Rugby news 2024: Former Wallabies captain Rocky Elsom charges ...
Former Wallabies captain Rocky Elsom says he has only been provided the documents detailing the allegations against him in the past week as he remains on the run from French authorities.
Elsom is facing allegations of forgery following his time as president and owner of French club Racing Narbonne in 2016, and faces five years in a French prison.
Some of the claims aired against him in a French court include accusations that he backdated a club doctor's contract, had a payment from beer giant Heineken transferred to a company in his name and issued salary advances to players.
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Rocky Elsom at Allianz Stadium. Getty
Elsom claims the charges are unjust and has vowed to clear his name from an undisclosed location, after police in Ireland came looking for the former breakaway, forcing him to leave the country.
The former Wallaby was coaching a high school team at the time, while he was waiting for legal documents.
Elsom told The Sydney Morning Herald French authorities attempted to contact him at addresses he had never lived or worked at or where he no longer lived, and questioned why an arrest warrant issued for him last year wasn't publicised.
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Rocky Elsom played 75 Tests for Australia. Getty
The address listed as his home on the court's written judgement, is the site of a Sydney storage company where he has had items sent, but he said it did not forward on mail.
"Not informing me, not allowing me to be there, running a rumour campaign for eight years, the most concerning thing is thinking that it was intentional, that it was intentionally done to make things harder for me," he said.
"The important thing to remember is if I am in custody, my defence gets a lot more expensive and a lot harder. If I'm detained, I'll need to engage a lawyer to do everything for me, all the phone conversations, to try and find documents, to talk to people, to try and defend myself."
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Elsom said he spoke to Irish police who said "they'll have to bring me in, so I told them I wasn't in Ireland and I wasn't going to be in Ireland any time soon."
He expressed fear about spending a long period of time in prison awaiting an appeal in France, and is doing everything he can to gather evidence ahead of a court date on November 15.
In the meantime, he's had to keep a low profile, with the interpol notice still in place.
"I have to go outside at some point but I am keeping my head down, that's for sure," he said.
"I've just got to try and normalise it to a degree, be able to get enough sunlight or do some exercise. Because this is month one. In a way, the attack on me has been going on for eight years so you wouldn't put it past them to be going on for months and months."
