West Coast star forward Willie Rioli’s career up in the air after avoiding conviction for drug possession

West Coast Eagles premiership player Willie Rioli’s future with the club remains up in the air after the star forward avoided a conviction for possessing cannabis at the Darwin Airport last month.

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WEST Coast Eagles premiership player Willie Rioli’s future with the club remains up in the air after the star forward avoided a conviction for possessing cannabis at the Darwin Airport last month.

The 25-year-old was handed a 12-month good behaviour bond on Wednesday after pleading guilty in the Darwin Local Court to possessing almost 25 grams of the drug on April 23.

The court heard Rioli was about to board a flight home to the Tiwi Islands when he was stopped by a police sniffer dog and produced a package containing 24.23g of cannabis from the front of his shorts.

His barrister Mark Thomas said Rioli had apologised to West Coast but it was still unclear what action the club or AFL would take as a result of the charge.

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Mr Thomas said Rioli had already paid a “very heavy price” before arriving at court due to “effectively, what amounts to a national humiliation” via the media.

“(He) still has every hope, if he can, to return to the West Coast Eagles but that, in a sense, is outside his hands,” he said.

Mr Thomas said Rioli’s situation was “unique for so many reasons”, including that he had attended more funerals in the past two years than his 38 games for the Eagles in what he described as a “cascade of death”.

Mr Thomas said despite a difficult upbringing and “unlike so many of his peers who have fallen foul of the law”, Rioli had “managed to raise himself to the pinnacle of professional sport”.

Willie Rioli arrives at the Darwin Local Court. Picture: Che Chorley

But prosecutor Patrick Curtin said Rioli’s doping ban meant he was not a “cleanskin” and “the only unique thing about him is he’s a sports star”.

Mr Curtin said while Rioli had apologised to his club, “he hasn’t apologised to the people of the Tiwi Islands” for trying to bring drugs into the community.

“He was attempting to smuggle the drugs into the community, he’d wrapped them to avert detection and he was caught,” he said.

“He’s not a unique person, he’s a young Aboriginal man from the Tiwi Islands who became a sports star.”

In handing Rioli a 12-month good behaviour bond without conviction, judge Michael Carey said he had already suffered from a “severe level of adverse publicity” and potentially jeopardised his career to a “very significant extent”.

Speaking outside court, another member of Rioli’s legal team, Dominic McCormack, said his client was “very grateful for the non-conviction”.

“Willie’s in a position now where he has to work with the West Coast Eagles as to his playing future and a really important part of that is making sure he gets the respect back of the playing group,” he said.

“Finally, on behalf of our client, what we’d like to say is just thank you very much for the support that he’s received, not only from his family but from the broader Australian footballing community.”

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