The case was once known as Australia’s trial of the century. And though it focuses on a defamation statement, it grapples with a more important question: Is the country’s most honored living soldier a war criminal?
On Thursday, a judge found that the answer was yes.
Four years later the soldier, Ben Roberts-Smith, sue three newspapers accused him of killing unarmed Afghan prisoners in cold blood, the judge ruled against him in his defamation case, finding that the newspapers proved that the narrative Their statements about his actions are essentially true.
The ruling is a rare victory for the media in a country with notoriously harsh defamation laws that have been criticized for favoring whistleblowers. And it will reverberate far beyond Mr Roberts-Smith, as Australia continues to face the consequences of its 20-year mission in Afghanistan and the operation of elite special forces there.
David Rolph, professor of media law at the University of Sydney, said: “Australia has a reputation for being very plaintiff-friendly. “We’ve got an all-out victory here for the newspapers — it’s not something you see in every case of defamation in Australia.”
He added that the verdict would “make war crimes a new focus” and could “put pressure on investigative and prosecuting agencies to investigate and review allegations of war crimes.” painting.”
In 2020, the country’s military released a damn public account about years of battlefield misconduct by special forces in Afghanistan, including “credible evidence” that 25 soldiers were involved in the killing of 39 Afghan civilians.
A government agency was then created to investigate war crimes in Afghanistan, and it was start testing between 40 and 50 charges of criminal conduct. MarchAuthorities have arrested an Australian soldier for the first time in a murder war crime case, accusing him of killing an Afghan man.
Although Mr Roberts-Smith himself was not tried in the case decided on Thursday, and it was a civil, not criminal case, it was the first time a war crimes charge had been filed. review in public court in Australia.
Mr. Roberts-Smith, 44, was once hailed as an exemplary Australian soldier. During 17 years of military service, he rose through the ranks to become commander of the Special Air Service Regiment. He has received two top Australian military honors and was named Australia’s Father of the Year in 2013. Two of his portraits are displayed in the national war memorial.
But his public image was broken in 2018, when The Sydney Morning Herald; The Age, a Melbourne newspaper; and The Canberra Times published a series of articles accusing Mr. Roberts-Smith of murder, or complicity in the killing of six Afghans.
Mr. Roberts-Smith was not named in the articles, but he later argued in court that he could be clearly identified.
Over 110 days, the court heard the testimony of 41 witnesses, including many current or former special forces soldiers who provided evidence anonymously or in closed courtrooms to the public.
Creepy and eerie details emerged: that Mr. Roberts-Smith had hired a private detective to spy on a girlfriend at an abortion clinic after they had agreed to terminate her pregnancy; that he was accused of burying evidence in a kid’s lunchbox in his backyard; and that he poured gasoline into his personal laptop and set it on fire.
The case has two central charges. In 2009, newspapers reported that two Afghan men were found hiding in a tunnel at a compound and taken prisoner. The newspapers reported that Mr. Roberts-Smith had killed one of the men with the prosthetic leg, and ordered a subordinate soldier to kill the other as a form of initiation. Mr. Roberts-Smith later brought the prosthetic back to Australia, the papers said, and encouraged other soldiers to use it as a novelty potion.
The papers also said that, in 2012, Mr Roberts-Smith kicked an unarmed, handcuffed Afghan farmer off a cliff and that a colleague later shot the man dead in front of him. by Mr. Roberts-Smith.
Mr. Roberts-Smith denied finding any Afghans in the tunnel in 2009. In the other case, he said, the man was a Taliban scout, not a farmer, and was murdered. legitimacy in combat, not after being driven out. a cliff.
The newspapers must demonstrate that it is more likely than not – rather than beyond a reasonable doubt, as in a criminal case – that Mr. Roberts-Smith committed a war crime.
The judge found that the newspapers had successfully proven their accounts of the two events to be true, as was Mr. Roberts-Smith’s complicity in another murder. The newspapers failed to successfully prove his involvement in the other two murders.
Nine, which owns The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, said in a statement that the ruling was a “whitewash” for the journalists involved, and that their articles “will have an impact” lasting to the Australian Defense Force and the way our soldiers conduct themselves in conflict.”
Arthur Moses, Mr. Roberts-Smith’s attorney, said that his legal team would consider the appeal.
