Australian champion cyclist Dennis gets suspended sentence after wife’s road death

Australian former world champion cyclist Rohan Dennis avoided jail Wednesday for driving in a way “likely to cause harm” before his car struck and killed his Olympian wife Melissa Hoskins.

A judge in South Australia handed down a suspended sentence of nearly 17 months citing his guilty plea, his remorse and his role as sole carer of their young children.

Dennis, 34, admitted last year to an “aggravated act likely to cause harm” over the December 2023 road incident, which ended in retired track cyclist Hoskins’ death.

Dennis, an Olympic medallist in 2012 and 2021, was not charged with causing her death.

Judge Ian Press told the District Court in Adelaide that the couple had an argument over house renovations, prompting Dennis to drive off to calm down.

Hoskins jumped onto the car bonnet but Dennis carried on slowly driving for up to 10 seconds — “an inherently risky and dangerous act”, the judge said.

She got off at an intersection and then opened the door to the moving car before Dennis reached out to shut it, and attempted to drive away, he added.

“What happened next does not form the basis of the charge as the prosecution accept that, unbeknownst to you, your wife held onto the car as you accelerated down the street,” the judge said.

“It was then that she fell and lost her life.”

Hoskins, who represented Australia at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, died in an Adelaide hospital from her injuries.

She rode in the Australian team that won the team pursuit event at the 2015 Track Cycling World Championships in France.

Dennis won the world time trials in 2018 and 2019, as well as taking a 2015 stage win in the Tour de France.

“To describe the consequences of the events on 30 December 2023 as tragic really does not do justice to the grief, the anguish and the turmoil those events have brought into the lives of those who knew and loved your wife,” the judge said.