- Matildas captain Sam Kerr to go on trial next February
- He allegedly racially abused a police officer in January 2023
- Preliminary hearing scheduled for May 20 canceled
- Kerr, 30, will plead not guilty at Kingston Crown Court in London
Sam Kerr’s court case over alleged racial abuse of a police officer will go ahead next year after a preliminary hearing scheduled for May 20 was cancelled.
Matildas captain Kerr and her legal team, led by leading criminal lawyer Grace Forbes, appeared at London’s Kingston Crown Court on Monday to fight allegations that the 30-year-old allegedly insulted, threatened or caused alarm or distress a police officer while returning. home in a taxi after a night out with his fiancée Kristie Mewis on January 30, 2023.
The case, in which Kerr will plead not guilty, will go to trial starting February 3, 2025 and will last four days.
A London court clerk said news corporation: ‘All issues between the parties have already been resolved.
‘The next date we have for the case is the trial, February 3 of next year.
The preliminary hearing scheduled for May 20 in London for Matildas captain Sam Kerr (right) has been cancelled.
It means Kerr’s case, in which she is accused of racially abusing a police officer, will officially go to trial in February next year.
‘The judge accepted that this was the case administratively. Monday’s hearing is no longer necessary.”
The development comes after three delays in support of the prosecution against Kerr, including CCTV footage which captured his alleged racist speech.
Kerr allegedly labeled PC Stephen Lovell a “stupid white bastard”, and Kerr’s legal representatives denied she had used the word “bastard”, instead allegedly calling the officer a “stupid white cop”.
Kerr’s lawyer, Grace Forbes, previously asked for CCTV footage from outside Twickenham police station and inside his custody room to be tendered into evidence.
PC Lovell is understood to have been called to the scene at Twickenham over a dispute over a taxi fare after the football superstar spent a night celebrating an FA Cup victory over Liverpool, where he scored a hat-trick to Chelsea.
Kerr also reportedly vomited in the taxi and at that time he was arrested and questioned.
Her legal team has argued that Kerr was subjected to an abuse of process after it took a year for her to be charged.
Kerr is currently recovering from a torn ACL suffered during a training camp in Morocco earlier this year.
On May 20, they also sought to have the criminal charge of racially aggravated harassment dismissed.
Kerr will not be required to attend the hearing in person next February.
Kerr, who is recovering from a torn ACL at a training camp in Morocco, did not disclose his arrest to Football Australia and later participated in the 2023 World Cup on home soil.
If convicted, Kerr could face a maximum prison sentence of two years or be deported from the UK.