{"id":4892,"date":"2026-05-05T04:07:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T04:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/4892\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T04:07:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T04:07:10","slug":"australian-author-craig-silvey-pleads-guilty-to-possessing-child-exploitation-material","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/4892\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian author Craig Silvey pleads guilty to possessing child exploitation material"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australian author Craig Silvey, best known for his award-winning book Jasper Jones, has pleaded guilty to possessing and distributing child exploitation material.<\/p>\n

Silvey, 43, was first charged in January after police raided his home and seized electronic devices, which resulted in some bookstores immediately pulling his work from shelves.<\/p>\n

Appearing in Fremantle Magistrates Court on Tuesday morning, the father-of-three pleaded guilty to the two charges, stemming from offences in January.<\/p>\n

\"Craig<\/p>\n

Australian author Craig Silvey arriving at Fremantle Court on Tuesday morning. (ABC News: David Weber)<\/p>\n

Two other charges, including one stemming from an allegation he produced child exploitation material over a period of months in 2022, have been dropped.<\/p>\n

Sexual assault\u00a0support lines:Lifeline<\/a> (24-hour crisis line): 131 114Full Stop Australia<\/a>: 1800 385 578Bravehearts<\/a>: counselling and support for survivors of child sexual abuse: 1800\u00a0272\u00a0831Child Wise<\/a>: counselling provider: 1800\u00a0991\u00a0099<\/p>\n

The charges Silvey pleaded guilty to involve images of child exploitation material.<\/p>\n

Silvey had nothing to say to waiting media when he left court.<\/p>\n

He is next scheduled to appear in the District Court in July, and his bail was continued.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Aside from Jasper Jones which was adapted into a feature film, Silvey has won numerous accolades for other books, including Rhubarb, Honeybee and Runt, a children’s novel that was also made into a film.<\/p>\n

\"Craig<\/p>\n

Author Craig Silvey at a book signing for his novel Runt in September, 2024. (Facebook: Craig Silvey)<\/p>\n

Silvey’s books were widely used in school English classes, but WA Education Minister Sabine Winton later ordered schools to stop using the texts while the matter was under investigation.<\/p>\n

His books have been popular with children and young adults, often delving into profound themes such as racism, sexual identity and abuse, mostly featuring teenage protagonists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian author Craig Silvey, best known for his award-winning book Jasper Jones, has pleaded guilty to possessing and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4893,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,823,6177,6179,6178,6181,6180,6183,466,463,465,464,6182],"class_list":{"0":"post-4892","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-austrlia","10":"tag-child-exploitation","11":"tag-craig-silvey","12":"tag-craig-silvey-child-exploitation-material","13":"tag-craig-silvey-child-sex-charges","14":"tag-craig-silvey-fremantle-court","15":"tag-craig-silvey-in-court","16":"tag-jasper-jones","17":"tag-perth-courts","18":"tag-perth-news","19":"tag-wa-courts","20":"tag-wa-news","21":"tag-what-is-craig-silvey-charged-with"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4892","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4892"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4892\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}