Vic: Qld businessman pleads guilty over Warne kiss claim

AAP General News (Australia)
12-16-2003
Vic: Qld businessman pleads guilty over Warne kiss claim

MELBOURNE, Dec 16 AAP - A Queensland businessman today pleaded guilty to demanding
$5,000 or tickets from the Australian Cricket Board (ACB) over an alleged incident involving
his niece and star bowler Shane Warne.

Christopher Kent, 46, of Florida Gardens on the Gold Coast, pleaded guilty in the County
Court in Melbourne to a charge of attempting to obtain property by deception.

He also admitted a second offence of using a telephone to menace.

The court heard that Kent rang the ACB in February last year telling them the media
was offering his then 15-year-old niece $5,000 to tell her story about an encounter with
Warne at Surfers Paradise.

Kent asked the board to match the offer and so avoid publicity.

Warne was alleged to have tongue kissed the teenager, an allegation he has emphatically
denied. He was was later cleared of any wrongdoing.

In a statement handed up in a Melbourne Magistrates Court committal hearing earlier
this year, Aleasha Black, now 17, described how she asked Shane Warne for a goodnight
kiss during an encounter at Surfers Paradise in January last year.

Instead of the expected kiss on the cheek, Warne tongue-kissed Ms Black then asked
her to expose her breasts to him, the committal hearing heard.

Today's plea hearing before Judge John Nixon is continuing.

AAP sew /szp/gfr/ldj/jlw

KEYWORD: KENT

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