By Adam Cooper
It was the proposed reality television series with a twist: the star of the show ended up charged after arranging for the program’s producer to be bashed.
The program never aired, but the production lasted three years until crime figure Roberta Williams and two of her goons walked from court on Friday.
Roberta Williams leaving the County Court on Friday.Credit: AAP
Williams, the former wife of gangland murderer Carl Williams, was on Friday convicted and put on a community correction order (CCO) for blackmailing television producer Ryan Naumenko and arranging for associates to assault and intimidate him.
Two of the three men involved in the assault also walked out of the County Court with corrections orders.
Ryan Naumenko with some of his injuries in 2019.Credit: Seven News
Williams, 53, and five men were arrested and charged in 2019, in the days after Naumenko was assaulted and threatened. One of the group later had his charges withdrawn.
The bashing came two months after Naumenko contacted Williams on Instagram and pitched that he had worked in the Australian television industry and wanted to produce a reality series on “mob wives” that focused on her, County Court Judge Fiona Todd said.
After Williams agreed to take part, Naumenko told her that crowdfunding had raised $50,000 for the project and there was talk of interest from Netflix.
Williams filmed scenes at a rented apartment in Hampton, but in the following weeks she and friend Daniel De Silva – whose production company, Cloakroom Media, worked on the project – suspected Naumenko was “scamming” them, Todd said. Naumenko also owed De Silva some money.
On July 9, 2019, Williams and De Silva arranged to meet Naumenko at Cloakroom Media’s Collingwood studio. Beforehand, Williams sent De Silva a WhatsApp message that said it would be “no big deal [if] one of the boys” gave Naumenko an “open-hand slap and push” to encourage him to repay De Silva.
“The boys”, the court heard, were James Harrison, Jake Sexton and Hassam Al Zwainy. Williams asked Harrison to attend, and he recruited his friends.
Carl and Roberta Williams in 2004.Credit: Angela Wylie
About 8.30pm, when everyone was at the studio, De Silva proposed a toast to the project but told Naumenko: “You’re f---ed. It’s all over now.” He said he and Williams both wanted to be paid.
Over the following three hours, Naumenko was tied to a chair, Sexton and Harrison repeatedly punched and kicked him, and at one point he was threatened with a gun, the judge said. Al Zwainy didn’t assault the producer but told him not to call the police.
Williams at one point yelled to her associates: “Kill the c---, he has no money.”
Naumenko arranged for his father and sister to transfer $1000 each to the studio’s bank account, and for his mother’s car to be transferred.
Roberta Williams outside court in 2020.Credit: Nine News
About 11.30pm, De Silva drove Naumenko home. The producer’s mother photographed the bruises and lacerations on his face and he contacted police two days later.
After months of negotiations between prosecutors and defence lawyers, Williams pleaded guilty to blackmail and recklessly causing injury for her complicity in the assault, though she did not take part. She had previously faced other charges but they were dropped.
De Silva also pleaded guilty to blackmail, though prosecutors accepted Naumenko owed him money. The other three men pleaded guilty to assault charges.
Todd said Williams “ought to have walked away [from the proposed project] when you first had the instinct”, but instead blackmailed Naumenko and had men intimidate and bash the victim in offending that was serious, protracted and cruel.
The ordeal terrified and traumatised the producer, Todd said.
In sparing Williams prison, the judge accepted her exceptional family circumstances, which include full-time care for the youngest of five children, a son with intellectual disabilities, and her own medical problems, which include recent abdominal and hand surgeries.
Todd also acknowledged Williams’ disadvantaged childhood, which included the death of her father in a car crash and time as a ward of the state as a young child. Her first husband was violent, and her relationship with Carl Williams ended with his 2010 murder in prison.
“Whatever else can be said about that relationship, it seems that for you, this was the first person who’d been kind to you,” Todd said of Carl Williams.
Roberta Williams has past court appearances for drug, violence, driving and dishonesty offences, but most were comparatively minor and long ago.
Williams, in court with daughter Dhakota, was convicted and put on a two-year CCO with supervision and a condition that she undergo mental health treatment.
Sexton, 27, was convicted and must serve a two-year CCO with 150 hours of unpaid work. The tradesman has past convictions for violence.
Al Zwainy, 26, was spared conviction and must complete 60 hours of unpaid work in a one-year CCO. He was also fined $800.
De Silva, 39, was previously put on an 18-month CCO after the judge acknowledged his past good character. Harrison, 27, is awaiting sentence.
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