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Speaker 1: You're listening to a Mother mea podcast. Mama Mia acknowledges

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Speaker 1: the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast

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Speaker 1: is recorded on from Mamma Maya. You're listening to No Filter.

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Speaker 1: I'm mea Friedman and today I am bringing you an

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Speaker 1: interview that I did a little while ago because there

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Speaker 1: has been a big new update in this story and

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Speaker 1: it remains one of the most fascinating true crime bizarre

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Speaker 1: stories you have ever heard. It's about a woman called

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Speaker 1: him out as a party, who keeps pretending to be

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Speaker 1: a child. She's a grown woman, and she keeps getting arrested.

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Speaker 1: And this story, if you saw it in a movie

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Speaker 1: or a TV show, you probably wouldn't even believe that

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Speaker 1: it's true. But it is true, and there's an update.

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Speaker 1: I'll be back at the end to tell you what

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Speaker 1: it is. So she won't seek help, she doesn't want

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Speaker 1: to get better.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, then the question arises, what do you do with

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Speaker 2: someone like Samantha.

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Speaker 1: When you hear the words scammer, you probably think of

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Speaker 1: one of those bloody, annoying text messages that you get,

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Speaker 1: the ones that try and trick you into clicking on

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Speaker 1: a link and handing over you bank details. Or maybe

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Speaker 1: you think of catfishing, where people pretend to be someone

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Speaker 1: else online to trick someone into falling in love with

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Speaker 1: them and sending them money. But the common denominator is

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Speaker 1: money though, right, that's our understanding of what a scammer wants.

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Speaker 1: But what you're about to hear is the story of

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Speaker 1: a woman called Samantha as a Party and Dakota Johnson

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Speaker 1: and Harper Heart and Aurora Hepburn and Emily as a

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Speaker 1: Party and dozens of other names that she made up,

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Speaker 1: along with forged documents, to trick people into into caring

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Speaker 1: for her, worrying about her, giving her attention.

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Speaker 2: One of the first things she said to me when

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Speaker 2: we spoke was, Oh, I'm so relieved you're a real person.

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Speaker 2: I thought maybe you were a forwardster because there are

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Speaker 2: so many fraudsters on these Facebook groups like you do

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Speaker 2: you not?

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Speaker 1: Samantha is one of Australia's most prolific and determined scammers,

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Speaker 1: but it's not money that she seems to want, and

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Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that her twisted stories and extraordinarily elaborate

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Speaker 1: schemes haven't devastated her victims. They have, and they include

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Speaker 1: famous athletes, young couples, vulnerable teenagers, and even young children.

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Speaker 1: One of the scams Samantha returns to most regularly is

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Speaker 1: passing herself off as a schoolgirl, even enrolling in schools

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Speaker 1: again and again, despite being in her twenties and then

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Speaker 1: in her thirties.

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Speaker 3: In her role, she looks about fourteen or fifteen.

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Speaker 1: She just looks colds and frail. She seems like a

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Speaker 1: traumatized young person to me. Samantha has been charged more

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Speaker 1: than one hundred times in Australia and has been jailed

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Speaker 1: for several of her crimes, which have occurred all over

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Speaker 1: the world. But she just can't stop.

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Speaker 4: Why would she do this? What is she hoping to

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Speaker 4: gain from this?

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Speaker 5: Now?

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Speaker 1: I just think she's a great con woman.

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Speaker 3: She's really good at.

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Speaker 4: What she does.

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Speaker 1: For Mamma Maya. I'm mea Friedman. You're listening to no Filter.

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Speaker 1: Sharon Davis is my guest today and as a Walkley

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Speaker 1: Award winning investigative journalist, she spent the past couple of

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Speaker 1: years working on a podcast about Samantha as a party

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Speaker 1: called Finding Samantha. So did she find her?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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Speaker 1: Yeah she did? And that's when things got even weirder.

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Speaker 1: This isn't just a fascinating story. It's also about the

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Speaker 1: power of one small, unassuming woman to successfully trick hundreds

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Speaker 1: of really smart people again and again for almost twenty

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Speaker 1: years in County. Here's Sharon Davis. Sharon, this story doesn't

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Speaker 1: start in Dublin, but I would like to start with

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Speaker 1: the General post Office and a little girl that was

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Speaker 1: found wandering in the street in October of twenty thirteen.

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Speaker 2: This week there were reports that a teenage girl was

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Speaker 2: found wandering in a dazed street on O'Connell Street in Dublin.

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Speaker 1: What happened on that day.

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Speaker 2: Well, on that day, as you say, there was this

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Speaker 2: little girl looking sort of waiflike and disheveled outside the

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Speaker 2: Dublin post Office and she looked kind of lost and

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Speaker 2: forlorn and alone, and a police officer in the street

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Speaker 2: saw her and became concerned about her welfare. Now, this

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Speaker 2: is against a backdrop in Europe and in the UK

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Speaker 2: and the Ireland where there was quite a lot of

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Speaker 2: sex picking teenaged bills going on at that time. I

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Speaker 2: mean there still is, but that was when people were

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Speaker 2: starting to become aware of it, and authorities were certainly

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Speaker 2: starting to become aware of it, and so the police

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Speaker 2: officer approached her and couldn't really get any answers out

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Speaker 2: of her about why she was there. In fact, she

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Speaker 2: didn't speak, She wouldn't spect. They didn't know whether she

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Speaker 2: understood English.

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Speaker 6: Even she appeared pleasant or didn't communicate, didn't want to speak,

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Speaker 6: no way contact.

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Speaker 3: She kept her hair down over her face.

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Speaker 2: So the police were concerned, and they contacted the station.

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Speaker 2: The station said, well, we can't just leave her there.

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Speaker 2: She may be in desperate trouble.

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Speaker 1: Did she seem distressed, Yes.

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Speaker 2: She seemed very distressed. So they contacted child welfare authorities

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Speaker 2: who suggested that for her own safety, that she needed

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Speaker 2: to be hostilepitalized while she was checked out as to

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Speaker 2: what a health situation was, and while they also tried

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Speaker 2: to ascertain who she was because she wasn't speaking.

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Speaker 1: When she was admitted to hospital, she continued to not speak,

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Speaker 1: but she drew some pictures. What did she draw?

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Speaker 2: She was drawing planes, she was drawing stick figures, She

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Speaker 2: was drawing I think at one point she drew a gun.

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Speaker 2: They were all things that made the authorities concerned that

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Speaker 2: what she was saying was that she had been sex trafficked.

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Speaker 2: They were also concerned as to why she wasn't speaking,

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Speaker 2: about whether she was so traumatized that she couldn't talk

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Speaker 2: at all, or whether this was a language issue. I mean,

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Speaker 2: this was a real conundrum in front of them. They

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Speaker 2: had this young girl who they believed was about thirteen

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Speaker 2: or fourteen, not speaking, lying in a hospital, bear very thin,

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Speaker 2: who showed lots of signs of trauma and distress. And

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Speaker 2: so they were calling in different psychiatrists, psychologists, doctors, health workers,

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Speaker 2: child welfare workers to try and figure out what this

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Speaker 2: story was about and who this young woman was.

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Speaker 6: On Toursday, the tenth of October, at approx. Be four

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Speaker 6: fifteen pm, members of Renguarded Chicana discovered a young female

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Speaker 6: on O'Connor Street in a distressed stage. She is described

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Speaker 6: as being favored sex and haste, slim bill and having

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Speaker 6: a long blonde hair. Do you recognize this girl?

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Speaker 1: How long until they decided to go public because I

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Speaker 1: imagine revealing a photograph of her to the world to

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Speaker 1: try and find out who she is was a big decision.

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Speaker 2: That was a huge decision, and it was a decision

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Speaker 2: that actually required because they believed she was a minor.

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Speaker 2: It required the court to be involved, so they actually

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Speaker 2: had to go to the court to get permission to

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Speaker 2: publish her photo, and that was many, many weeks after

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Speaker 2: she was first found in the street in Dublin, so

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Speaker 2: she was in hospital for at least four weeks or

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Speaker 2: more while this discussion went on about how they would

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Speaker 2: approach this and how they might in the end find

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Speaker 2: out who she was. And essentially why they wanted that

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Speaker 2: photo was to try and release it to other police

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Speaker 2: agencies around the world really to see if anyone could

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Speaker 2: identify her before they went public. They didn't go public

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Speaker 2: straight away with the photo. Even they did circulate it

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Speaker 2: amongst police first of all around the world through Interpol.

