Spencer Leniu said he initially referred to his on-field racist sledge of Ezra Mam as “fun and games” because “I thought it was one brown man sledging another brown man”.
The Sydney Roosters enforcer was hit with an eight-match ban on Monday night as the ugly Las Vegas incident involving Brisbane’s Mam that happened eight days ago finally drew to a close.
The penalty will see Leniu return in round 10 for the New Zealand Warriors on May 12 – one week after the Suncorp Stadium showdown against Mam and the Broncos.
The NRL wanted Leniu to be hit with an eight-match ban, and the two-man judiciary panel of Sean Hampstead and Bob Lindner both agreed. NRL counsel Lachlan Gyles told the panel they had an opportunity to “draw a line in the sand and send a very clear and unambiguous message that there is no place for racism in our game”.
Gyles, who started proceedings referring to Leniu as “Spencer Luai”, and the Samoan international as “Tongan” – said it was also wrong to assume it was not a racist slur if the comment came from a “dark-skinned person”.
Leniu’s lawyer James McLeod called for a four-match ban because Leniu never intended for the comment to be racist, and had shown genuine remorse.
Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu at Monday night’s hearing.Credit: Wolter Peeters
The 23-year-old prop confirmed he had used the word “f–k up monkey” after Mam told a Brisbane teammate to run at him in the Roosters’ defensive line.
Leniu later said he wanted to fly to Brisbane and apologise, “face to face, man to man, without anyone knowing”.
Roosters CEO Joe Kelly was asked why it had taken Leniu five whole days to apologise, and he said: “Until we all got back here to Australia, it was a situation where up to a point in time, Spencer wasn’t even aware it was a racial slur. We worked our way through this. We convened as soon as got back to Sydney.
“In that first meeting with Spencer, we said, ‘how do you want to deal with it?’, and he said, ‘I want to go and see Ezra in Brisbane’.”
Spencer Leniu clashes with Kotoni Staggs minutes after his slur against Ezra Mam.Credit: Getty
Gyles asked Leniu if he was aware of Sydney Swans player Adam Goodes, who had been subjected to racism during an AFL game in 2013, but said he had not. Gyles said using the word “monkey” has “connotations that race is somehow different or less than the ordinary person”.
Leniu said that growing up in Mt Druitt it was not uncommon for his mates with the “same skin tone” to refer to each other as “black c–t” and “blacky”. He said he had never taken offence at being called “monkey” and “coconut”.
Mam was not required to attend League HQ, but did provide a 12-paragraph statement, and wanted eight of those paragraphs to remain confidential. Video footage played at the hearing showed Leniu yelling in the direction of Mam before the Bronco became upset.
“Spencer said, “f-k up you monkey’, and at that point I was so angry and saw red after that, my mind was no longer focused on the game,” Mam wrote in his statement.
Mam remains angry about the incident, and quickly found support from fellow Indigenous players, most notably Latrell Mitchell. Mitchell himself later became a headline when his strong views on social media upset fellow Indigenous man and former NRL player Anthony Mundine.
Roosters coach Trent Robinson sat just metres away from Leniu for moral support, as did club CEO Joe Kelly.
In recent days, there were suggestions Leniu may have only been reacting to being abused himself by Broncos players, but it was a claim quickly dismissed as nonsense by Brisbane officials.
Marcelo Montoya was hit with a four-match ban for a homophobic slur directed at Mitch Barnett during a game in 2022.
Bryan Fletcher was sacked as South Sydney captain and fined $10,000 by the club after he racially abused Parramatta’s Dean Widders during a game in 2005. Fletcher said at the time: “Although it’s only words, they’re pretty harsh words that I’ve said.” Widders was a notable attendee at the Leniu hearing.
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