Roxy Jacenko flees court in tears after magistrate’s ‘damning’ judgment

PR queen Roxy Jacenko stormed out of a Sydney court in tears this afternoon, after a magistrate delivered her “damning” judgment.

Roxy Jacenko has fled in tears from a court after a bombshell decision rejected her AVO order and described her evidence as “hollow and unimpressive” and “grossly exaggerated”.

The PR maven waited until Magistrate Allison Hawkins had finished her damning judgment rejecting Jacenko had any real fears from Instagram posts and abusive graffiti, then ran crying from the Downing Centre court leaving behind her entourage of lawyers and supporters.

The man Jacenko had wrongly claimed had spray painted “Roxy is a c***” on her office wall emerged jubilant, after the magistrate ruled there was no evidence to support Jacenko’s accusations.

Jacenko had hired top Sydney barrister Greg James QC, a former judge, to argue that she had been fearful and intimidated after an encounter with Melbourne businessman Michael Hess a year ago.

A screenshot of a video of Roxy Jacenko crying as she walked from court. Picture: Channel 7

Picture: Channel 7

Jacenko claimed he had posted threatening Instagram messages and photos and that he had done the offending graffiti.

But the magistrate did not believe Jacenko, or one of her principal witnesses.

Her Honour said she could believe Jacenko’s claims that her fears were genuine and that she was seriously scared of Mr Hess, who she described as “an effusive witness”.

Ms Hawkins said while sisters Bridget and Bianca Rosucciano had been credible witnesses, she rejected the testimony of Jacenko’s assistant Mason Brown as “exaggerated”.

Ms Hawkins said CCTV and audio of Jacenko’s interaction at the Ivy event Mr Hess attended show the PR queen “was not alarmed scared or shocked.

“She seemed well in control.”

Roxy Jacenko leaving the court at the lunch break. Picture John Grainger

Mr Hess had put up Instagram posts about Roxy Jacenko and her husband Oliver Curtis with lewd comments.

“These included ‘I’m a ho’ and a wedding photo with the words “He married Roxy … do you think he wanted to go to jail to get away”.

Ms Hawkins said Mr Jess’s posts were “puerile and juvenile”.

“But I can’t be satisfied (Jacenko) had any real fear of (Mr Hess).”.

She refused the AVO application.

Outside the court Mr Hess said he was going to celebrate and that there were many people who could be the real person who had graffitied Jacenko’s office.

Earlier, Mr Hess told the court Jacenko was “scary” and said “she came at me like a steam train” during an alleged heated encounter.

Mr Hess also alleged that homophobic insults hurled at him on camera were a deliberate “set up … for her TV show”, I Am Roxy.

Mr Hess was repeatedly accused by Ms Jacenko’s barrister of writing the words “Roxy is a c***” on the wall of the Sweaty Betty PR Sydney offices in April last year, and he repeatedly denied having done so.

Under fire by Greg James, QC, Mr Hess said “no, that’s not my style”.

“Gay guys don’t do graffiti,” he said. “I’m not violent, I’m not criminal.

“I’m more a funny … guy.”

Anthony Hess arrives at the downing centre today. Picture: John Grainger

Roxy Jacenko arrives for today’s hearing. Picture: John Grainger

“She came at me like a steam train,” he said.

“Her husband was actually really lovely.

“He was coming to walk us out.

“And she was ‘my husband is not going to walk you out’.

“She kept screaming at me ‘have some respect’.

“By the time I left I was bawling my eyes out.

“We had gone there to support her, gone to listen to this PR maven, this PR guru.

“It was heartbreaking, it was devastating.”

The hearing heard Mr Hess and two sisters, fashion designers Bianca and Bridget Roccisano exchanged insults, which both sides deny.

Mr Hess denied he had called the sisters “fat bush pigs”.

“I don’t use the words ‘bush pigs’. I think they are attractive girls,” he said.

“Anything about their weight … is not something I would have said.”

Footage captured by a television crew at The Ivy function was played during a hearing at the Downing Centre Local Court last November.

It shows Mr Hess walking through the door to the ballroom, where Ms Jacenko is waiting to go onstage.

“We’re leaving, that’s disgusting,” Mr Hess says.

The court heard Mr Hess’s allegation he was called a “male prostitute who had AIDS” was described by Bianca Roccisano, as a “complete lie”.

Mr Hess repeated the accusation of homophobic slurs at the hearing on Thursday.

He said he had objected to the insults because “this is Roxy’s event” and he didn’t want it ruined.

Roxy Jacenko at her office in Paddington. Picture: Supplied

“Obviously I realised it was a set-up,” he said.

“The girls launched at me.

“It made great viewing, great drama for Roxy’s TV show.”

Challenged by Mr James for Ms Jacenko “are you accusing my client” of a set-up, Mr Hess replied: “I feel it was a set-up.”

Twice during Mr James’ cross examination of Mr Hess, Magistrate Allison Hawkins told him to cease his line of questioning and move on.

Ms Jacenko said at the hearing last year that Mr Hess started “screaming and ranting” at her as she tried to enter the ballroom.

She said she was in fear of Mr Hess as he came “hurtling” towards her full of “anger and aggression”.

“I have a room of 500 women, I don’t think it’s right that those women should have to be in that environment, so … my aim was to diffuse the situation and remove your client,” she said to Mr Hess’s lawyer, Brett Galloway.

Responding to questions from Mr James, Ms Jacenko said the spray paint attack left her feeling nervous and fearful, while the argument with Mr Hess in the ballroom of the Sydney CBD venue was intimidating.

The public spat between the Sydney public relations queen and a man who attended one of her events just turned uglier after their last court appearance when the socialite sought a restraining order against him. Picture: Dylan Robinson

In closing remarks on Thursday, Mr James said he was not seeking to prove Mr Hess had painted the graffiti on Mr Jacenko’s office wall.

Mr Hess told the court he was in bed in an Oxford Street flat a ten minute drive from the Jacenko office at the time of the incident, in the early hours of the morning.

Challenged about whether he had lied to police about not being in Sydney at the time the graffiti was painted in, Mr Hess said: “Regardless of whether it’s a lie, I didn’t do the graffiti.

“It wasn’t me.”

Asked by Mr James if he still harboured resentment towards Ms Jacenko for how he was allegedly treated at The Ivy event, Mr Hess said he didn’t.

“To be honest, I’m too busy jetsetting around the world to worry about Roxy and what she is doing,” Mr Hess replied.

Mr James said for the graffiti incident, Mr Hess’s “alibi doesn’t wash. He was in the area.”

Urging Magistrate Jackson to impose the AVO permanently, he said: “Ms Jacenko needed to be protected from intimidation and harassment.”

Brett Galloway, for Mr Hess, said in closing that “Ms Jacenko was quite aggressive towards Mr Hess” at The Ivy event.

Mr Galloway said his client Mr Hess’s posts on Instagram about Me Jacenko and others were “insulting, but not threatening”.

Mr James then told the court that “the categorisation of Roxy as a c*** is more than inappropriate, it is deliberately designed to injure”.