The daughters of former Carlton president Luke Sayers have publicly supported their father amid a defamation and privacy lawsuit filed by their mother, Cate Sayers, in the Victorian Supreme Court. The case stems from a lewd photo posted on Luke Sayers' X account during a family holiday in Italy in January 2025.
Cate Sayers alleges that the AFL cleared her husband of wrongdoing in just two weeks, accepting his statutory declaration without a proper investigation. The declaration claimed the photo was taken for medical purposes and that only Cate knew of its existence. Cate's lawyers argue the AFL failed to interview her, examine the phone, or follow its own investigation protocol.
Luke Sayers' statutory declaration, which has not been released to the media, reportedly contained defamatory imputations that Cate accessed his account and posted the image, and that she suffers from mental illness. Cate's lawyers claim 11 false statements in the declaration, including an alleged rape claim. Luke's lawyers have yet to respond to the latest claims.
The case threatens to expose the AFL's internal investigation processes, which critics have called self-serving and opaque. Luke Sayers stepped down as a Carlton director after the post, and his marriage to Cate collapsed. The four daughters have now sided with their father in the legal dispute.