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Speaker 1: And they had no luck. Inter poll knew nothing.

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Speaker 2: Well interestingly enough, they had no luck. But then what

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Speaker 2: happened was they then circulated it publicly. This was all

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Speaker 2: in a matter of a couple of days. But at

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Speaker 2: the same time as they got a lead on this

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Speaker 2: young woman from Ireland, there was also a police officer

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Speaker 2: in Western Australia that contacted them and said I think

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Speaker 2: I know who this girl is. So they had kind

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Speaker 2: of two sources for their information. One was a man

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Speaker 2: who lived in Ireland, who had been a stepfather for

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Speaker 2: a while and the mother and he had separated and

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Speaker 2: he had gone back to Ireland because he was Irish

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Speaker 2: by origin, but he lived with the family in Australia,

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Speaker 2: and so he contacted the police and said, I know

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Speaker 2: who this girl is. That's the daughter of my previous partner.

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Speaker 2: And at the same time they had this Western Australian

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Speaker 2: police officer contacting them saying I think I know who

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Speaker 2: this girl is.

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Speaker 1: Because what they told the authorities in Dublin who were

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Speaker 1: trying to find out who this little girl was, is

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Speaker 1: that she wasn't a little girl. She was a twenty

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Speaker 1: five year old woman called Samantha as a Party.

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Speaker 6: Ireland's mystery girl who was feared was the victim of

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Speaker 6: sex trafficking and it turned out to be an Australian

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Speaker 6: woman who's known to police and who is now on

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Speaker 6: her way home.

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Speaker 4: Samantha as a Party was in fact a fraudster and

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Speaker 4: had confections for fraud and Australia and this was her

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Speaker 4: part of her mortus operande, and that fraud was something

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Speaker 4: that she specialized in.

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Speaker 2: That's right. She wasn't thirteen or fourteen years old, and

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Speaker 2: she wasn't a human sex trafficked victim. She was in

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Speaker 2: fact a young as you say, twenty five year old,

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Speaker 2: not so young, but certainly a young woman from Campbelltown

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Speaker 2: in Sydney.

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Speaker 1: How did you get involved at this point?

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Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting because you know, I've been making radio

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Speaker 2: programs and podcasts for a while, and I have to

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Speaker 2: admit me that I've always been fascinated by scammers, like

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Speaker 2: a lot of us are. A few years ago, I

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Speaker 2: actually wanted to make a series, a general podcast series

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Speaker 2: about scamming and the psychology behind it and why people

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Speaker 2: do it. And so I was collecting stories and this

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Speaker 2: story emerged of this young woman just down the road

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Speaker 2: from my Sydney in a city suburb who'd gone to

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Speaker 2: school pretending to be a traumatized, down fourteen fifteen year

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Speaker 2: old and she had been caught. But she'd been going

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Speaker 2: to that school for a while and it was a

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Speaker 2: school for troubled and disadvantaged kids.

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Speaker 1: How long had she been going to school.

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Speaker 2: Oh, she'd been there for more than a year.

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Speaker 1: Just going to school, taking.

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Speaker 2: Classes, taking classes, hanging around with other kids, pretending she

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Speaker 2: was a literate. So she was getting special attention from

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Speaker 2: social workers and literature teachers. She'd been found by a

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Speaker 2: couple in the street in Auburn, outside of Sydney Western Suburbs.

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Speaker 2: They had taken her in and had decided that she

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Speaker 2: needed their help, and they thought she was a young girl,

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Speaker 2: and she told them she was on a US Witness

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Speaker 2: protection program and that she was hiding from a situation

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Speaker 2: where she'd been sexually abused, and they believed her, and

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Speaker 2: they put her into this school in Marrickville, the School

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Speaker 2: of Good Shepherd in Merrickville, the disadvantaged kids who had

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Speaker 2: education issues, and she was there for a really long time.

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Speaker 2: But during the time she was there, what happened was

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Speaker 2: the school needed to work out her identity. They needed

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Speaker 2: some sort of bona fides. They asked for birth certificates,

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Speaker 2: and a birth certificate wasn't forthcoming, And they also asked

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Speaker 2: for medical records because she disappeared from school for a

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Speaker 2: couple of months and they didn't know where she was.

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Speaker 1: Was she still living with his family with a couple.

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Speaker 2: She was living with his family. Her story was, you know,

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Speaker 2: and the family story was that she hadn't been well

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Speaker 2: and hadn't been able to attend school. And then they

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Speaker 2: get a birth certificate, and you know, it later emerges

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Speaker 2: that their certificate is fake, but it shows her as

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Speaker 2: a US citizen called Harper Heart, and the school starts

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Speaker 2: to kind of look at a little bit further because

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Speaker 2: they're really worried that there's something that isn't quite right

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Speaker 2: about this. But this is all going on over a

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Speaker 2: process of months, you know, months and months and months,

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Speaker 2: and in the meantime, you know, Samantha is getting these

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Speaker 2: resources and a lot of attention from some of the

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Speaker 2: school teachers.

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Speaker 1: How old was she at this time?

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Speaker 2: This was only a few years ago. This was twenty

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Speaker 2: and seventeen, so she was at the time about twenty seven.

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Speaker 3: Wow.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, she's good. She's really good at doing this stuff.

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Speaker 2: She was drawing freckles on her face at that time,

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Speaker 2: according to the police officer who eventually did the investigation

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Speaker 2: into her at the school, detected Barren Power from Berwood

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Speaker 2: Police Station.

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Speaker 7: When we arrested her, we noticed the freckles she had

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Speaker 7: on her face, making it look like a little thirteen

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Speaker 7: year old girl, were actually fake.

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Speaker 3: They're actually drawn on by her. They'll make up.

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Speaker 2: What was her response when she was arrested, She.

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Speaker 3: Knew who we were was like she could smell police.

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Speaker 7: She was very cool and calculated. She seemed very disciplined,

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Speaker 7: showed no emotional response. I wouldn't cooperate with police, wouldn't

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Speaker 7: answer any questions, and maintained her right to silence.

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Speaker 2: He was quite taken by how good she was at

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Speaker 2: changing her identity. He called her a chameleon.

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Speaker 1: When was the first time that she came to the

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Speaker 1: attention of authorities?

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Speaker 2: Okay, so in two thousand and seven she appeared in

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Speaker 2: rock Hampton. As far as I know, that was the

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Speaker 2: first time she attracted police attention. At that time. Her name,

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Speaker 2: she said, was Lindsay Lana John Bennett, Coplan. It's interesting

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Speaker 2: that her names often have some relationship with either movie

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Speaker 2: stars or people of some notoriety, And at that time,

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Speaker 2: I think that John Bennett case in the United States

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Speaker 2: was really known and popular. So she turns up in

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Speaker 2: rock Hampton and she's charged with a couple of minor offenses,

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Speaker 2: and those offenses were intentioned to defraud. She was using

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Speaker 2: fake Medicare cards, so she'd obviously got them somewhere, and

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Speaker 2: she'd also been picked up for shoplifting and a thing.

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Speaker 2: But then she kind of flies under the radar for

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Speaker 2: another couple of years, and to be quite honest, I

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Speaker 2: think there's other stories about Samantha out there that still

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Speaker 2: haven't come to the surface. So she flies under the

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Speaker 2: radar for a couple of years and then re emerges

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Speaker 2: again in about two thousand eight ten in Brisbane and

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Speaker 2: then she is Dakota Johnson. She wants to enroll in

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Speaker 2: a school in Brisbane. Again. She gives a story about

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Speaker 2: her uncle who has been sexually abusing her, and that

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Speaker 2: she's run away. She was trapped on an island with

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Speaker 2: her uncle. And she basically turns up at this school

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Speaker 2: and wants to enroll, and the welfare authorities again become involved.

