Roberts-Smith asked private investigator to take blame for ‘threatening’ letters, court told

A private investigator who worked for Ben Roberts-Smith has told the Federal Court he called the war veteran a “weak dog” and cut off contact with him after the former soldier asked him to lie and take the blame for an allegedly threatening letter to another soldier.

John McLeod, a former police officer, told Mr Roberts-Smith’s defamation case on Wednesday that the decorated former soldier asked him in 2018 to post letters to a Special Air Service soldier dubbed Person 18. The identity of the man cannot be revealed for national security reasons.

John McLeod outside the Federal Court in Sydney on Wednesday.Credit:Peter Rae

A week to ten days after he posted two letters, both of which were addressed to Person 18, Mr McLeod said he was “summonsed by Ben to a meeting in Milton” in Brisbane.

He said Mr Roberts-Smith walked towards him when he arrived at the car park, yelling “no phones, no phones, no phones”.

Mr McLeod said he switched off his phone and left it in the car, and walked down the side of a building. Mr Roberts-Smith asked him if he had “seen the media” and said, “they’re saying that the letters were threats”.

Ben Roberts-Smith in Sydney earlier this week.Credit:James Alcock

“I realised that this could relate to the envelopes,” he said. “He was just saying that ‘they’re saying they’re threats, it’s in the Herald. They’re not f—ing threats. It’s just a touch up’.”

In September 2018, The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald reported that a threatening letter had been sent to a soldier who served alongside Roberts-Smith in Afghanistan, warning against helping a Defence Inspector-General inquiry into allegations of misconduct and war crimes by Australian soldiers.

Mr McLeod said that he told Mr Roberts-Smith that if he had put him “in the frame, you’d better get me a good lawyer”, and that if he had done something stupid he should admit it because “the cover-up is ten times worse”.

Mr Roberts-Smith told him to say “you’re a supporter of mine” who wrote the letters because “you were sick of the way I was being treated”, he said.

“I said, ‘f— that, you weak dog’,” Mr McLeod said.

He said he “ceased contact” with Mr Roberts-Smith.

Mr McLeod denied he had spoken to the media about the alleged events, saying “I despise the media”.

Mr McLeod told the court that Mr Roberts-Smith had given him the name of another soldier, dubbed Person 1, as a potential recipient of a letter, but the former soldier later told him Person 1 was “either on deployment or overseas and to throw that in the bin”.

Person 1 has previously given evidence in the Federal Court that Mr Roberts-Smith threatened and bullied him over a number of years, an allegation Mr Roberts-Smith has denied.

Mr McLeod said he also conducted surveillance on a woman in 2017 or 2018 at the request of Mr Roberts-Smith, who was seeking video evidence of her entering and leaving an abortion clinic in Queensland.

He said the woman appeared to have gone to a neighbouring hospital with a similar name, which did not perform abortions.

Mr Roberts-Smith has admitted in court that he had an affair with the woman and asked Mr McLeod to follow her to check if she attended an abortion clinic because he suspected she was lying about being pregnant to manipulate him into staying in the relationship.

The private investigator said Mr Roberts-Smith also asked him in about 2017 or 2018 to help get another SAS soldier investigated over an alleged weapons offence.

Mr McLeod said he used an anonymous email address to contact the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police, The Australian, and former independent Senator Nick Xenophon.

He said Mr Roberts-Smith asked him to reply to a journalist who responded to the email and say he was a serving member of the SAS, because “it’s not from you, it’s from me”.

The court has previously heard that Mr Roberts-Smith suspected the soldier at the centre of the allegations, Person 6, had made damaging claims about him to the media.

Mr Roberts-Smith told the court last year that he told Mr McLeod it was “fine with me” if he passed the information on to his contacts or friends in the AFP but he “didn’t “instruct [Mr McLeod] to do anything”.

He said he did not remember discussing with Mr McLeod if the material was given to a journalist at The Australian but said they “possibly” discussed it.

The court has heard Mr Roberts-Smith sent a text to his wife, Emma, which read “what happened to [Person 6] will scare the others”. He has denied seeking to intimidate anyone.

Mr McLeod gave evidence for The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Canberra Times in the defamation suit filed against the mastheads by Mr Roberts-Smith.

Mr Roberts-Smith alleges a series of articles published in 2018 portray him as a war criminal who bullied a fellow soldier, among other claims. He denies all wrongdoing. The media outlets are seeking to rely on a defence of truth.

The trial continues.

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