Matthew Doyle’s wife Kelsea: ‘I will support my husband’
Matthew Doyle’s wife Kelsea has spoken for the first time since her husband was charged over an international plan to smuggle up to 300kg of cocaine into Australia a year ago. Kelsea has told The Sunday Telegraph she will stand by her husband, who has been jailed for five years.
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The wife of jailed property developer Matthew Doyle has spoken publicly for the first time since her husband was arrested 12 months ago over an international plan to smuggle up to 300kg of cocaine into the country.
Kelsea Nagel Doyle told The Sunday Telegraph she was relieved the court case was over and wanted to get on with her life as best she could while her husband served his five-year sentence.
“It’s been an extremely tough 12 months for our family. I’m just thankful it’s now over,” Doyle said on Saturday night.
“I would love to be left in peace to get on with looking after my child and supporting my husband and I would appreciate the media would finally give me some privacy.”
The former fashion designer PR supremo has been living at the couple’s $2 million home in Burraneer, in southern Sydney, since Doyle was taken into custody last year. She is not accused of any wrongdoing.
She attended court on Friday when Doyle, 32, was sentenced in the NSW District Court.
Judge Penny Hock said Doyle and his co-accused Jared Raymond Hart, 31 and Raoul Kesby, 29, were all young men with good prospects of rehabilitation.
They were arrested almost a year ago to the day of sentencing, on September 3, 2019.
The judge said she took into account their pleas of guilty for which they received a 25 per cent reduction on their sentences.
Just three years ago, Doyle was an emerging young star in the business world after launching his app, Zen Now, co-founded with Melissa Rohlf and dubbed the ‘Uber of Massage’.
Profiled on David Koch’s ‘Kochie’s Business Builders’, Rohlf credited Doyle’s extensive network and business background as integral to building the company, which planned to go national.
During his trial, his barrister, Phillip Boulten SC said Doyle had hardly led an unblemished life, but was “very aware” of the wrongs he had committed and the harm he had caused.
He asked for leniency on the basis that Doyle has been unable to see his family, and in particular his young son, since March due to COVID-19 restricting prison visits.
The NSW Crime Commission won an order freezing millions of dollars worth of Doyle’s real estate, cars and company shares under proceeds of crime laws.
INSIDE MATTHEW DOYLE’S INSTA-PERFECT WORLD
Young, good looking, with a glamorous wife, Matthew Doyle’s Insta-perfect life seemed like a stream of high society parties, luxury travel and multimillion-dollar homes.
But the 32-year-old property developer and entrepreneur who fancied himself as Sydney’s cocaine king was on Friday sentenced to a minimum of five years behind bars.
Doyle’s world came crashing down last September after he was arrested at a Marrickville storage unit in a police sting over a plot to import a hefty amount of cocaine.
The eastern suburbs party boy who boasted he “was not a gangster but a businessman and loved money” plead guilty to his role in importing 300kg of cocaine.
Before his arrest, Doyle, from Burraneer in Sydney’s south, and his wife Kelsea, a socialite and publicist who once worked for fashion brand Camilla and Marc, appeared the picture of success.
On social media, the handsome Doyle never seemed far from a sun-drenched party.
Clad in linen shirts, expensive watches and designer sunglasses, Doyle and his wife were familiar faces on the social scene, often spotted at Bondi Icebergs and partying in the eastern suburbs. Kelsea is not accused of any wrongdoing.
They were seen enjoying lavish holidays in villas in Asia and lounging on the back of a speed boat in Europe, often with a champagne in hand.
Doyle’s picture perfect image culminated in the couple’s summer wedding when he married Kelsea in a lavish ceremony overlooking the Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House.
Surrounded by glamorous friends, the couple walked down an aisle strewn with white petals before their reception at Bennelong Point. The bride wore two designer dresses from Monique Lhuillier and Naeem Khan.
Buying up apartments across the city, Doyle had amassed an impressive property portfolio at the time of his arrest. Supreme Court documents showed he was involved in residential properties and developments worth millions of dollars. That portfolio, along with shares in 16 companies and a series of expensive cars, were among assets seized by authorities.