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Speaker 2: They become very concerned about her. They enleissed a number

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Speaker 2: of social workers to help her. The social workers, of course,

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Speaker 2: have to involve the police. You have to notify police

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Speaker 2: when you've got a child who you expect is in

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Speaker 2: danger in the same way that that had to happen

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Speaker 2: in Dublin, So they contact the police. There is an

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Speaker 2: investigation that started. It's found that she's not who she

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Speaker 2: says she is, but again takes about a month. It

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Speaker 2: involves child protection authorities, it involves the police. It involves

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Speaker 2: social workers, and she's charged with falsely representing herself with

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Speaker 2: intention to defraud. She's again charged with a whole range

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Speaker 2: of documents, having a whole range of other people's documents

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Speaker 2: in her possession. You know, when she's picked up by

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Speaker 2: the police, she refuses to give her name, her day

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Speaker 2: to birth, so again the police have to go into

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Speaker 2: quite a lot of investigation to find out who she

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Speaker 2: really is. So she was charged with that as well,

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Speaker 2: but she got a sort of a wrap over the

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Speaker 2: uncles and a fine.

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Speaker 1: Sharon. Usually, when you think about fraud, you think about

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Speaker 1: or scammers, you think about someone trying to get money.

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Speaker 2: Yep, right.

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Speaker 1: And what's fascinating to me about this story and about

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00:17:59,965 --> 00:18:02,405
Speaker 1: Samantha is that most people spend their lives trying to

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Speaker 1: get away from school.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I know.

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Speaker 1: And she seems to spend her life trying to go

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Speaker 1: back to school.

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Speaker 4: Yes, this was a woman that was ten years older

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Speaker 4: than the person she was portraying to be going back

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Speaker 4: wanting to go back to school. Most kids, you can't

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Speaker 4: get them to go to school, let alone go back twice.

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Speaker 1: And this is something that keeps happening throughout her life,

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Speaker 1: doesn't it.

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Speaker 2: It does, and I think it may have a relationship

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Speaker 2: with her childhood. I think she had interrupted schooling when

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Speaker 2: she was a child. I think school was particularly difficult

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Speaker 2: for her. I think that she may have had some

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Speaker 2: learning difficulties. She was certainly at one point in a

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Speaker 2: section of the school which was for learning difficulties. When

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Speaker 2: she was at Ed's High School in Campbelltown. People that

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Speaker 2: knew her at school, some of the people that I

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Speaker 2: spoke to were really scathing about her, and I thought

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Speaker 2: that was pretty awful. You know how school playgrounds can

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Speaker 2: be really nasty, and if you're dealing with someone who's

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Speaker 2: particularly vulnerable, that can have a real impact on someone.

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Speaker 2: And I think at that time in her life she

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Speaker 2: was very vulnerable, and I think she was also having

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Speaker 2: some mental health issues. Certainly there were schisms in her family.

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Speaker 2: Her mother and father had separated. It appears that she

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Speaker 2: wasn't very settled as a child, that she was moved

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Speaker 2: around a lot to a lot of different schools. Now,

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Speaker 2: I'm speaking as somebody who had that experience in my

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Speaker 2: own life as a child, I was moved around a lot,

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Speaker 2: and my family were not a happy family, and I

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Speaker 2: know what that means. I know how that can kind

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Speaker 2: of disconnect you in many ways and make you feel

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Speaker 2: like you don't have a firm surface to sort of

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Speaker 2: stand on to grow. So I sort of see that

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Speaker 2: in her, and I see that in that history of her.

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Speaker 1: You know, when she kept going back to school as

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Speaker 1: an adult pretending to be a child, did she befriend

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Speaker 1: are the kids? Was she popular? Was she also just

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Speaker 1: a bit of a misfit at school?

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Speaker 2: She did befriend the other kids. And we have had

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Speaker 2: some correspondence with parents of those kids who are very

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Speaker 2: angry about the fact that her school friends believed that

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Speaker 2: they were dealing with someone their own age, and then

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Speaker 2: they find out that she's in fact an adult and

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Speaker 2: she's a fake, and that nothing that they've told them

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Speaker 2: is true. So they're very angry about what that means

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Speaker 2: for their children. None of those kids have been willing

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Speaker 2: to speak, and I kind of understand that there's a

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Speaker 2: lot of traumatized people in the story, including Nothink Samantha,

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Speaker 2: and so it's very difficult, and a lot of them

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Speaker 2: are young, so it's very difficult for them to talk

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Speaker 2: about their experience again, and a lot of them and

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Speaker 2: their parents don't want them to have to relive it.

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Speaker 2: I think the big thing that she did in those

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Speaker 2: wool rules, she got a lot of attention from teachers.

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Speaker 2: She got a lot of extra attention and help. And

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Speaker 2: maybe that's what she craved. Maybe that's what she craved

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Speaker 2: at school. Maybe that's the basis of all of her scams,

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Speaker 2: is some sort of feeling of being protected and looked

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Speaker 2: after and loved and nurtured in a way that maybe

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Speaker 2: didn't happen at school.

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Speaker 1: She turned up in Canada in twenty fourteen. She was

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Speaker 1: twenty six by this time. What was her scam in Canada?

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Speaker 2: Oh, my goodness, this scam is so complicated. What'samantha does

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Speaker 2: is she often sets up her scams as well, So

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Speaker 2: there's quite a lot of pre planning and pre thought

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Speaker 2: to a lot of her scams. So what she did

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Speaker 2: was she rang the police and said that her sister

365
00:22:09,325 --> 00:22:14,925
Speaker 2: Aura had gone missing, and that her sister and herself

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00:22:15,125 --> 00:22:19,605
Speaker 2: were part of a cult and they'd run away from

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Speaker 2: the cult and their lives were in danger. And of

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00:22:22,365 --> 00:22:26,005
Speaker 2: course in the cult there was sex abuse and there

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Speaker 2: was all sorts of weird stuff going on. So she

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Speaker 2: reports her sister as a missing person.

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Speaker 1: So she makes up a fake person to report herself,

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Speaker 1: who was also fake to be missing.

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Speaker 2: Yep, exactly. It's complicated, isn't it. Sometimes this stuff does

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Speaker 2: your head in.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is.

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Speaker 2: All via phone. She rings police, and the police put

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00:22:51,125 --> 00:22:55,405
Speaker 2: an alert for this missing girl, and then two weeks

378
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Speaker 2: later she walks into another police station and says she's

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Speaker 2: the missing girl. Aurora, Aurora.

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Speaker 8: It was on September sixteenth of twenty fourteen that a

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Speaker 8: young girl walked into the Alexandra Community Health Center, which

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Speaker 8: is in downtown Calgary. She was complaining about nausea and

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Speaker 8: vomiting that she'd.

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Speaker 1: Had a head injury.

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Speaker 8: She said her name was Aurora.

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Speaker 2: Hepburn again, she's hospitalized. There's a lot of hospitals that

387
00:23:23,925 --> 00:23:26,645
Speaker 2: come into this story as well. The person in a

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Speaker 2: hospital there is the focus of attention, aren't they. They're

389
00:23:29,405 --> 00:23:32,565
Speaker 2: getting a lot of attention, a lot is happening around them,

390
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Speaker 2: but they're the focus. So yeah, she's put into a

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Speaker 2: hospital while the police do investigations. Her fingerprints are taken

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Speaker 2: and by this time her fingerprints are on file and

393
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Speaker 2: they figure out that she's in fact samanthas a party

394
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Speaker 2: Australian Samantha as a party, they detain her. She goes

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Speaker 2: to jail there and they deport her from Canada.

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Speaker 9: Calgary Police Service of Chars and Australian Women with mischief

397
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Speaker 9: after claiming she was underage victim of sex trafficking and exploitation.

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Speaker 9: The woman told investigators she'd endured years of violent sexual

399
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Speaker 9: abuse torture for several weeks. Investigators and healthcare workers spent

400
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Speaker 9: countless hours working on the alleged victims to establish the

401
00:24:18,085 --> 00:24:21,485
Speaker 9: extent of her abuse and provides services for her recovery.

402
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Speaker 2: But again, you know, she's basically spent thousands of dollars

403
00:24:27,325 --> 00:24:32,645
Speaker 2: in state resources and in resources such as nurses, hospitals,

404
00:24:33,245 --> 00:24:37,285
Speaker 2: care workers that probably would have been spent on somebody

405
00:24:37,285 --> 00:24:40,325
Speaker 2: who really was a victim rather than somebody who's just

406
00:24:41,125 --> 00:24:41,925
Speaker 2: playing a game.

