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In 2019, Timothy Joseph Whittaker made a move that would unravel his life and career.
There had been whispers about his behaviour for years. A tall and broad man, Whittaker was both physically imposing and gregarious. He had earned a reputation as a big drinking and, at times, combative face of Cricket Australia.
Timothy Whittaker (right) outside court on June 1 with his lawyer, Dermot Dann, KC.Credit: Justin McManus
As communications chief, Whittaker had been called upon to defend Cricket Australia during some of the body’s greatest crises in recent memory: the ball-tampering scandal; the Tim Paine lewd photo scandal; and the 2018 cultural review, which exposed the “arrogant” and “controlling” ethos of some administrators and players.
Melbourne Magistrates’ Court heard Whittaker had privately begun to crumble under the pressure of Cricket Australia’s “fairly disturbing workplace culture”.
Whittaker was last week found guilty of the sexual touching without consent of two men in 2016 and 2019. On Friday, he avoided jail, receiving a 30-month community corrections order for his “opportunistic” crimes.
“In the midst of those stresses and that sort of environment, my client did develop a significant problem with alcohol,” Whittaker’s defence lawyer Dermot Dann, KC, told the court on Monday.
“Alcohol is very much the setting in which these two incidents occur; indeed, one of the incidents occurs directly after a workplace function.”
That function was an end-of-season Cricket Australia event in March 2019 that also served as a de-facto farewell for Whittaker, who was due to take up a career-defining role as communications boss for the International Cricket Council in Dubai the following week.
After a boozy function in South Melbourne, a smaller group moved on to another pub. About 2am, a group of stragglers made their way to Whittaker’s Abbotsford apartment.
There, Whittaker set about mixing drinks and handing them out. One guest, 24-year-old Reuben Williams, flopped on the couch. Witnesses recalled him being visibly drunk, before he fell asleep on the couch.
Some time later, when the other guests had left, Williams woke in Whittaker’s bed. Williams’ clothes were half off, and Whittaker was masturbating him.
Magistrate Timothy Gattuso found Whittaker guilty of two charges of “sexual assault”, which he described as “more opportunistic than predatory”.
“Nevertheless, your moral culpability for this offending was high, and I denounce your conduct,” he told Whittaker on Friday.
“Each of your victims were either so drunk that they either passed out or were not easily roused and, for your own apparent gratification, you invaded their privacy and safety in the most serious way. You’ve left them with feelings of trauma, embarrassment and shame.”
Two days after the incident, Williams got in touch with Cricket Australia’s human resources team and contacted the police.
News of the sexual offence on Williams reached “Jim” who in 2016 had been a 21-year-old up-and-comer in the cricket world when he was assaulted by Whittaker in strikingly similar circumstances.
In a victim impact statement read to the court, Jim told of trying for years to pretend that nothing of consequence had happened.
“There were deep feelings of embarrassment, betrayal of trust and sick anger that I never addressed. And it contributed to a downward spiral of depression, breakdown in relationships with girlfriends and detachment from work and reality,” Jim said.
“I’ve struggled to maintain healthy relationships with girlfriends through both an inability to trust in them or myself, and the feelings involved as well as struggling to be intimate. Both of which, before speaking out, I had to make excuses as to why I was feeling that way rather than telling the truth.”
Whittaker’s legal team sought to paint their client as having succumbed to the pressures of an unhealthy work culture.
But barrister Sharn Coombes, for the prosecution, told Gattuso that Whittaker’s conduct was “predatory”.
“Ordinarily … people have the right to determine [whether they] will consent to sexual behaviour but, in this case, we have two adult males [who] were completely vulnerable, intoxicated [and] asleep. They should have felt entitled, your honour, to feel safe in the home of a trusted, respected senior colleague … the offending constitutes an abuse of power and trust.”
At one point during his plea hearing, Whittaker put his head down and sobbed.
Whittaker didn’t cry when he was found guilty. Instead, he wept when his lawyer observed that every online search of Timothy Whittaker’s name would produce “article after article” about his sexual assault convictions.
“You won’t find any articles about his good work or his community work,” Dann said.
The court was told Whittaker – who has a lengthy history doing volunteer work, including for St John’s Ambulance and the Country Fire Authority – had lost friends and work since he was arrested.
Whittaker has moved back in with his parents and battled chronic depression and anxiety.
On Friday, Gattuso sentenced Whittaker to a 30-month community corrections order, during which he must complete 300 hours of unpaid community service, and complete alcohol and mental health treatment.
Gattuso said he was satisfied that Whittaker was “highly unlikely to reoffend” and rejected the prosecution’s application to put him on the sex offender’s register.
At the end of Whittaker’s sentencing hearing, Dann got to his feet and announced his client intended to appeal his conviction. Whittaker maintains his innocence.
Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).
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