Ben Roberts-Smith told his wife Emma Roberts she would lose access to their children if she didn’t lie publicly about him having an affair, during the tumultuous break-up of their marriage, a court has heard.
During emotional evidence before the federal court Monday, Emma Roberts said her now ex-husband – when confronted with evidence of his extramarital affair – said they both needed to lie to the press that they had been separated at the time.
“Ben had suggested that the only way we would survive that if we said we were separated, that I was to lie,” Roberts said.
“I didn’t want to lie. There were enough lies.”
Roberts told the court: “He [Roberts-Smith] pointed to our children sitting in the loungeroom, and he said ‘if you don’t lie you will lose them’.”
Roberts says she was told to pose for a photograph to accompany a front-page story in The Australian newspaper the next day, saying the couple was separated. Roberts told the court the story was false.
Roberts also said she gave a false statement to lawyers for her husband, claiming they were separated.
“Ben asked me to lie,” she told the court.
Roberts-Smith, a recipient of Australia’s highest military honour, the Victoria Cross, is suing the Age, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Canberra Times for defamation over a series of reports he alleges are defamatory and portray him as committing war crimes, including murder.
The newspapers are pleading a defence of truth. Roberts-Smith denies all wrongdoing.
In court Monday, Roberts was asked to recount in detail her marriage to the decorated soldier and her growing suspicions he was being unfaithful between October 2017 and April 2018.
Ben Roberts-Smith watched his former wife give evidence from the back corner of the courtroom, accompanied by his father Len, a former judge and a Major General in the army.
On their wedding anniversary in December 2017, Roberts received a letter, addressed to her husband, detailing his affair, including the number of the hotel room he was sharing with his girlfriend.
Confronted with this, Roberts-Smith denied the affair and said another soldier, antagonistic towards him, had sent the letter.
Over the next few months, Roberts-Smith’s behaviour was “erratic”, his phone was often switched off, and his wife suspected he had a second secret phone.
Roberts-Smith finally conceded he was having an affair when his girlfriend, anonymised before court as Person 17, turned up at the family house and confronted his wife. Roberts’ parents were also there at the time.
Person 17 showed Roberts text messages between her and Roberts-Smith during the course of her affair. Roberts read them over three hours.
Person 17 had a black eye at the time, which she said was caused by a drunken fall following a function at Parliament House she had attended with Roberts-Smith.
Person 17 said Roberts-Smith had refused to see her any more “because of this”, pointing at her eye.
Roberts told the court her parents were also involved in the conversation: “My mum said ‘are you saying that Ben did that to you?’”
“She [Person 17] didn’t answer.”
Roberts said Person 17 told her she had fallen pregnant with Roberts-Smith’s child - “it was definitely Ben’s” - but was no longer pregnant at the time of their meeting, having lost or terminated the pregnancy.
One of the allegations against Roberts-Smith in the newspapers’ defence is that he committed an act of domestic violence against Person 17, following the event at Parliament House. He denies this and has given evidence he assisted Person 17 after she drunkenly fell down stairs.
Roberts was asked about a series of anonymous letters allegedly received by a fellow SAS soldier. The soldier, Person 18, received letters warning him to recant evidence to a military inquiry into war crimes allegations, the court heard.
When the contents of the letters were reported publicly, Roberts confronted her husband.
“What the fuck have you done?,” Roberts said she asked Roberts-Smith.
“He told me he had written the letters, had printed them at the Seven office, had sealed them in the envelopes, addressed them, and had given them to [family friend and occasional employee] John McLeod to post.”
Roberts told the court she had previously seen her husband walk into the house carrying a grey shopping bag carrying blank paper, a packet of envelopes and a packet of gloves. She said Roberts-Smith had asked her about the PO Box for the SAS regiment in Perth, and whether there were security cameras on post boxes.
Roberts-Smith allegedly told his then wife that McLeod - who is also set to give evidence later in this trial - crossed the border from Queensland into New South Wales to post the letters.
In his evidence last year, Roberts-Smith denied any involvement in the letters and said the conversation with his wife never occurred.
“That’s not true,” he told the court.
He told the court during his evidence his ex-wife was “extremely bitter”.
“She has done things along the way that have been detrimental to my family, and particularly to me, because she thinks it will hurt me.”
Roberts denied being motivated by bitterness or anger towards her ex-husband.
Roberts was asked about the first publication of the war crimes allegations in the press, which named a soldier only as ‘Leonidas’, a Spartan king and war hero.
Roberts said Roberts-Smith believed the stories referred to him, and that “he was devastated”.
Roberts said the media allegations were mentioned to her at the school their children attended, and people in their social group broke off friendships in response to the reporting.
It caused immense stress within their family. One of the couple’s daughters asked: “why does Dad not smile anymore?”
Roberts broke down in tears in the witness box, and the judge briefly adjourned the hearing.
Bruce McClintock, SC, acting for Roberts-Smith, accused Roberts of “fabrication” in her evidence about the timing of her separation from her husband, and about accessing emails on a business account. She consistently rejected this.
In a parallel court action, Roberts-Smith sued his ex-wife over access to emails on a joint business account, to which she had lawful access. His action against his ex-wife failed.
Emma Roberts will resume in the witness box under cross-examination Tuesday morning.
The trial, before Justice Anthony Besanko, continues.
