assist for a period of time. [10] : 6  In It was later alleged that following the patrol's return to base, that Roberts-Smith had threatened to shot them in the back of the head. [10] : 8  In 2006, Roberts-Smith and Locke were awarded the Medal for Gallantry in recognition of their actions on 2 June. [7] [10] : 9 

Victoria Cross

After completing junior leadership training in 2009, Roberts-Smith was posted to 2 Squadron as a patrol second-in-command (2IC). [6] On 11 June 2010, at Tizak in the Kandahar Province, he and other SASR soldiers were on a mission searching for a Taliban commander during the Shah Wali Kot Offensive. [6] [2] : 20  [4] Immediately upon helicopter insertion, the soldiers became pinned down by machine gun and rocket-propelled grenade fire from multiple positions. [6] [2] : 20  With air support, Roberts-Smith and his patrol were able to move within 70 metres of their opponent's positions. [6] The patrol advanced on the insurgent position but were pinned down by sustained fire 40 metres from their objective. [6] Robert-Smith then spotted a structure from which he was able to get cover from fire. [6] He approached the position and engaged a grenadier, killing them in the process. [6] Roberts-Smith's patrol was still pinned down by machine gun fire from three positions. [6] He exposed his position and drew fire away from the rest of his patrol. [6] With fire drawn away from the patrol, Roberts-Smith's commander was able to throw a grenade, which neutralised one of the positions. [6] Disregarding his own safety, Roberts-Smith then stormed the remaining two positions. [6] [2] : 20 

For his actions at Tizak he was presented with the Victoria Cross (VC) by the governor-general of Australia, Quentin Bryce, at a ceremony held at Campbell Barracks on 23 January 2011. [11] [12] After being awarded the VC, he became "Australia's most highly decorated combat soldier from the conflict". [13] [14] During defamation proceedings in 2022, the awarding of the VC to Roberts-Smith was questioned, with testimony revealing that multiple SASR members suspected the events justifying the honour may have been fabricated. [15] [16] [17]

Patrol commander

In 2012, Roberts-Smith was deployed to a rotation in Afghanistan as a patrol commander. [2] : 30  He left the full-time army in 2013 at age thirty-five with the rank of corporal, then joining the Army Reserve. [18] Roberts-Smith was awarded the Commendation for Distinguished Service as part of the 2014 Australia Day Honours on 26 January 2014. [19] The award arose from the 2012 tour of Afghanistan, in which he "distinguished himself as an outstanding junior leader on more than 50 high risk" operations. [20] Roberts-Smith left the Army Reserve in 2015. [21]

Corporate career

The University of Queensland offered Roberts-Smith a scholarship to study a Master of Business Administration in October 2013, after he announced that he was leaving the full-time army. At this time the university was looking to establish a program to support soldiers to enter corporate roles. [18] [22] Roberts-Smith graduated in December 2016 at age 38 and said, "I joined the army at 18 so I hadn't gone to university for a Bachelor degree and I didn't have the base level of business knowledge because there were many things I just hadn't been exposed to." [22] [23] [24]

In April 2015, Roberts-Smith was appointed by Seven West Media's owner Kerry Stokes to be deputy general manager of regional television for Seven Queensland, based in Maroochydore. Two months later, he was promoted to general manager. [25] [26] [27] When he was first promoted to general manager, some staff joked "that it would have been difficult to find a less qualified person than Roberts-Smith". [2] : 94  He also admitted that he was "shocked" at being offered the position. [2] : 94  In April 2016, Roberts-Smith was also made general manager of Seven Brisbane following the resignation of Max Walters. [28] [29]

While at Seven Queensland, Roberts-Smith was secretly recorded expressing disdain for the media business, dislike of fellow Seven executives and incredulity that he was still running Seven Queensland despite being at the centre of a war crimes scandal. [30] He told a colleague that "I'll be frank with you ... I don't really like this industry, to be honest. I don't see myself staying." [2] : 97  Roberts-Smith, however, felt indebted to media mogul and Seven owner Kerry Stokes for financing his personal legal actions. [30] It was alleged during defamation proceedings in February 2022 that Roberts-Smith had employed a private investigator, John McLeod, to pose as a barman during a Seven Queensland work event to listen to staff at the event and discern their opinions of him. [31]

