ABC live TV broadcast disrupted by vile outburst on Sydney street
A man has been charged three months after he allegedly disrupted an ABC reporter’s live cross with an offensive antisemitic outburst.
Reporter Myles Houlbrook-Walk was delivering a report about Sydney’s housing crisis outside NSW parliament on Macquarie Street about 6.15am on January 28.
Myles Houlbrook-Walk’s live cross was interrupted by a man’s alleged antisemitic outburst.Credit: ABC TV
About halfway through his report, a man can be heard off-screen allegedly shouting offensive Nazi phrases.
Houlbrook-Walk continued his report as the man yelled, with the reporter’s eyes darting off-camera before he quickly recovered and continued to deliver his live cross.
Moments earlier in the bulletin the ABC had covered sombre and moving scenes in Poland as the world marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, a Nazi concentration camp.
The Sydney Morning Herald cannot publish the contents of the video for legal reasons.
An ABC spokesperson said the incident was reported to police and no one was injured during the interaction.
NSW Police launched an investigation following the incident, and after three months, a man was arrested in Darlinghurst on Thursday evening.
The 48-year-old was taken to Day Street Police Station and charged with knowingly displaying by a public act a Nazi symbol without reasonable excuse.
He was granted bail and will appear before Downing Centre Local Court on April 24.
“We’re grateful to the ABC reporter and crew for reporting this disturbing incident to authorities and to the NSW Police for investigating the matter and charging the individual,” said Alex Ryvchin, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry.
“If something positive can be taken from this, it is the demonstration that we each have a choice when confronted with unacceptable behaviour which is to shrug our shoulders or to stand up to it.”
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