407
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Speaker 1: So each time this happens overseas is she deported back

408
00:24:47,925 --> 00:24:50,285
Speaker 1: to Australia in Ireland.

409
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Speaker 2: The first time she was accompanied back to Australia by

410
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Speaker 2: Irish police, she didn't talk on the whole flight home.

411
00:24:57,445 --> 00:24:59,725
Speaker 2: She capped up the ruse of being up, the ruse

412
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Speaker 2: on the whole.

413
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Speaker 1: Victim of sex slavery.

414
00:25:03,085 --> 00:25:06,685
Speaker 2: When she arrived back in Australia, from Canada. She was

415
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Speaker 2: actually arrested because she'd been traveling on passports, so the

416
00:25:11,005 --> 00:25:13,965
Speaker 2: Australian authorities met her at the airport and arrested her.

417
00:25:14,485 --> 00:25:18,805
Speaker 2: And she did sometime in jail in twenty fifteen because

418
00:25:18,845 --> 00:25:21,885
Speaker 2: of traveling on false passports. So she has done a

419
00:25:21,965 --> 00:25:25,005
Speaker 2: bit of jail time as well, but it doesn't seem

420
00:25:25,045 --> 00:25:29,405
Speaker 2: to be a huge deterrment. She did jail time for

421
00:25:29,965 --> 00:25:33,525
Speaker 2: the Merrickville Harper heart story as well, but it wasn't

422
00:25:33,685 --> 00:25:38,565
Speaker 2: a huge deterrent. She's done time in Melbourne. That's when

423
00:25:38,925 --> 00:25:45,325
Speaker 2: Samantha's offending becomes even more serious. Somethink up.

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Speaker 1: Next, Sharon tells us what happens when Samantha made her

425
00:25:48,605 --> 00:25:52,525
Speaker 1: way to Melbourne and the family that unknowingly became involved

426
00:25:52,565 --> 00:25:57,405
Speaker 1: in yet another of her scams. This one was just devastating.

427
00:26:03,445 --> 00:26:06,725
Speaker 1: Let's talk about Melbourne. What happened when she got there

428
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Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen.

429
00:26:09,365 --> 00:26:14,965
Speaker 2: Well, she answered ads on all Pear sites. What I've

430
00:26:15,085 --> 00:26:19,605
Speaker 2: found in the process of making this is that because

431
00:26:19,685 --> 00:26:22,085
Speaker 2: childcare is so hard to come by, and there's a

432
00:26:22,125 --> 00:26:25,205
Speaker 2: lot of busy women out there who really need to

433
00:26:25,365 --> 00:26:31,085
Speaker 2: find a solution to their childcare issues, they often don't

434
00:26:31,125 --> 00:26:35,165
Speaker 2: do enough due diligence on who they're bringing into their

435
00:26:35,205 --> 00:26:40,605
Speaker 2: homes they're making part of their families. Now that was

436
00:26:40,685 --> 00:26:45,605
Speaker 2: certainly the case with Samantha. Is that she answered ads

437
00:26:45,725 --> 00:26:49,285
Speaker 2: on an all pair site in Melbourne. But before she

438
00:26:49,365 --> 00:26:53,925
Speaker 2: went to Melbourne, she'd also answered an AD on all

439
00:26:53,965 --> 00:26:57,245
Speaker 2: peir site in Brisbane, so she'd been in Brisbane. So

440
00:26:57,325 --> 00:26:59,245
Speaker 2: if we wind back a little bit, she'd been in

441
00:26:59,285 --> 00:27:02,085
Speaker 2: Brisbane she answered an ad on or all pair site

442
00:27:02,205 --> 00:27:06,245
Speaker 2: and she got picked up by the Jarvis family Jazzy

443
00:27:06,325 --> 00:27:09,325
Speaker 2: Jarvis and Tom Jarvis and Tom is a famous bass

444
00:27:09,405 --> 00:27:13,925
Speaker 2: before and so she had all paired for them and

445
00:27:14,005 --> 00:27:19,325
Speaker 2: their daughter for about six months in Brisbane. They were

446
00:27:19,405 --> 00:27:22,365
Speaker 2: very happy with her. She works very well in families

447
00:27:22,405 --> 00:27:25,085
Speaker 2: and she often has a great relationship with the kids

448
00:27:25,125 --> 00:27:28,005
Speaker 2: that she's all hearing. We had no confounds at all

449
00:27:28,445 --> 00:27:28,925
Speaker 2: quite a time.

450
00:27:29,005 --> 00:27:29,405
Speaker 1: Loved her.

451
00:27:30,125 --> 00:27:31,725
Speaker 2: They got on really well. We weren't.

452
00:27:31,765 --> 00:27:34,685
Speaker 4: She met our I met our family, she met our friends.

453
00:27:34,685 --> 00:27:35,565
Speaker 1: She was at.

454
00:27:35,605 --> 00:27:39,845
Speaker 9: Basketball games with fifteen thousand people and nobody suspected she

455
00:27:40,005 --> 00:27:41,285
Speaker 9: was thirty one.

456
00:27:42,485 --> 00:27:45,205
Speaker 4: You know, she looked really really young and nobody suspected

457
00:27:45,205 --> 00:27:45,525
Speaker 4: A theme.

458
00:27:46,045 --> 00:27:48,805
Speaker 1: Does she do it as herself under her own name. No,

459
00:27:49,525 --> 00:27:51,325
Speaker 1: and does she give herself a backstory?

460
00:27:51,685 --> 00:27:54,165
Speaker 2: Oh, she gives herself a great backstory. She often comes

461
00:27:54,205 --> 00:27:57,765
Speaker 2: from rich parents. There are often some of her parents

462
00:27:57,765 --> 00:28:02,085
Speaker 2: are lawyers. They're often based in the US, or if

463
00:28:02,085 --> 00:28:05,525
Speaker 2: they're Australian, they travel a lot, so they're often not

464
00:28:05,965 --> 00:28:09,805
Speaker 2: living in the country at the time. She supprised photos.

465
00:28:10,285 --> 00:28:13,565
Speaker 2: She has photos of her on yachts and all sorts

466
00:28:13,565 --> 00:28:17,565
Speaker 2: of things. I think she's pretty good at manipulating social media.

467
00:28:17,765 --> 00:28:22,445
Speaker 2: Often the photos don't have full pictures of her face,

468
00:28:23,765 --> 00:28:27,845
Speaker 2: so they could be her, but they couldn't be her

469
00:28:27,925 --> 00:28:28,405
Speaker 2: as well.

470
00:28:28,765 --> 00:28:30,805
Speaker 1: She's got long blonde hair. It's not that hard.

471
00:28:30,925 --> 00:28:35,125
Speaker 2: Yeah, And she's good at stealing other photos of Facebook pages.

472
00:28:35,165 --> 00:28:38,045
Speaker 2: We've now realized, you know that she's quite good at

473
00:28:38,045 --> 00:28:40,565
Speaker 2: lifting pictures, Sharon.

474
00:28:40,645 --> 00:28:43,325
Speaker 1: This sort of marked a real shift, as you say,

475
00:28:43,485 --> 00:28:48,565
Speaker 1: you know, going from portraying herself as a victim of

476
00:28:48,645 --> 00:28:57,205
Speaker 1: abuse or sex trafficking to being a very privileged young

477
00:28:57,245 --> 00:29:00,765
Speaker 1: woman who is there to take care of other people's children.

478
00:29:00,885 --> 00:29:03,405
Speaker 1: So she's no longer pretending to be an abused child

479
00:29:04,325 --> 00:29:07,885
Speaker 1: but a privileged woman. This is like quite a big shift,

480
00:29:07,925 --> 00:29:10,005
Speaker 1: isn't it? Does it work better for her. Do you

481
00:29:10,005 --> 00:29:12,765
Speaker 1: think she just ran out of that story.