In April 2021, Roberts-Smith temporarily stepped down from Seven Queensland to focus on his defamation action against Nine Entertainment. [32] He resigned from Seven in June 2023 following the case's unsuccessful outcome. [27] [33]

War crime allegations

In October 2017, Roberts-Smith's actions during deployments to Afghanistan began to come under scrutiny. One controversy concerned the killing of a person, who Roberts-Smith had claimed was a Taliban spotter, during a confrontation in May 2006 at Chora Pass. According to the journalist Chris Masters, two members of the patrol had witnessed a lone Afghan teenager approaching the patrol observation post, leaving shortly thereafter. Although the two operators had decided it was not necessary to engage the Afghan, Roberts-Smith and patrol 2IC Matthew Locke arrived on-scene and the pair "decided to hunt down and shoot dead the two 'enemy' after concluding they had spotted the patrol". [34] The patrol report had identified only a single Afghan unarmed "spotter", but Roberts-Smith later said that two armed insurgents had approached the position in an oral account provided to the Australian War Memorial. When the inconsistency was raised, Roberts-Smith claimed to have remembered incorrectly. [34]

Following the publication of Masters' book No Front Line in October 2017, Fairfax Media's Nick McKenzie and the ABC's Dan Oakes covered the story, linking the case to an ongoing inquiry by the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force into criminal misconduct on the battlefield by special forces; an inquiry that resulted in the Brereton Report. Responding to the coverage in an interview with The Australian , Roberts-Smith described the scrutiny as "un-Australian". Oakes wrote, "It's not 'un-Australian' to investigate the actions of special forces in Afghanistan". [35] [36]

In June 2018, a joint ABC–Fairfax investigation detailed an assault on the village of Darwan in September 2012 during which a handcuffed man was kicked off a cliff by an Australian special forces soldier nicknamed "Leonidas" after the famed Spartan king. [37] [38] [39] On 6 July 2018, Fairfax Media reported that Roberts-Smith was "one of a small number of soldiers subject to investigation by an inquiry looking into the actions of Australian special forces soldiers in Afghanistan". [40] In August 2018, Fairfax Media reported that Roberts-Smith bullied several of his fellow soldiers and alleged that he had committed domestic violence against a woman he was having an affair with. Roberts-Smith denied these allegations. [41]

In June 2023, the ABC reported allegations that Roberts-Smith directed another SASR soldier to kill an elderly imam during an August 2012 operation in Afghanistan. It was alleged that this led to the man being dragged from a mosque and killed, despite him being unarmed and a prisoner of the Australians. This incident was among those which the Brereton Report recommended be considered by war crimes investigators. [42]

Investigation

In November 2018, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) announced that they "received a referral to investigate allegations of war crimes committed by Australian soldiers during the Afghanistan conflict". [43] In 2018, former AFP commissioner Mick Keelty informed Roberts-Smith that the AFP had received referrals regarding alleged war crimes. [44] Keelty's disclosure came days after the AFP began a covert operation targeting Roberts-Smith, leading him to start using burner phones to obstruct the police investigation. [45] [2] : 191–201 

The Federal Court of Australia noted in September 2020 that no charges against Roberts-Smith had been laid. [46] In April 2021, the AFP confirmed it was conducting a probe into allegations that Roberts-Smith had destroyed or buried evidence directly related to the ongoing investigation. [47] The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions later decided that the original AFP investigation could not lead to a prosecution, because of the likelihood that information it had received from the Brereton inquiry would be inadmissible, due to the Inspector-General's use of special coercive powers to question serving members of the ADF. [48] The abandonment of the probe led to the establishment of a new joint task force with personnel from the Office of the Special Investigator and a new team of AFP investigators to investigate the allegations. [48]

Defamation suit

In response to this series of articles, in January 2019, Roberts-Smith commenced defamation proceedings in the Federal Court against Fairfax Media (a subsidiary of Nine Entertainment) and two journalists, Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters, and a former journalist, David Wroe. Fairfax mounted a truth defence, based on its reporting being "substantially true". As part of this, Fairfax detailed a series of six unlawful killings alleged to have been carried out by Roberts-Smith in Afghanistan, including those in Darwan. [49] [50] The defamation trial was labelled by lawyers and media as "the trial of the century". [2] : 220  [51]

