{"id":152530,"date":"2025-09-18T17:30:18","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T17:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/152530\/"},"modified":"2025-09-18T17:30:18","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T17:30:18","slug":"nrl-star-brandon-smith-hit-by-media-scrum-before-facing-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/152530\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL star Brandon Smith hit by media scrum before facing court"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brandon Smith must not make contact with fellow NRL star Victor Radley as part of his bail conditions after facing court on drug and betting charges.<\/p>\n

The South Sydney hooker, 29, was swamped by a media scrum when he fronted court for the first time on the charges on the Gold Coast today.<\/p>\n

His lawyer told Southport Magistrates Court the charges would be contested before the case was adjourned until October 9 for mention and his appearance was excused.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/South Sydney Player Brandon Smith leaves Southport Magistrates Court after appearing on drug charges. (Glenn Campbell)<\/p>\n

As part of his bail conditions, Smith must make no contact with Sydney Roosters lock Radley and another man, Joshua Bainbridge.<\/p>\n

The Roosters become entangled in the Smith matter, with text messages allegedly exchanged between its star Radley uncovered in the police investigation.<\/p>\n

There is no suggestion of any wrongdoing by Radley and the Roosters player has not been charged with any offence.<\/p>\n

A Rabbitohs fan got a selfie with Smith while he waited to sign bail before the NRL star was whisked away by a car waiting outside court.<\/p>\n

Smith faces charges of supplying a dangerous drug and using or disclosing inside knowledge for betting.<\/p>\n

\"BrandonBrandon Smith will plead not guilty. (Getty)<\/p>\n

Smith refused to answer questions as he was swarmed by reporters and photographers – one reporter copping a swift accidental elbow to the chest during the melee.<\/p>\n

Smith is represented by leading Sydney lawyer Paul McGirr, who confirmed yesterday the 29-year-old Kiwi hooker would fight the charges.<\/p>\n

“Brandon will attend the mention with an agent solicitor on my behalf,” McGirr told AAP.<\/p>\n

“He will enter a plea of not guilty to both charges and we will request a brief of evidence.<\/p>\n

“That’s all we will say at this stage until we are served the actual physical brief of evidence that the Queensland Police rely on.”<\/p>\n

The charges stem from a police investigation after officers seized Smith’s phone at the Gold Coast airport.<\/p>\n

The South Sydney hooker was questioned by police when he arrived in Queensland ahead of their August 10 clash with Gold Coast.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/Sydney Roosters forward Victor Radley. There is no suggestion of any wrongdoing by Radley and the Roosters player has not been charged with any offence. (Getty)<\/p>\n

He was quizzed before the Titans game with police saying they had cause to speak to the 29-year-old at Coolangatta Airport.<\/p>\n

But he was released without charge and ran out against the Titans.<\/p>\n

“We chatted to him about a number of things and then he was able to go on and play football,” Acting Police Commissioner Shane Chelepy told 4BC on August 14.<\/p>\n

“Brandon was very co-operative with us and he was able to go on and play a good game of football from what I saw.”<\/p>\n

However, police confirmed on August 25 that Smith had been charged.<\/p>\n

The next day, the NRL allowed the rake to play in the final regular season round for South Sydney, ruling out the prospect of enforcing an immediate ban.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brandon Smith must not make contact with fellow NRL star Victor Radley as part of his bail conditions…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":152531,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-152530","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nrl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-national-rugby-league","11":"tag-nationalrugbyleague","12":"tag-nrl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=152530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/152530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/152531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=152530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=152530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=152530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}