By Rob Harris
London: Matildas captain Samantha Kerr met with police the night after a drunken altercation two years ago to apologise for her behaviour and explain that she had feared for her life during the taxi driver journey which led her there.
The Australian soccer star’s criminal trial at Kingston Crown Court was played a 15-minute interview between Kerr and an officer where she was quizzed why she had allegedly racially abused Constable Stephen Lovell and caused £900 ($1796) damage to a taxi.
Samantha Kerr has pleaded not guilty to the charge.Credit: Getty Images
Kerr, 31, pleaded not guilty to a charge of racially aggravated harassment of a police officer on January 30, 2023, accepting she made the comments but denying the comments amounted to the charge.
In the interview the following day, Kerr told the officer in charge that “I shouldn’t have been so front-footed” but “in that moment I was feeling very, very threatened because of one: how I was being treated, and two: for my life in that car”
She did not have a lawyer, and told the officer she vomited through the window, “and in that moment onwards the taxi driver became very aggressive” and was driving dangerously.
“He would not drive us to our location, and he was just driving us around and around very, very dangerously... he had us both very, very afraid.”
She said she did not remember calling Lovell “f---ing stupid and white” and, once played the tape, said it was not intended as a racial slur to cause him distress.
Asked if she was aware the comments amounted to an offence of public order, Kerr said she was not. Then she was asked if she was aware the words could be perceived as racist, to which she said: “I’m aware that anything can be perceived as racist for sure.”
Kerr and her partner, West Ham and former US midfielder Kristie Mewis, had been for a night out in south-west London and decided to get a taxi home in the early hours. The driver told police he drove the couple to Twickenham police station after one of the passengers was sick in his vehicle, refused to pay the clean-up fee, and smashed the rear window.
Matildas captain Sam Kerr (right) and partner Kristie Mewis, of the US, after a match in 2021.Credit: Getty Images
The pair, who admitted to being intoxicated, then told police the cabbie had tried to kidnap and hold them hostage.
“I apologise for putting them in a situation where they had to stay there for so long and deal with two very angry girls that probably wasn’t gonna get solved in that moment,” Kerr said, according to the tape, “[but] I just wanna add how like I didn’t feel we were being heard.”
Kerr, one of the world’s finest women’s soccer players, is alleged to have become “abusive and insulting” towards Lovell, calling him “f—king stupid and white”. Kerr, who is of Anglo-Indian heritage, mentioned his ethnicity several times, including accusing him of “white privilege”.
Lovell said he was left feeling “upset” and “belittled”.
During her police interview, Kerr explained that she could not recall which officer was Lovell, but said: “We spoke to three officers and honestly I didn’t feel very helped”.
“I’ve never been in a situation like that where a taxi driver has locked the door and drove two females around for 15, 20 minutes without letting us go and that’s why I felt so angry and so upset and I apologise.”
Kerr told officers she had contacted emergency services about the driver, but Lovell said there was no record of that, the court heard.
The court heard police did not request copies of the emergency service calls at that time, and the taxi driver was never arrested or interviewed. His last involvement with officers was to facilitate the women paying him for damage to his car, police said.
Speed cameras that may have captured his vehicle were not checked, the court was told, no number plate recognition technology records were searched, nor was cell site data for his devices. Police asked if he had any recording device in his vehicle, and he told them that he did not, but the officers did not check the cab for such a device.
Kerr is Australia’s all-time leading goalscorer with 69 goals. The alleged incident took place a day after Kerr had scored a hat-trick in Chelsea’s FA Cup victory over Liverpool. She has scored 99 goals in 128 appearances for Chelsea, but has not played in more than a year after rupturing her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in January 2024.
Kerr and Mewis are expected to give evidence on Wednesday (London time). The trial continues.
Audio source: Sam Kerr interview with police, Kingston Police Station, January 31, 2023.
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