Kerry Stokes' private investment company, Australian Capital Equity (ACE), extended Roberts-Smith a line of credit to fund his legal action, against which he drew A$1.9 million. [52] Stokes and another director of ACE were also on the board of the Australian War Memorial (AWM). Calls were made at the time for Stokes, as then AWM chairman, to stand down over his public and private support for soldiers accused of war crimes in Afghanistan. [53]

In August 2020, it was reported that legal experts had raised concerns about a personal relationship between Roberts-Smith and his defamation lawyer, saying it could constitute unprofessional conduct. [54] News Corp Australia published a photo of Roberts-Smith holding hands with the lawyer, who they reported was visiting him in his new apartment in Brisbane. [52] The lawyer conceded that it was "unwise to spend time with him socially". [55]

On 1 September 2020, Fairfax/Nine Entertainment lawyer Sandy Dawson told the Federal Court that the Australian Federal Police had information, including an eyewitness, that allegedly implicated Roberts-Smith in Afghanistan war crimes. [56] The defamation trial, expected to last for ten weeks, commenced in June 2021 in Sydney. [57] In November 2020, the Federal Court was told that Roberts-Smith and his wife had given inconsistent accounts about the status of their relationship during previous years. [58] In April 2021, The Age published an article alleging that Roberts-Smith had attempted to cover up the alleged crimes by hiding incriminating images on a USB drive buried in his backyard, which had since been obtained by the Australian Federal Police. [59]

A colleague of Roberts-Smith, referred to as Person 16 (identity legally protected as part of proceedings), told the court in 2022 that Roberts-Smith had shot dead an unarmed Afghan teenage prisoner in 2012, and bragged about it. [60] [61] Several serving members of the SASR provided testimony regarding bullying and threats made by Roberts-Smith during his service both within Australia and Afghanistan. "Person 1", a serving SASR member, said that Roberts-Smith had stated that he would "put a bullet in the back of his head" if he did not improve his performance. After this, Person 1 was advised by other members to report Roberts-Smith's threat which he did, leading to Roberts-Smith threatening him again, stating "If you're going to make accusations, cunt, you better have some fucking proof." Reports of Roberts-Smith's bullying were also reiterated by Person 43 and Person 10, other serving members of the SASR. [62] [63] Fairfax Media's defence against Roberts-Smith's suit ended in early April 2022 after calling witnesses for eleven weeks. [64] Submissions ended in June 2022 after 110 days of evidence. [65]

Judgment

On 1 June 2023, Justice Anthony Besanko dismissed the defamation case brought by Roberts-Smith. Besanko found that the newspapers on trial, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Canberra Times, had established substantial or contextual truth of many of their allegations, including that Roberts-Smith "broke the moral and legal rules of military engagement and is therefore a criminal". [66] [67] [68] As a defamation suit is a civil proceeding, Besanko was required by the Evidence Act 1995 (Cth) to assess the evidence using the civil standard of proof, the balance of probabilities, instead of the criminal standard of proof, beyond reasonable doubt. [67] [69] [70] Due to the gravity of the allegations, Besanko followed the Briginshaw principle, which required stronger evidence than would be necessary for a less serious matter. [71] [72]

Besanko found that four murder allegations against Roberts-Smith had been proven. [73] [74] The judgment concluded that it was substantially true that:

It was ruled that two allegations of murder at Syahchow and Fasil in 2012 were not proven. [75] [68]

Besanko separately found that it was proven that:

Allegations that Roberts-Smith committed domestic violence and threatened to report another soldier to the International Criminal Court were found to have not been proven. The judgement concluded that this did not further harm Roberts-Smith's reputation given the other substantially true allegations, thus establishing contextual truth. [68] Judge Besanko also stated that Roberts-Smith was not a reliable witness due to having an obvious motive to lie. Besanko also stated that he believed that Roberts-Smith had threatened a soldier who gave testimony against him. [81]

