Titus Day trial: Guy Sebastian rejects claims he gave ‘untruthful evidence’ about ‘missing’ payment from Taylor Swift tour

Guy Sebastian has rejected claims he gave “untruthful evidence” about payment “missing” for his support of Taylor Swift’s Aussie tour as his former manager stands trial accused of embezzlement.

Titus Emanuel Day is standing trial for allegedly embezzling $640,000 of Mr Sebastian’s royalties and performance fees, including the alleged failure to remit $187,000 to Mr Sebastian for performance fees as a support act for Swift on her 2013 Red tour of Australia and other corporate gigs and performances.

Mr Day has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of embezzlement as a clerk or servant and one count of attempting to dishonestly obtain financial advantage by deception.

He has denied doing anything fraudulent or dishonest.

Mr Day’s barrister, Thomas Woods, on Monday said money from Mr Sebastian’s performance at Swift’s tour was used to purchase shares on the pop star’s behalf, to which Mr Sebastian responded were “completely fabricated” claims and a “complete lie”.

The barrister later suggested Mr Sebastian had given “untruthful evidence” when rejecting those claims.

“I’m suggesting to you now that you have given untruthful evidence on that topic in rejecting those propositions,” Mr Woods said.

Mr Sebastian rejected that statement as “absurd”.

“No, that is a very easy one to reject – the proposition that you suggested is absurd to me, that I somehow wouldn’t notice or know, or my bookkeepers wouldn’t know, about 200 odd thousand Australian dollars being invested,” Mr Sebastian said.

The pop star also rejected suggestions he gave untruthful evidence when rejecting earlier claims his former manager hadn’t stolen, embezzled or misappropriated any of his money.

Mr Woods additionally proposed the pop star was either mistaken, or had given untruthful evidence, in questioning related to several of the counts in the case, including suggestions Mr Sebastian had agreed to “look after” Mr Day down the track over “lost commissions” in the early days of their agreement.

Mr Sebastian rejected all suggestions that he was mistaken or gave untruthful evidence.

Guy’s meeting with manager amid bitter dispute

Mr Sebastian moved over to Mr Day’s management company 6 Degrees three years after winning Australian Idol, having worked with him previously at Mr Day’s former agency, 22 Management.

No formal agreement was signed at 6 Degrees, but the court was told their agreement was based on Mr Sebastian’s former arrangement with 22 Management.

The pair, once so close that Mr Sebastian considered them to be “a family of sorts”, experienced a “really big shift” in their relationship by 2016, with Mr Sebastian claiming documents, statements and invoices “were not being sent anymore”.

Having “grievances” with his former manager, the court was told Mr Sebastian met with Mr Day at a cafe towards the end of 2017.

Mr Woods on Monday suggested Mr Sebastian had spoken “more or less continuously for half an hour” during the meeting, prompting Mr Day to say words to the effect of “I’m willing to discuss the issues, but I’m not willing to sit here and listen to a monologue from you about all my failures”.

“I do not recall that, no,” Mr Sebastian replied.

The Battle Scars singer also denied suggestions he’d agreed to pay Mr Day commissions he was asking for if he could show they were payable as per his former agreement with 22 Management by way of a “handshake agreement” at the 2017 meeting.

“Definitely not, no – you couldn’t come up with a more completely opposite version of what happened in that meeting,” Mr Sebastian said.

“The purpose of that meeting was I was actually trying to avoid being negative about it and trying to come to some kind of peaceful ending to everything where Titus would provide some accounting for what was missing.”

The court was told Mr Day was pushing for commissions to be paid to him after the pair parted ways professionally; however, Mr Sebastian and his lawyer at the time maintained there were no post-term commission arrangements.

Mr Sebastian later told the court that he was happy to pay commission for anything Mr Day had worked on.

Mr Woods on Monday put to Mr Sebastian that if he truly believed $270,000 worth of performance fees for several gigs – including his tour with Swift – had truly been stolen or embezzled, he would have been more persistent with chasing it up with Mr Day.

“I suggest that if it had truly been stolen or embezzled, as you allege, then you would have kept up your inquiries persistently about what you now say is missing money. Do you accept that?” Mr Woods asked.

Mr Sebastian rejected the claim and told the court any money chasing was left to his bookkeepers.

Mr Woods earlier told the court that there would be “no dispute” that on some occasions his client should have transferred money onto Mr Sebastian “but did not”.

“For many of the charges, the real question is not going to be whether my client failed to transfer the money to Sebastian but whether his failure to do that was criminal,” Mr Woods said.

Mr Sebastian told Mr Day that he was leaving his management in 2017, the court was previously told.

Mr Sebastian launched Federal Court proceedings against Mr Day the following year. He in turn filed a counterclaim.