482
00:29:13,325 --> 00:29:18,245
Speaker 2: Yeah, quite possibly, because by that stage she was starting

483
00:29:18,285 --> 00:29:22,685
Speaker 2: to get a little more known, and there were fingerprints

484
00:29:22,685 --> 00:29:28,285
Speaker 2: on file and maybe, you know, all of her stories

485
00:29:28,325 --> 00:29:32,525
Speaker 2: are around being childlike. Maybe this was just another sort

486
00:29:32,525 --> 00:29:37,245
Speaker 2: of step in the progression. Maybe at times she thought

487
00:29:37,285 --> 00:29:40,005
Speaker 2: it was a bit harder to pretend that she was

488
00:29:40,045 --> 00:29:43,485
Speaker 2: thirteen or fourteen. But I'm not so sure about that,

489
00:29:43,525 --> 00:29:46,005
Speaker 2: because she then came back to Sydney later on and

490
00:29:46,325 --> 00:29:49,645
Speaker 2: pretended to be a fifteen year old, so she still

491
00:29:49,685 --> 00:29:53,045
Speaker 2: gets away with that. I've seen Samantha. She's very young looking.

492
00:29:53,525 --> 00:29:57,165
Speaker 2: You know, you can look at her and feel incredible

493
00:29:57,285 --> 00:30:00,885
Speaker 2: empathy for her. You can feel like she's very young.

494
00:30:01,325 --> 00:30:04,325
Speaker 2: She certainly doesn't look thirty three or thirty four, which

495
00:30:04,325 --> 00:30:08,285
Speaker 2: she is now. She's very thin, she looks at times

496
00:30:08,445 --> 00:30:12,645
Speaker 2: very very distress. It's very easy to kind of get

497
00:30:12,725 --> 00:30:16,765
Speaker 2: drawn into that. But I do think that there was

498
00:30:16,805 --> 00:30:20,605
Speaker 2: something about with the or pairing. There is something about

499
00:30:20,645 --> 00:30:24,125
Speaker 2: the fact that she was becoming more known, so she's

500
00:30:24,165 --> 00:30:26,245
Speaker 2: got to sort of vary the story a little bit.

501
00:30:27,205 --> 00:30:30,005
Speaker 1: And as an O pair, you live in with a family.

502
00:30:30,125 --> 00:30:32,645
Speaker 2: Usually again you're a bit more of a focus.

503
00:30:32,965 --> 00:30:35,845
Speaker 1: Yeah, you take care of the children, but you're also

504
00:30:36,365 --> 00:30:38,805
Speaker 1: a little bit of a child yourself, you know, in

505
00:30:38,925 --> 00:30:41,885
Speaker 1: terms of you get your meals made and you get

506
00:30:41,925 --> 00:30:45,805
Speaker 1: to live as part of the family. Yeah, in exchange

507
00:30:45,845 --> 00:30:48,245
Speaker 1: for you know, doing some late housework off of looking

508
00:30:48,285 --> 00:30:52,525
Speaker 1: after the children. So she lived with the Jervis's. They

509
00:30:52,565 --> 00:30:54,685
Speaker 1: were happy for six months. Why did she leave?

510
00:30:55,285 --> 00:30:58,685
Speaker 2: Oh, she didn't leave. They had to move to Melbourne.

511
00:30:59,125 --> 00:31:02,285
Speaker 2: And so what they said was they wanted to take

512
00:31:02,325 --> 00:31:06,005
Speaker 2: her to Melbourne with them, and so she moved to

513
00:31:06,045 --> 00:31:09,965
Speaker 2: Melbourne with them, and she was all pair for them.

514
00:31:10,005 --> 00:31:12,725
Speaker 2: But then a few things started to happen in the

515
00:31:12,845 --> 00:31:17,965
Speaker 2: Jarvis family that made Jazzy Jarvis a bit concerned about

516
00:31:18,005 --> 00:31:23,045
Speaker 2: who this young woman was and what she might be

517
00:31:23,085 --> 00:31:28,565
Speaker 2: presenting herself as. In Melbourne, people rang Jazzy and said

518
00:31:28,565 --> 00:31:33,125
Speaker 2: that they'd seen a woman with their child who wanted

519
00:31:33,245 --> 00:31:36,005
Speaker 2: free things and had said that she was married to

520
00:31:36,005 --> 00:31:42,525
Speaker 2: Tom Jarvis. And when they confronted Samantha about it, and

521
00:31:42,565 --> 00:31:46,205
Speaker 2: again Samantha was amusing her name. She was harper Hermandez.

522
00:31:46,725 --> 00:31:50,245
Speaker 2: When they confronted her about it, she had some sort

523
00:31:50,285 --> 00:31:54,325
Speaker 2: of fantastic story, but it didn't kind of ring true,

524
00:31:54,965 --> 00:31:58,525
Speaker 2: and there were a series of incidents like that that

525
00:31:59,165 --> 00:32:03,525
Speaker 2: started to make Jazzy Jarvis particularly a little bit unsure

526
00:32:03,565 --> 00:32:07,205
Speaker 2: about who this young woman was in their home. The

527
00:32:07,245 --> 00:32:10,965
Speaker 2: worst thing that happened, though, was that while she was

528
00:32:11,005 --> 00:32:15,125
Speaker 2: actually living with the Jarvises, she was also running a

529
00:32:15,165 --> 00:32:18,965
Speaker 2: couple of other scams that they knew nothing about. So

530
00:32:19,005 --> 00:32:22,285
Speaker 2: she would have holidays where she'd go and see her family,

531
00:32:23,085 --> 00:32:26,485
Speaker 2: but what she was actually doing while she was supposedly

532
00:32:26,565 --> 00:32:29,645
Speaker 2: going to see her family was running these other scams.

533
00:32:30,405 --> 00:32:34,605
Speaker 2: So she had put a couple of ads up as

534
00:32:34,685 --> 00:32:38,845
Speaker 2: a talent scout saying that she was looking for young

535
00:32:38,965 --> 00:32:46,685
Speaker 2: teenage girls to appear in animations, and a couple of

536
00:32:46,725 --> 00:32:50,685
Speaker 2: young girls answered those ads. One was a girl in

537
00:32:50,725 --> 00:32:54,765
Speaker 2: Sydney and another girl was a young girl in Melbourne,

538
00:32:55,005 --> 00:33:00,085
Speaker 2: and she was meeting with those girls at separate times.

539
00:33:00,085 --> 00:33:03,045
Speaker 2: This was a few months apart. She was a different

540
00:33:03,165 --> 00:33:06,205
Speaker 2: name for each of those girls, and she worked for

541
00:33:06,325 --> 00:33:11,245
Speaker 2: a different international talent agency. But she was meeting those

542
00:33:11,245 --> 00:33:15,005
Speaker 2: girls and getting them to perform these kind of very

543
00:33:15,045 --> 00:33:20,765
Speaker 2: bizarre tasks under the guise of auditions. So she would

544
00:33:20,845 --> 00:33:24,445
Speaker 2: get them to go into say a Center Link office

545
00:33:24,605 --> 00:33:28,205
Speaker 2: and say that they'd been sex trafficked. She'd paint bruises

546
00:33:28,245 --> 00:33:32,005
Speaker 2: on their faces. There were all sorts of strange things

547
00:33:32,045 --> 00:33:34,885
Speaker 2: that she was getting them to do. She went by

548
00:33:34,885 --> 00:33:36,685
Speaker 2: the name Maali to us.

549
00:33:37,245 --> 00:33:40,125
Speaker 5: She made me pretend that I had been going through

550
00:33:40,565 --> 00:33:45,645
Speaker 5: like really bad mental health problems and that I needed

551
00:33:45,645 --> 00:33:50,605
Speaker 5: to see a social worker, and she pretended to be

552
00:33:50,725 --> 00:33:54,525
Speaker 5: my mom. So it was a bit like scary when

553
00:33:54,525 --> 00:33:56,525
Speaker 5: I found out that I wasn't allowed to tell anybody

554
00:33:56,565 --> 00:33:58,685
Speaker 5: about it. I was a little bit weirded out and

555
00:33:58,845 --> 00:34:00,725
Speaker 5: ordered to tell my parents, but I wasn't allowed.

556
00:34:01,285 --> 00:34:04,645
Speaker 1: So it's almost like a form of moonshousens and munshausens

557
00:34:04,645 --> 00:34:05,325
Speaker 1: by proxy.

558
00:34:05,765 --> 00:34:08,205
Speaker 2: Yeah, very strange where.