On 15 June 2023, Roberts-Smith stated that he was proud of his actions in Afghanistan and would not be apologising. [82] Later in June, he accepted liability for payment of the legal costs of his failed defamation suit against the three newspapers from 17 March 2020. [83] [84] One respondent to the case previously stated that approximately $30 million was spent on successfully defending it. [83] In November 2023, it was ruled that Roberts-Smith should pay approximately ninety-five per cent of the costs incurred by Nine Entertainment from when he began proceedings against them in 2018. [85] In December 2023, Kerry Stokes's private investment company, Australian Capital Equity, was ordered to pay costs. [86] [87]

In 2023, Kim Beazley, Chair of the Australian War Memorial Council, acknowledged "the gravity of the decision in the Ben Roberts-Smith VC MG defamation case and its broader impact on all involved in the Australian community". [88] Beazley added that careful consideration was being given to the additional content and context to be included in collection items on display. [88] [13]

In June 2024, Roberts-Smith attended Government House, Perth, to receive the King Charles III Coronation Medal from the governor of Western Australia, Chris Dawson, bestowed by King Charles III on all living Australian recipients of the Victoria Cross. [89] Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese commented that the decision to include Roberts-Smith had been made by the Palace and not the Australian government, although they had previously indicated to the palace that they had "no objections" to the making of the awards. [90] [91]

In September 2024 it was reported by The Sydney Morning Herald that Roberts-Smith had attended a recent Australian Defence Force gala dinner to celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the Special Air Service Regiment and that some who had served in the special forces found this inappropriate. The same article said that the Office of the Special Investigator could soon bring criminal charges against Roberts-Smith, including further alleged war crimes and other criminal matters. [92]

Appeal

On 11 July 2023, Roberts-Smith filed an appeal against Justice Besanko's judgment to the Full Court of the Federal Court after being granted an extension. [84] [93] Nine Entertainment said it would oppose the appeal. [84] The Federal Court ordered Roberts-Smith to pay almost $1 million in security for costs ahead of an appeal in October. [94] Commencing on 5 February 2024, the Full Court heard Roberts-Smith's appeal over ten days. [95] [96] [97]

Lawyers for Roberts-Smith filed an interlocutory application with the Federal Court on 27 March 2025, seeking to amend his appeal due to a secret recording of a conversation between Nick McKenzie and one of his sources. [98] [99] Roberts-Smith's lawyers sought "wide-ranging subpoenas" as part of the application to re-open the appeal, which Nine Entertainment's lawyers opposed, calling them a "fishing expedition". [100] Justice Nye Perram denied the majority of Roberts-Smith's subpoenas, allowing only subpoenas for communications between Nick McKenzie's and Nine Entertainment's lawyers, and between Roberts-Smith and a friend of his ex-partner. [100]

In May 2025, the secret recording between McKenzie and a witness known as "Person 17", a former lover of Roberts-Smith, was admitted into evidence. [96] McKenzie was recorded telling "Person 17" that Roberts-Smith's ex-partner and her friend had been "actively briefing us on his legal strategy in respect of you … we anticipated most of it. One or two things now we know", Roberts-Smith's lawyers told the court. [101] In court, Roberts-Smith argued that his ex-partner had accessed his email account and passed on privileged communications to McKenzie. [102]

Roberts-Smith lost his appeal against Besanko's ruling on 16 May 2025. [103] [104] The Full Court of the Federal Court unanimously found that he was not defamed when Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters published reports alleging he had committed war crimes in Afghanistan. [103] [105] [106] "We are unanimously of the opinion that the evidence was sufficiently cogent to support the findings that [Roberts-Smith] … murdered four Afghan men" the court stated, ordering Roberts-Smith to pay the respondents' legal costs. [105] The interlocutory application to amend the appeal was also dismissed, with judges expressing doubts about the integrity of the secret recording, stating they could not be confident "that the contents of the recording have not been doctored by removing sections or splicing together different parts of a recorded conversation". [99] [107] Legal costs are estimated to have totalled $30 million for the initial trial and $4 million for the appeal. [108]

On 17 June 2025, Roberts-Smith sought special leave in the High Court of Australia to appeal against the judgment of the Full Federal Court. [108] Roberts-Smith argued that Besanko's judgment had branded him a war criminal, despite coming as a consequence of civil proceedings; and that the rules of evidence should have been applied more strictly, given that Roberts-Smith had not been charged with any criminal offence and was entitled to a presumption of innocence. [109] On 4 September 2025, the High Court refused his application for leave to appeal and ordered that he pay costs—which will include the further cost of the application to the High Court. [110]

