Brandon Smith questioned by police over person linked to drug probe

South Sydney recruit Brandon Smith was questioned by police about a person known to him, a decade after he faced drugs charges as a teenager in north Queensland.

Officers at Gold Coast Airport took the 29-year-old New Zealand international aside after landing at the airport on Saturday ahead of the Rabbitohs’ match against the Gold Coast Titans on Sunday.

According to sources with knowledge of the matter speaking on the condition of anonymity, Smith was questioned about an individual familiar to him in relation to a Queensland Police investigation into the supply of drugs.

There is no suggestion of wrongdoing on his part and he was released without charge.

But this masthead can reveal that he previously pleaded guilty to drug offences while living in Townsville and was an emerging talent with the North Queensland Cowboys.

According to court records, Smith was charged in 2014 with two counts of supplying and possessing dangerous drugs after being found with an amount of MDMA at Nelly Bay on Magnetic Island.

He initially appeared in Townsville Magistrates Court before the case was committed to the District Court, where he pleaded guilty.

He was sentenced in 2016 with a fine of $3000. No convictions were recorded.

Smith was one of several players who had to attend the United States consulate in Sydney before being granted a visa to fly to Las Vegas for the NRL’s historic season launch there last year.

Queensland Police confirmed they had spoken to Smith on Saturday but did not detail why.

“Queensland police had cause to speak to a 29-year-old male at Coolangatta airport,” said a Queensland Police Service statement issued on the weekend.

“The male was later released without charge and police have no further information to provide.”

Smith, who was contacted for comment, joined injury-hit Souths from arch rivals the Sydney Roosters midway through the season and started from the bench in a narrow win over fellow strugglers the Titans.

Souths informed the NRL integrity unit about police approaching him on the Gold Coast but the club and the NRL have declined to comment on the reasons for the player being questioned.

Rabbitohs coach Wayne Bennett was also tight-lipped on the subject following his team’s 20-18 victory at Cbus Super Stadium, telling reporters: “That’s an issue we’re not going to talk about.”

Smith spent the majority of his NRL career with Melbourne before signing for the Roosters and then Souths, but initially moved from New Zealand to Townsville, where he played for the Cowboys’ underage teams until joining the Storm in 2016 when he was 20.

A colourful personality, nicknamed “Cheese”, he was at the centre of a so-called white powder scandal in 2021 over footage of him and then Melbourne teammates Cameron Munster and Chris Lewis in a hotel room.

The video emerged before the Dally M awards, which he was attending with his mother and where he won the hooker of the year prize.

“As we’re walking out of the hotel bro, we get this message from the general manager of the Storm saying, ‘This video is about to go viral’ and there’s a video of me in front of the table doing stuff I shouldn’t have been doing,” Smith told the Keegan and Company podcast last year of the incident, for which he was suspended for a match and fined $15,000 by the NRL.

“I was like, ‘I’m so sorry mum, I’m so sorry’. It sucked, bro, it sucked. But not for me. It sucked for my mum — I wanted her to enjoy her f---ing night.

“Then bro what really f---ing hit home was that my niece and my nephew were getting bullied at school because of something I did.

“You know, I f---ing did that and hearing that from my brother and just seeing that shit bro, that was definitely something that hurt my heart bad.”