Former AFL star Daniel Kerr has joined The Frownlow Medal Wife Beaters Club after pleading guilty to domestic violence.
The Frownlow Medal is awarded to the player whose off-field demeanour epitomises the values of the modern-day footballer and draws attention to the status of footballers as role models to young Australians. It covers Australia’s four major football codes; the National Rugby League (NRL), Australian Football League (AFL), the A-League (Football) and Rugby Union’s Super Rugby competition. NRL player Shaun Kenny-Dowall won the inaugural medal in 2015, while NRL star Talatau Amone is the most recent recipient.
The Frownlow Medal Hall of Fame honours former players and players who received media attention in previous seasons, for similarly scandalous behaviour, and its inductees include Ben Cousins and Julian O’Neill.
Kerr was nominated in 2016, 2020 and 2024 for numerous scandals. His third nomination came after revelations that he inflicted physical, psychological, verbal and financial abuse on his former partner for at least six years.
Kerr reportedly destroyed the woman’s property, gained control of her finances and her social media accounts and marred the relationship with drug and alcohol abuse. During the court case, it was revealed that Kerr repeatedly assaulted the woman and once punched her while holding keys, before licking the blood off his hands.
The West Coast Eagles star also grabbed her by the hair, threw her against a wall, punched her while she was holding their child and twice put his hand around her neck and choked her. He also burned her clothes on one occasion and cut her bed in half with a chainsaw.
In mid-2020, the woman took out a violence restraining order against him.
Somehow, Kerr avoided prison for the violence. Perhaps it was his lawyer’s claim that he suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, which was blamed on his time in custody – not for the domestic violence, but for setting fire to a house his parents owned.
He will not go behind bars for the domestic violence but was instead given a suspended prison sentence.
Kerr joins the following list of footballers to have been found guilty of violence against women:
NRL
Kenny Edwards
Zane Tetevano
Ben Barba
Jake Friend
Anthony Watts
Isaac Gordon
Richie Fa’aoso
Anthony Cherrington
Addin Fonua-Blake
Kirisome Auva’a
Jarryd Hayne
Jamil Hopoate
Joel Romelo
Wes Patten
AFL
Elijah Taylor
Nick Stevens
Liam Jurrah
Andrew Lovett
Wayne Carey
Albert Proud
Jeff Farmer
Rugby Union
Craig Wells
The Frownlow Medal 