Veteran Australian broadcaster and former Wallabies coach Alan Jones has been charged with sexually abusing seven men and a 17-year-old boy over two decades, police said.
The 83-year-old was taken into custody at his Sydney apartment early on Monday morning. He made no comment to the media.
Detectives from the New South Wales Police Child Abuse Squad searched Jones’ harbour-front property and seized electronic devices.
He will appear in a Sydney court on December 18 in relation to eight alleged victims, Assistant Police Commissioner Michael Fitzgerald said.
Former teacher Jones is one of the country’s most influential media figures and has previously denied allegations of abuse, first published by The Sydney Morning Herald in 2023.
Fitzgerald told reporters: “In regards to the victims, we will allege that the accused knew some of them personally, some of them professionally.
“And we’ll also allege that some of the victims when the alleged offence took place, was the first time that they ever met the accused.
“I wish to commend the victims and their bravery in coming forward. [They] have now got the ability to have a voice. This is what they've been asking for.”
Jones now faces 24 charges over alleged incidents between 2001 and 2019, including 11 counts of aggravated indecent assault and nine of assault with an act of indecency.
He hosted 2GB’s popular Sydney breakfast radio from 2002 and boasted one of the nation’s biggest audiences until he retired citing health issues in 2020.
Jones was also a successful coach of the Australian national rugby team for four years from early 1984. The team won 86 of their 102 matches under his leadership.
He was also influential in conservative politics and a speechwriter in the seventies and eighties for Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, who died in 2015.
In 2012, Jones faced backlash for suggesting that then-PM Julia Gillard’s father had “died of shame”.
Seven years later, the DJ faced an advertiser boycott after saying someone should “shove a sock” down the throat of Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s leader at the time.
