Student Benjamin Cohen has taken legal action after being wrongly named as Bondi attacker
A Sydney university student is seeking damages from Channel 7 after being wrongly named as the Bondi killer multiple times in live broadcasts and on social media.
A university student wrongly named as the Bondi Junction knife-wielding murderer has taken legal action against Channel 7 after the network aired multiple live broadcasts labelling him as the culprit.
Benjamin Cohen, a first-year student at the University of Technology, Sydney, has engaged law firm Giles George and is seeking an apology, compensation and costs for serious harm after he was falsely named as the Bondi killer.
Under the NSW Defamation Act it can attract damages up to $459,000.
A concerns notice has been sent by Mr Cohen’s lawyers to Seven West Media chief executive officer and managing director James Warburton outlining that the network incorrectly identified Mr Cohen as the wrong man who killed six people, and not the actual killer, 40-year-old Queenslander Joel Cauchi.
Among those to wrongly name Mr Cohen included one of the network’s highest profile stars – Sunrise co-host Matt Shirvington – who told Weekend Sunrise viewers on Sunday the killer was “40-year-old Benjamin Cohen, dressed in a Kangaroos ARL jersey”, who was “shot and killed by a brave female officer.”
Shirvington’s comments were aired on the program at 6.05am AEST and then just 10 minutes later hosts Monique Wright and Michael Usher spoke with reporter Lucy McLeod in a live cross and she too wrongly named Cohen as the murderer.
“The attacker, 40-year-old Benjamin Cohen, is known to police,” she told viewers.
“His motives are not yet know, he was working on his own.”
Mr Cohen’s picture began circulating hours after the killings at Westfield Bondi Junction on social media platforms including X, formerly Twitter, and numerous users named him as the killer.
Many accounts also noted that Mr Cohen is Jewish and his image was shown on the platform alongside an image of the killer inside the shopping centre wielding a knife.
RMIT’s journalism lecturer and programs manager, associate professor Alexandra Wake, said the error highlighted the “importance of journalism 101, you check and you recheck”.
“The pressure has overwhelmed that particular station and they’ve gone with it before they have checked and double checked,” she said.
“At the moment Channel 7 can’t do anything right it appears and this is in a long line of errors.
“In this day and age with the problems of fake news, journalists cannot afford to get it wrong.”
NSW police did not name the killer until about 9am AEDT on Sunday.
Seven blamed “human error” on the multiple mistakes.
Seven News apologises on-air after naming an innocent man as the knife-wielding Bondi killer. The error was made on Weekend Sunrise including by presenter Matt Shirvington. pic.twitter.com/zDiixRagaI
— Sophie Elsworth (@sophieelsworth) April 14, 2024
Giles George solicitor Patrick George told The Australian on Wednesday: “We have issued a concerns notice.”
Seven’s 7NEWS Australia YouTube account – which has 1.66 million subscribers – also aired a report on the Bondi killings and published a caption underneath the video that named Mr Cohen as the “attacker”.
This post was later deleted by Seven after the network received questions from The Australian about it.
The concerns notice has been issued to Mr Warburton – who leaves Seven West on Thursday – and the network’s legal representatives, law firm Addisons.
Mr Cohen told The Australian the actions by Seven that led him to be falsely named as the murderer multiple times was “highly distressing”.
“It’s extremely disappointing to me to see people mindlessly propagating misinformation like this without even the slightest thought put into fact checking,” he said on Sunday.
“But what’s even more disappointing to me is a major news network doing this, using my name without waiting for a statement from police to verify this or going out to try and verify it themselves.”
Seven is yet to respond to the concerns notice.
The network aired an apology eight hours later on Sunday, which was read out during a live cross between Usher and reporter Sarah Jane Bell.
“One last thing, earlier this morning in reports of the incident, it incorrectly named the perpetrator as Benjamin Cohen,” she said.
“It was later confirmed that the name of the 40-year-old was Joel Cauchi from Queensland.
“Seven apologies for any distress caused by our earlier reports.”
Usher responded: “Yes, that’s an important correction, thanks for doing that Sarah Jane.”
Mr Cohen and a Seven spokesman were both contacted on Wednesday but would not comment.
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