Funding

Roberts-Smith has been supported by some wealthy Australians. [111] Kerry Stokes funded his original civil proceedings. [111] [112] John Singleton paid for newspaper advertising which called attacks on Roberts-Smith "disgraceful". [111] Australia’s richest person, Gina Rinehart has said: "Many patriotic Australians query, is it fair that this brave and patriotic man who risked his life on overseas missions which he was sent on by our government, is under such attack." [112] When questioned, Rinehart refused to rule out funding Roberts-Smith's defamation action. [112]

The media respondents, seeking further information about the funding of Roberts-Smith's legal proceedings, have obtained a Federal Court subpoena for documents naming Rinehart. [113]

On 9 September 2025, the Federal Court ordered Roberts-Smith together with Kerry Stokes's private company Australian Capital Equity to pay costs fixed at $13,270,950 to the media respondents, plus a costs assessment fee of $224,872 for the application for costs. [114] [115]

Public perceptions

Reputation

Roberts-Smith speaking at a 2012 event at the Australian War Memorial with Governor-General Quentin Bryce and Prime Minister Julia Gillard in attendance Governor-General attends Cross Your Heart event (1).jpg
Roberts-Smith speaking at a 2012 event at the Australian War Memorial with Governor-General Quentin Bryce and Prime Minister Julia Gillard in attendance

Prior to the publication of war crimes and domestic violence allegations, Roberts-Smith was widely regarded as one of Australia's most admired and highly decorated soldiers. [116] [117] He was considered a national hero. [118] Roberts-Smith was the Fremantle Football Club's number-one ticket holder for the 2012 to 2015 Australian Football League seasons. [119] [120] In 2013, he was named Australian Father of the Year by The Shepherd Centre, a not-for-profit charitable organisation. [118] [121] In 2014, Roberts-Smith was made deputy chair for Tony Abbott's mental health advisory committee. [122]

A combat uniform Roberts-Smith wore in Afghanistan was displayed in the War Memorial. [14] [123] A 2014 painting of him, Pistol Grip by Michael Zavros, was commissioned by the Australian War Memorial. [124] From 2014 to 2017, he was chair of the National Australia Day Council, an Australian Government-owned social enterprise. [125] In 2015, the voices of Roberts-Smith and others were featured in the song "Lest We Forget" with Australian country music singer Lee Kernaghan on the studio album Spirit of the Anzacs . [126] In 2018, the National Portrait Gallery commissioned a photo of him by Julian Kingma. [127]

During defamation proceedings against newspapers and journalists, Roberts-Smith said that after the publications of the allegations against him, that he lost approximately $475,000 worth of speaking engagements. [117] [128] He had been offered a partnership at consulting firm PwC; however, after he had informed them of the allegations, the job had not proceeded. [128] When his civil action was dismissed in June 2023, Justice Besanko found that Roberts-Smith's "reputation has been lowered so far ... that two unproven allegations of battlefield murder weren't enough to defame him" [118] Besanko upheld that he had "disgraced his country Australia and the Australian army by his conduct as a member of the SASR in Afghanistan". [118]

Masters book controversy

In July 2023, Chris Masters published a book detailing the allegations of war crimes and later defamation lawsuit. [10] A committee of the Australian War Memorial selected the book for award of a major prize. The council of the Memorial overruled the selection, stating that the committee had not applied recently updated criteria. Masters and others involved criticised the retrospective change which disqualified his book. [129] [130] However, the council defended its decision with support from prime minister Anthony Albanese. [131] [132]

Personal life

Roberts-Smith met his former wife Emma Groom in 1998, at an army ball in Sydney, when he was 19. [2] : 22  She came from a military family. On 6 December 2003, the couple married at the University of Western Australia. [133] [2] : 48  Their twin daughters were born in 2010. On retirement from the army in 2015, Roberts-Smith moved to Queensland with his wife and daughters. [134]

