19 hours Ago By Adelaide Lang
A former Liberal MP will have to wait almost a year to face trial on charges he sexually assaulted a teenager after meeting on a hook-up site. Login or signup to continue reading Roderick 'Rory' Amon, 35, is accused of presenting as a 17-year-old after matching with a boy on a gay hook-up website in mid-2017. Prosecutors allege the boy, then 13, said he was 15 and later agreed to meet in person.
Amon insisted on meeting in a private place and led the 13-year-old to a bathroom in a car park where the sexual assaults occurred on two separate occasions, prosecutors allege. At the time, Amon was a local councillor and later rose to win the Liberal safe seat of Pittwater on Sydney's northern beaches. The now 35-year-old former MP faced the Sydney District Court on Friday and formally pleaded not guilty to five charges of sexual intercourse with a person aged 10 to 14.
Amon, who was flanked by his mother and brother, also pleaded not guilty to five other charges related to the alleged illegal hook-ups. Judge Stephen Hanley set the matter down for a 10-day trial in February 2026. Prosecutors told the court further material from Snapchat, where Amon and the boy communicated, was expected to be served within the next three months.
The complainant, now aged in his 20s, alleges Amon continued to send him explicit images until he was charged over the alleged child sex abuse in August 2024. Amon was elected to parliament in March 2023 and was the opposition spokesman on youth issues at the time of his arrest. He resigned soon after, with a subsequent by-election taking the seat out of Liberal hands for the first time in 50 years.
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