559
00:34:08,405 --> 00:34:12,525
Speaker 1: For attention you you fabricate. Usually it's a physical illness,

560
00:34:12,805 --> 00:34:17,125
Speaker 1: but in this case it's almost a victimhood that she fabricates,

561
00:34:17,205 --> 00:34:20,045
Speaker 1: either on herself and now on these other young girls.

562
00:34:20,205 --> 00:34:23,045
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, very similar stories getting these young girls to

563
00:34:23,085 --> 00:34:25,725
Speaker 2: play out, very similar stories to the ones that she

564
00:34:25,925 --> 00:34:29,645
Speaker 2: had in fact played out when she was in Dublin

565
00:34:30,045 --> 00:34:34,005
Speaker 2: and in Canada and in Queensland and in Western Australia.

566
00:34:34,765 --> 00:34:36,445
Speaker 1: And why do you think she did that? Is it

567
00:34:36,485 --> 00:34:40,805
Speaker 1: to get the attention vicariously. Again, it wasn't a financial scam.

568
00:34:40,885 --> 00:34:45,365
Speaker 2: It is vicarious attention. But maybe it's also about power.

569
00:34:46,885 --> 00:34:50,725
Speaker 2: Maybe it's also about getting some sort of enjoyment out

570
00:34:50,765 --> 00:34:54,005
Speaker 2: of the scam in a way, getting some sort of

571
00:34:55,125 --> 00:34:58,205
Speaker 2: thrill about the fact that you are able to trick people,

572
00:34:58,365 --> 00:35:01,725
Speaker 2: that you're good at it. I think there's an element

573
00:35:01,965 --> 00:35:08,485
Speaker 2: of that in Samantha that certainly as her scams have progressed.

574
00:35:08,765 --> 00:35:11,605
Speaker 2: Maybe they did start out this way, maybe they started

575
00:35:11,645 --> 00:35:15,405
Speaker 2: as something to draw attention to herself, but I think

576
00:35:16,525 --> 00:35:20,445
Speaker 2: as time has gone on, I think she does get

577
00:35:20,565 --> 00:35:25,365
Speaker 2: some sort of pleasure or sense of power out of

578
00:35:25,685 --> 00:35:26,485
Speaker 2: tricking people.

579
00:35:27,125 --> 00:35:30,125
Speaker 1: When did things escalate to the point that she was

580
00:35:30,245 --> 00:35:32,605
Speaker 1: arrested for child's dealing.

581
00:35:33,765 --> 00:35:37,005
Speaker 2: Well, what happened in Melbourne was that Jazzy Jarvis let

582
00:35:37,005 --> 00:35:39,725
Speaker 2: her goes I say, she'd had all of these sort

583
00:35:39,765 --> 00:35:43,165
Speaker 2: of things occurring that made her uncomfortable, so she let

584
00:35:43,165 --> 00:35:46,125
Speaker 2: her go as an all pair. At the same time,

585
00:35:46,165 --> 00:35:50,605
Speaker 2: she's running this talent scout scam with these young girls.

586
00:35:51,285 --> 00:35:54,005
Speaker 2: Both of those young girls, I have to say now

587
00:35:54,005 --> 00:35:57,965
Speaker 2: and did be traumatized, and so are their mothers and

588
00:35:58,045 --> 00:36:02,005
Speaker 2: their parents because they feel like their children are really

589
00:36:02,085 --> 00:36:07,365
Speaker 2: vulnerable and that they had some responsibility for that because

590
00:36:07,405 --> 00:36:10,525
Speaker 2: they were taken in by her as well, and thought

591
00:36:10,685 --> 00:36:15,005
Speaker 2: that what she was getting the kids to do were auditions.

592
00:36:15,045 --> 00:36:17,605
Speaker 2: They were sort of pretty naive. They didn't really know

593
00:36:17,685 --> 00:36:20,845
Speaker 2: how these things went. One of the families did their

594
00:36:20,965 --> 00:36:25,485
Speaker 2: due diligence and looked up this international talent agency and

595
00:36:25,565 --> 00:36:28,285
Speaker 2: there was a person with the name and blah blah blah.

596
00:36:28,325 --> 00:36:32,325
Speaker 2: So you know. Anyway, she gets dropped by the Jarvisism

597
00:36:32,605 --> 00:36:36,445
Speaker 2: or pairs, so she answers another or pair site. She's

598
00:36:36,645 --> 00:36:42,525
Speaker 2: employed by a family who are French and they've only

599
00:36:42,565 --> 00:36:47,085
Speaker 2: recently arrived in the country and she's got the care

600
00:36:47,165 --> 00:36:50,325
Speaker 2: of two young kids. I think one was one year old,

601
00:36:50,365 --> 00:36:53,485
Speaker 2: the other one was three. She's there for a couple

602
00:36:53,485 --> 00:36:56,605
Speaker 2: of weeks. Things seem to be going okay. She asked

603
00:36:56,645 --> 00:36:58,845
Speaker 2: the mom if she can take the kids on a picnic.

604
00:36:59,565 --> 00:37:03,325
Speaker 2: The mom says fine, but thinks it's a picnic just

605
00:37:03,405 --> 00:37:07,525
Speaker 2: down the road. She takes them to Bendigo, which is

606
00:37:07,565 --> 00:37:10,405
Speaker 2: a long way. She's living in a stay in Melbourne

607
00:37:10,605 --> 00:37:14,885
Speaker 2: that's two hours into a regional area. She takes these

608
00:37:15,005 --> 00:37:19,445
Speaker 2: kids to Bendigo and as I was saying before, she

609
00:37:19,565 --> 00:37:24,445
Speaker 2: sets up scams well ahead. She goes into this mental

610
00:37:24,485 --> 00:37:29,525
Speaker 2: health place in Bendigo with the kids, and she's also

611
00:37:29,565 --> 00:37:33,485
Speaker 2: got another backpacker in Toe who speaks French with the kids.

612
00:37:33,525 --> 00:37:37,765
Speaker 2: That she kind of advertised a job, some sort of

613
00:37:37,845 --> 00:37:42,405
Speaker 2: data collection job that this backpacker had answered. So she's

614
00:37:42,405 --> 00:37:44,845
Speaker 2: got her in Toe as well, who doesn't know that

615
00:37:44,925 --> 00:37:49,445
Speaker 2: she's involved in this big scam. She's been sexually abused

616
00:37:49,645 --> 00:37:53,805
Speaker 2: again by a relative and these kids a result of that,

617
00:37:55,365 --> 00:37:59,005
Speaker 2: and the woman behind the counter recognizes it and calls

618
00:37:59,005 --> 00:38:03,005
Speaker 2: the police. As I say, she'd set this scam up

619
00:38:03,005 --> 00:38:07,485
Speaker 2: well ahead. She'd had three months of contact with this

620
00:38:08,445 --> 00:38:13,485
Speaker 2: used mental health service in Bendigo before she actually walked

621
00:38:13,485 --> 00:38:17,565
Speaker 2: in there and did this, So this was planned. It

622
00:38:17,605 --> 00:38:18,765
Speaker 2: was all pre planned.

623
00:38:19,765 --> 00:38:22,605
Speaker 1: And Sharon, is that the CCTV footage I've seen of

624
00:38:22,645 --> 00:38:26,525
Speaker 1: her in a school uniform carrying a baby?

625
00:38:26,885 --> 00:38:29,885
Speaker 2: Yep, she had a school uniform which she also bought

626
00:38:29,965 --> 00:38:31,965
Speaker 2: online some months earlier.

627
00:38:32,485 --> 00:38:35,205
Speaker 1: Because that's deeply unsettling. I mean, she does look like

628
00:38:35,245 --> 00:38:39,485
Speaker 1: a schoolgirl and she's got this toddler toddling behind her,

629
00:38:39,645 --> 00:38:42,405
Speaker 1: she's got a baby on her hip. It's like a

630
00:38:42,405 --> 00:38:46,165
Speaker 1: private schoolgirl uniform. She's sort of got this hat and

631
00:38:47,125 --> 00:38:49,405
Speaker 1: I think she claimed that she was pregnant at the time.

632
00:38:50,165 --> 00:38:52,565
Speaker 1: This is a woman who's at this stage in what

633
00:38:52,605 --> 00:38:54,005
Speaker 1: her late twenties, early.

634
00:38:53,845 --> 00:38:56,685
Speaker 2: Thirties, yeah, early thirties.

