{"id":54292,"date":"2026-07-20T07:08:20","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T07:08:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/54292\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T07:08:20","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T07:08:20","slug":"man-admits-to-making-menacing-phone-call-to-age-journalist-nick-mckenzie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/54292\/","title":{"rendered":"Man admits to making ‘menacing’ phone call to Age journalist Nick McKenzie"},"content":{"rendered":"

A man has been ordered to complete an anger management course after he was caught making a “menacing” phone call to award-winning journalist Nick McKenzie.<\/p>\n

The Melbourne Magistrates Court heard David Scholes, 32, called McKenzie on Christmas Eve in 2025 and called him a “f***ing scumbag”.<\/p>\n

It came after McKenzie, a reporter at The Age, had written about Mr Scholes’s employer, MA Services Group.<\/p>\n

The stories related to allegations of suspected tax evasion, worker exploitation and sexual harassment involving the company’s founder, court documents said.<\/p>\n

The security company collapsed in late 2025,<\/a> leaving up to 1,700 people out of work.<\/p>\n

According to a summary of allegations read to the court, Mr Scholes used software from his work to track down McKenzie’s phone number, which was not publicly listed.<\/p>\n

The MA Services Group manager switched off his phone’s caller ID and rang McKenzie, boasting that the reporter was easy to find.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

David Scholes has been placed on a good behaviour bond for 12 months. (Supplied)<\/p>\n

“Bro I f***ing hope you sleep well at night \u2026 you’re a rat,” Mr Scholes said during the two-minute call.<\/p>\n

During a police interview, Mr Scholes said he made the call because he blamed McKenzie for job losses at the company, where several of his family members worked.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He was also concerned an article would be written about him and his wife.<\/p>\n

Prosecutor Annina Tropea said the incident left McKenzie feeling “rattled and under attack”.<\/p>\n

“Journalists and the media play an important role in the community and this type of menacing behaviour is designed to intimidate them performing that role,” she said.<\/p>\n

Defence lawyer Alastair Grigor said his client made full admissions and had written an apology letter to the reporter.<\/p>\n

Mr Scholes, from Fraser Rise in Melbourne’s north-west, was charged with using a carriage service to harass or menace.<\/p>\n

The Age welcomes ‘people being held accountable’<\/p>\n

On Monday, Magistrate Donna Bakos described the phone call as “menacing” and “distressing to receive”, and placed Mr Scholes on a diversion order.<\/p>\n

The order means Mr Scholes has taken responsibility for making the call but no formal finding of guilt will be entered against him, nor a conviction recorded.<\/p>\n

Mr Scholes was supported by family in court, and the magistrate said six character references had been tendered on his behalf.<\/p>\n

She ordered him to complete an anger management program and be placed on a good behaviour bond for 12 months.<\/p>\n

McKenzie is one of Australia’s most-decorated reporters and has won 20 Walkley awards for journalistic excellence.<\/p>\n

Since 2024, he has reported extensively allegations of corruption and criminality within Victoria’s building industry.<\/p>\n

In a statement, The Age editor Patrick Elligett said: “It is pleasing to see people being held accountable for threatening journalists, which could have a chilling effect on public interest reporting if left unchecked.”<\/p>\n

McKenzie’s house was targeted in an unrelated incident in October 2025<\/a>, when an offender climbed onto his roof and tried to disable a security system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man has been ordered to complete an anger management course after he was caught making a “menacing”…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54293,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48105,22,21,21209,324,1110,48103,48106,48104,5177,260,48102,35169,68],"class_list":["post-54292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-anger-management","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-big-build","tag-construction","tag-courts","tag-david-scholes","tag-good-behaviour","tag-ma-services-group","tag-magistrates-court","tag-melbourne","tag-nick-mckenzie","tag-the-age","tag-victoria"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54292","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=54292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}