In April 2018, Groom discovered that Roberts-Smith had been having an affair after a woman, who was given the pseudonym "Person 17" in the defamation trial, showed up at her house and showed her hundreds of text messages sent by Roberts-Smith. [2] : xiii, 145–147  Roberts-Smith's and Groom's divorce was finalised in December 2020. [135] [136] [137] In January 2022, Roberts-Smith was ordered to pay his ex-wife's legal costs after unsuccessfully trying to sue her in the Federal Court over allegations that she had accessed confidential emails. [138]

See also

Footnotes

  1. ↑ A patrol consists of four to six personnel, which is usually commanded by a sergeant and occasionally by a senior corporal. [8] : 95  [9] : 31 

References

  1. ↑ "The life and times of Ben Roberts-Smith". Nine News . Australian Associated Press. 1 June 2023. Archived from the original on 30 November 2024. Retrieved 13 April 2025.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 McKenzie, Nick (2023). Crossing The Line. Hachette Australia. ISBN   978-0-7336-5043-7.
  3. ↑ MacNaughton, Tanya (18 October 2016). "Baritone Sam Roberts-Smith gets hooked on WA Opera's The Pearl Fishers". PerthNow . Archived from the original on 1 March 2022. Retrieved 1 March 2022.
  4. 1 2 Cowan, Sean; Taylor, Nick (21 January 2011). "WA digger awarded VC medal". The West Australian . Archived from the original on 18 May 2021. Retrieved 7 May 2025.
  5. ↑ Phillips, Yasmine (4 February 2011). "VC hero Ben Roberts-Smith urges students to strive for excellence". PerthNow . Archived from the original on 13 May 2021. Retrieved 1 March 2022.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 "Australian Army Awarded the Victoria Cross for Australia/Medal for Gallantry Corporal Benjamin Roberts-Smith, VC, MG – Citation". Department of Defence. Archived from the original on 4 April 2012. Retrieved 13 August 2016– via Trove.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 "Medal for Gallantry: Lance Corporal Ben Roberts-Smith, Special Air Service Regiment, Australian Army". Australian War Memorial . Archived from the original on 18 May 2021. Retrieved 1 June 2023.
  8. ↑ Lee, Sandra (2007). 18 Hours: The True Story of an SAS War Hero. Pymble, New South Wales: HarperCollins. ISBN   978-0-73228-246-2.
  9. ↑ Crompvoets, Samantha (2021). Blood Lust, Trust & Blame. Clayton, Victoria: Monash University Publishing. ISBN   9781922464613.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Masters, Chris (2023). Flawed Hero: Truth, lies and war crimes. Allen & Unwin. ISBN   9781761069819.
  11. ↑ "Victoria Cross for Australia (VC) – Corporal Benjamin Roberts-Smith MG, WA" (PDF) (No. S 12 ed.). Commonwealth of Australia Gazette. 23 January 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 March 2011. Retrieved 10 April 2025.
  12. ↑ AAP (23 January 2010). "SAS digger awarded VC for taking on Taliban". The Sydney Morning Herald . Archived from the original on 7 January 2014. Retrieved 23 January 2011.
  13. 1 2 Chrysanthos, Natassia (18 May 2025). "War Memorial to update Roberts-Smith panels but display will remain". Sydney Morning Herald. Archived from the original on 18 May 2025. Retrieved 18 May 2025.
  14. 1 2 Yan Zhuang (3 October 2021). "He's Australia's Most Decorated Soldier. Did He Also Kill Helpless Afghans?". The New York Times . Archived from the original on 27 December 2022. Retrieved 27 December 2022.
  15. ↑ McKinnell, Jamie (3 February 2022). "Soldiers believe events that earned Ben Roberts-Smith Victoria Cross may have been 'falsified', court hears". ABC News . Archived from the original on 23 March 2022. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
  16. ↑ "SAS soldiers considered Ben Roberts-Smith 'arrogant' and undeserving of Victoria Cross, court told". The Guardian . 3 February 2022. Archived from the original on 23 March 2022. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
  17. ↑ Whitbourn, Michaela (8 February 2022). "Soldier harboured doubts about Roberts-Smith's VC honour, court told". The Sydney Morning Herald . Archived from the original on 23 March 2022. Retrieved 23 March 2022.
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