635
00:38:56,685 --> 00:38:58,725
Speaker 1: And so the police came, she was arrested.

636
00:38:59,045 --> 00:39:02,165
Speaker 2: Well, no, what happened was she figured out that something

637
00:39:02,325 --> 00:39:06,005
Speaker 2: was up, so she actually took off, went into a

638
00:39:06,125 --> 00:39:09,445
Speaker 2: local shopping center and tried to kind of disappear, but

639
00:39:09,645 --> 00:39:13,245
Speaker 2: a police found her and was following her and actually

640
00:39:13,285 --> 00:39:18,525
Speaker 2: called out Samantha, and she turned around, and so they

641
00:39:18,605 --> 00:39:23,365
Speaker 2: arrested her. But the other disturbing thing about this is

642
00:39:23,765 --> 00:39:28,405
Speaker 2: when she was arrested, she totally maintained her silence and

643
00:39:28,445 --> 00:39:32,445
Speaker 2: wouldn't tell them who the children belonged to. So it

644
00:39:32,525 --> 00:39:35,085
Speaker 2: was only by sort of getting a hold of her

645
00:39:35,205 --> 00:39:39,925
Speaker 2: phone and getting into the details of her phone that

646
00:39:39,965 --> 00:39:42,685
Speaker 2: they actually figured out who the kids belonged to. So

647
00:39:42,765 --> 00:39:45,285
Speaker 2: there was a period of a couple of hours, even

648
00:39:45,485 --> 00:39:49,085
Speaker 2: after she had been arrested, where the police could not

649
00:39:49,205 --> 00:39:52,725
Speaker 2: identify who the parents were. Oh my god, Now those

650
00:39:52,765 --> 00:39:56,405
Speaker 2: parents are like totally traumatized, as you would be. The

651
00:39:56,405 --> 00:40:00,485
Speaker 2: mother of those kids no longer trusts anyone to mind

652
00:40:00,525 --> 00:40:05,885
Speaker 2: her children that has had a huge financial aside from

653
00:40:05,885 --> 00:40:09,565
Speaker 2: the psychological impact that it's had on that family, a

654
00:40:09,685 --> 00:40:12,925
Speaker 2: huge financial impact on the family because the mum was

655
00:40:12,925 --> 00:40:16,485
Speaker 2: a working mum and she doesn't want to do that

656
00:40:16,605 --> 00:40:19,165
Speaker 2: anymore because she doesn't know who to trust.

657
00:40:19,765 --> 00:40:22,525
Speaker 10: She has that charisma of getting people to trust her

658
00:40:22,605 --> 00:40:26,045
Speaker 10: straight away, and that's an art form, and she's getting

659
00:40:26,045 --> 00:40:29,485
Speaker 10: people to invest in her, invest their time, invest their heart,

660
00:40:29,805 --> 00:40:33,725
Speaker 10: invest their care in her. I'm not suppanted she betrays

661
00:40:33,725 --> 00:40:34,085
Speaker 10: all of that.

662
00:40:34,685 --> 00:40:37,565
Speaker 1: What I really got from your podcast and from this

663
00:40:37,685 --> 00:40:41,925
Speaker 1: story was it's easy to say it's a victimless crime

664
00:40:42,365 --> 00:40:47,805
Speaker 1: because no one is physically harmed. There's no actual physical

665
00:40:47,845 --> 00:40:51,805
Speaker 1: abuse in most cases, there's no large amounts of money stolen.

666
00:40:52,565 --> 00:40:56,485
Speaker 1: It's all really playing with people's trust and people's emotions.

667
00:40:57,765 --> 00:41:00,925
Speaker 1: And in talking to some of these people, what did

668
00:41:00,965 --> 00:41:03,965
Speaker 1: you discover that the legacy was because by now we're

669
00:41:04,005 --> 00:41:07,965
Speaker 1: talking about she'd been involved in over one hundred scams,

670
00:41:08,245 --> 00:41:10,525
Speaker 1: or she'd been charged over a hundred times by now,

671
00:41:10,565 --> 00:41:10,885
Speaker 1: hadn't you.

672
00:41:11,725 --> 00:41:16,485
Speaker 2: Yeah, these are not victimless crimes. In some ways, these

673
00:41:16,525 --> 00:41:19,965
Speaker 2: crimes are tougher than if she had a stolen money

674
00:41:20,605 --> 00:41:25,205
Speaker 2: or you know, identity documents. These are crimes that play

675
00:41:25,245 --> 00:41:30,525
Speaker 2: with your head. These are crimes that make you wonder

676
00:41:30,605 --> 00:41:33,925
Speaker 2: who you can trust, who you can let into your life,

677
00:41:34,685 --> 00:41:38,045
Speaker 2: make you question your own judgment about everything you know,

678
00:41:38,725 --> 00:41:42,645
Speaker 2: and particularly with the kids and your pair stuff. They

679
00:41:42,805 --> 00:41:47,005
Speaker 2: make you really question how you are as a parent.

680
00:41:47,725 --> 00:41:50,125
Speaker 1: Like, how could I have left my children?

681
00:41:50,285 --> 00:41:52,565
Speaker 2: How could I have put my kids in this sort

682
00:41:52,565 --> 00:41:55,645
Speaker 2: of danger? What kind of parent am I? Am I

683
00:41:55,685 --> 00:41:58,525
Speaker 2: actually fit to be a parent? I don't know whether

684
00:41:58,565 --> 00:41:59,525
Speaker 2: you ever get over them.

685
00:42:00,405 --> 00:42:04,085
Speaker 1: Every time she was in front of a judge, what

686
00:42:04,325 --> 00:42:09,085
Speaker 1: did the judges do? Because often the actual things she

687
00:42:09,165 --> 00:42:15,085
Speaker 1: was charged with were not serious enough for a custodial sentence,

688
00:42:15,285 --> 00:42:19,365
Speaker 1: or certainly not a long custodial sentence, and yet she's

689
00:42:19,405 --> 00:42:20,685
Speaker 1: a menace to society.

690
00:42:21,765 --> 00:42:25,205
Speaker 2: Well, the judges are really concerned because they've got a

691
00:42:25,245 --> 00:42:30,245
Speaker 2: young woman in front of them who has done these

692
00:42:30,325 --> 00:42:34,125
Speaker 2: same sorts of things over and over again. Some of

693
00:42:34,165 --> 00:42:36,565
Speaker 2: the judges have been very angry about the fact that

694
00:42:36,605 --> 00:42:41,125
Speaker 2: she continues to offend and have actually given her custodial sentences,

695
00:42:41,445 --> 00:42:46,485
Speaker 2: But they're also sort of weighing up often the fact

696
00:42:46,565 --> 00:42:51,365
Speaker 2: that she clearly has a background where she has had

697
00:42:52,005 --> 00:42:56,325
Speaker 2: problems in her background, possible sexual abuse in her background,

698
00:42:57,125 --> 00:42:59,845
Speaker 2: certainly mental health problems in her background.

699
00:43:00,085 --> 00:43:02,805
Speaker 1: Is that what her defense is each time she's charged,

700
00:43:02,805 --> 00:43:05,245
Speaker 1: because she has to table a defense. What is her defense?

701
00:43:05,685 --> 00:43:07,805
Speaker 2: Well, it's not her defense because she never speaks in

702
00:43:07,885 --> 00:43:13,005
Speaker 2: courtner She's always represented by a lawyer. When she appears

703
00:43:13,005 --> 00:43:15,525
Speaker 2: in court, she rarely says a word. It's the same

704
00:43:15,565 --> 00:43:19,565
Speaker 2: sort of approach that she has to police when she's arrested.

705
00:43:20,125 --> 00:43:21,445
Speaker 2: She rarely says anything.

706
00:43:21,885 --> 00:43:23,005
Speaker 1: Why is that do you think?

707
00:43:24,285 --> 00:43:29,445
Speaker 2: Oh, I think it's clever. Other people do all the defending.

708
00:43:29,845 --> 00:43:33,965
Speaker 2: I mean, she always pleads guilty. She doesn't plead not guilty.

709
00:43:34,205 --> 00:43:37,725
Speaker 2: There was only one time where she did that, and

710
00:43:37,805 --> 00:43:39,605
Speaker 2: she changed her plea fairly quickly.

