Former commando Heston Russell demands ABC be held to account for ‘doctored audio’ scandal

Former special forces veteran Heston Russell wants an unconditional apology from the ABC acknowledging that he did not shoot at unarmed civilians from a helicopter in Afghanistan.

Former commando Heston Russell.

Former commando Heston Russell is demanding Communications Minister Michelle Rowland hold the ABC to account following its belated release of a report that found an “editing error” was responsible for extra gunshots being added to a news report and blamed ABC lawyers for failing to pass on his complaints.

Mr Russell has requested meetings in Canberra this week with Ms Rowland, Veterans’ Affairs Minister Matt Keogh and senior shadow ministers as he seeks an unconditional apology from the ABC acknowledging he did not shoot at unarmed civilians from a helicopter in Afghanistan.

“My plan is to bang this drum all day through the election until these people are held accountable,” Mr Russell told The Australian.

The former special forces officer, who served on four combat deployments in Afghanistan and the Middle East, is also seeking “a truly independent” inquiry into the ABC stories, rather than one conducted by the broadcaster’s former editorial policy director, Alan Sunderland.

In his final report into the altered gunshots audio, Mr Sunderland found that extra shots had been “inadvertently” added to footage but that there was “no evidence of any intent to mislead”. Mr Sunderland blamed ABC lawyers for failing to pass on to the editorial team complaints from Mr Russell about the misleading edits.

The ABC launched an internal investigation into how the broadcaster published an online video that edited footage of a soldier firing from a helicopter in Afghanistan. Screenshot from vision provided by Heston Russell to the ABC and Spotlight.

Mr Sunderland completed the report in December but the ABC did not release it until Friday, and did not provide Mr Russell with a copy.

Instead, ABC managing director David Anderson sent Mr Russell an email with a link to the already public report on Friday evening, three hours after The Australian asked the ABC why it had waited so long to release the report. The broadcaster declined to give reasons for the delay.

Mr Anderson’s email pointed to an apology on the ABC website for “lapses in our processes” and to Mr Russell “for the impact of these shortcomings”, adding that the reports “did not name or allege any wrongdoing by Mr Russell”.

However, Mr Russell said the ABC had submitted a truth defence to the Federal Court in a separate defamation case that it had footage of him shooting indiscriminately out of a helicopter at unarmed civilians and “may be reasonably suspected … of the war crime of attacking civilians”.

That claim is still on the public record and in online media reports that repeat the ABC’s assertion the alleged act “was investigated by the inspector general of the Australian Defence Force in a secret war crimes inquiry”.

Heston Russell, pictured in 2012 in Afghanistan.

Mr Russell won the defamation case against the ABC and was awarded $390,000 in damages plus legal costs over stories that included allegations regarding the death of a prisoner in Afghanistan in 2012.

The ABC dropped its truth defence in the case shortly after Mr Russell’s lawyers contacted it to complain about the altered gunshots audio, submitting additional defences and documents Mr Russell says show his lawyers’ warnings were not missed by the ABC, but immediately acted upon.

“If they weren’t reviewed by ABC management, who approved the submission of those new defences?” Mr Russell said. “These are all conversations that my lawyer, Sue Chrysanthou, and I had directly with Alan Sunderland in his evidence-gathering for his report, and which have been glossed over and omitted from the detail.

“The whole issue here is that there’s a culture at the ABC where they think it’s okay to edit combat footage of Australian soldiers and add gunshots to a story where the whole context is accusing us as war criminals.

“Regardless of whether it’s an editing error, the culture thinks that that’s OK, and then when we expose them, all they do is appoint one of their own to mark their own homework.”

ABC Investigations reporter Mark Willacy arriving at the Federal Court in Sydney in August 2023 to give evidence about articles over which he was being sued by former commando Heston Russell. Picture: NCA Newswire/Gaye Gerard

Mr Russell is also angry that no action has been taken against reporter Mark Willacy despite a finding by Mr Sunderland that a comment by a US DEA agent in an interview “was taken out of context and used in a way which was potentially misleading”.

The agent, Bret Hamilton, agreed with Willacy that war crimes should be investigated, saying “Yes, they should definitely be investigated”, but his comment was used in the story directly after the reporter referred to “a handful of soldiers” in Task Force 66, which involved Australian commandos.

“The report says (Hamilton’s) quote was misused in a way that could mislead people, so why doesn’t it say Mark Willacy therefore should be held accountable?” Mr Russell said.

“Just the complete lack of respect in this entire process is dumbfounding. And the fact that they had this report before Christmas and didn’t even think to try and get it to me and my family before then so we could have that clarity of mind before the holiday break, it’s just further demonstration of how much the ABC does not care.”

A spokesperson for Ms Rowland said Mr Russell’s request for a meeting was “being given due consideration”.