711
00:43:39,885 --> 00:43:42,125
Speaker 1: What's the significance of that pleading guilty?

712
00:43:42,405 --> 00:43:45,325
Speaker 2: The significance is that the victims don't appear in the court.

713
00:43:45,565 --> 00:43:49,205
Speaker 2: She never has to face her victims. Sometimes there'll be

714
00:43:49,285 --> 00:43:52,645
Speaker 2: victim statements like they were in Melbourne, which is how

715
00:43:52,685 --> 00:43:57,485
Speaker 2: I know how impacted those families were. But quite often

716
00:43:57,725 --> 00:44:02,005
Speaker 2: she doesn't have to confront what she's done to these families.

717
00:44:02,685 --> 00:44:06,925
Speaker 2: And she has lawyers, they're all legally lawyers. She never

718
00:44:06,965 --> 00:44:09,285
Speaker 2: has her own lawyers, and they are always different lawyers,

719
00:44:09,685 --> 00:44:14,645
Speaker 2: but they genuinely represent their client as somebody who has

720
00:44:14,645 --> 00:44:18,525
Speaker 2: a background with mental health issues. Jail clearly is in

721
00:44:18,605 --> 00:44:21,885
Speaker 2: the deterrent. She's been in there a few times, She's

722
00:44:21,925 --> 00:44:25,125
Speaker 2: come out and pretty much offended straight away. You can

723
00:44:25,805 --> 00:44:28,205
Speaker 2: put mental health orders on her if she had to

724
00:44:28,245 --> 00:44:33,005
Speaker 2: attend psychological counseling, etc. And that was mandatory, and if

725
00:44:33,045 --> 00:44:35,405
Speaker 2: she broke that, she would be back before the court.

726
00:44:35,565 --> 00:44:38,165
Speaker 2: Or she broke that within a matter of months. And

727
00:44:38,245 --> 00:44:44,045
Speaker 2: so then the question arises, what do you do with

728
00:44:44,165 --> 00:44:45,245
Speaker 2: someone like Samantha?

729
00:44:46,245 --> 00:44:48,605
Speaker 1: So she won't seek help, she doesn't want to get better?

730
00:44:49,285 --> 00:44:53,765
Speaker 2: Yeah, does she actually understand the extent of her problem?

731
00:44:54,245 --> 00:44:58,685
Speaker 2: I think so? Why doesn't she seek help? I can't

732
00:44:58,845 --> 00:45:05,485
Speaker 2: really understand that. My feeling is it's not easy being Samantha,

733
00:45:07,805 --> 00:45:11,205
Speaker 2: and that I don't I think that that life would

734
00:45:11,205 --> 00:45:14,445
Speaker 2: be a life that you would choose, if you could

735
00:45:14,485 --> 00:45:18,525
Speaker 2: make choices. Maybe sometimes people grow out of this stuff.

736
00:45:19,645 --> 00:45:23,485
Speaker 2: But she is now close to mid thirty in.

737
00:45:23,325 --> 00:45:26,205
Speaker 1: Your research and working on this case for such a

738
00:45:26,205 --> 00:45:29,965
Speaker 1: long time on this story, does she have relationships, a

739
00:45:30,085 --> 00:45:32,885
Speaker 1: romantic relationship something that she ever seeks out?

740
00:45:33,965 --> 00:45:34,125
Speaker 2: No?

741
00:45:34,725 --> 00:45:38,245
Speaker 11: Never, she told one of her psychiatrists in her report

742
00:45:38,325 --> 00:45:42,125
Speaker 11: before the court that relationships don't mean anything to her

743
00:45:42,085 --> 00:45:46,165
Speaker 11: and that she hasn't really ever had any relationships, and

744
00:45:46,205 --> 00:45:48,445
Speaker 11: I don't think she's got a lot of friends either.

745
00:45:48,965 --> 00:45:49,845
Speaker 1: What about family.

746
00:45:50,525 --> 00:45:55,005
Speaker 2: Her family, at different times, particularly her father, has been

747
00:45:55,645 --> 00:45:59,485
Speaker 2: it seems quite supportive of her, certainly when she was

748
00:45:59,565 --> 00:46:03,245
Speaker 2: before the courts last year, when I was following her

749
00:46:03,285 --> 00:46:06,085
Speaker 2: through a trial in front of picked in court, she

750
00:46:06,165 --> 00:46:09,645
Speaker 2: was living with her father. But at various times she

751
00:46:09,805 --> 00:46:12,605
Speaker 2: has told the courts that she's estranged from her family

752
00:46:12,685 --> 00:46:14,965
Speaker 2: and doesn't really want anything to do with them. So

753
00:46:15,765 --> 00:46:18,845
Speaker 2: it's kind of really hard to know what the truth

754
00:46:18,885 --> 00:46:22,125
Speaker 2: of the family situation is. Of course, in the making

755
00:46:22,325 --> 00:46:25,205
Speaker 2: of the podcast, I reached out to a number of

756
00:46:25,205 --> 00:46:27,605
Speaker 2: family members, but none of them wanted to speak.

757
00:46:29,005 --> 00:46:31,965
Speaker 1: This wasn't the end of my conversation with Sharon. We

758
00:46:32,085 --> 00:46:35,445
Speaker 1: kept the microphones turned on for Mum and me as subscribers,

759
00:46:35,885 --> 00:46:38,725
Speaker 1: because in the next part of this interview that's available

760
00:46:38,765 --> 00:46:41,365
Speaker 1: now via the link in our show notes, we discuss

761
00:46:41,485 --> 00:46:47,245
Speaker 1: how Sharon's life became unexpectedly and really weirdly entangled with

762
00:46:47,325 --> 00:46:50,525
Speaker 1: this case and the impact that Samantha has had on

763
00:46:50,645 --> 00:46:53,085
Speaker 1: Sharon personally. Here's a taste.

764
00:46:53,765 --> 00:46:58,885
Speaker 2: So she does her research, she works out people's vulnerabilities,

765
00:46:58,885 --> 00:47:03,005
Speaker 2: she works out areas of connection. She does a lot

766
00:47:03,045 --> 00:47:06,925
Speaker 2: of research, and she's clearly with me, had done research

767
00:47:07,005 --> 00:47:09,285
Speaker 2: on me as well. So you know, when you get

768
00:47:09,485 --> 00:47:13,005
Speaker 2: call from someone who's saying they've got documents you need

769
00:47:13,045 --> 00:47:18,525
Speaker 2: to see about international corruption, and you've got experience and

770
00:47:18,885 --> 00:47:22,405
Speaker 2: a profile as an investigative journalist that does those kinds

771
00:47:22,445 --> 00:47:25,205
Speaker 2: of stories, well you're going to buy it. I'm an idea.

772
00:47:26,165 --> 00:47:28,405
Speaker 1: Remember, you can listen right now by clicking on the

773
00:47:28,485 --> 00:47:31,525
Speaker 1: link in the show notes. This episode was produced by

774
00:47:31,565 --> 00:47:34,725
Speaker 1: Cassie Merrett and Emmeline Gazillis. The executive producer of No

775
00:47:34,805 --> 00:47:38,405
Speaker 1: Filter is Eliza Ratliff, with sound production by Madeline Joanna.

776
00:47:38,965 --> 00:47:41,605
Speaker 1: I'm mea Friedman and thank you for having me in

777
00:47:41,645 --> 00:47:49,885
Speaker 1: your ears. I told you that story was incredible and

778
00:47:50,445 --> 00:47:53,645
Speaker 1: here are a couple of updates. Not long after this

779
00:47:53,725 --> 00:47:57,165
Speaker 1: interview was recorded, Samantha was actually released from jail and

780
00:47:57,325 --> 00:48:00,365
Speaker 1: was immediately back to her old tricks. One of the

781
00:48:00,365 --> 00:48:03,685
Speaker 1: first things she did was to reach out to our

782
00:48:03,845 --> 00:48:06,965
Speaker 1: editorial team here at Mamma Mia under a fake name.

783
00:48:07,245 --> 00:48:11,205
Speaker 1: We believe it was her, and claiming that she had

784
00:48:11,685 --> 00:48:16,245
Speaker 1: new information about Samantha and it was not what everybody thought,

785
00:48:16,325 --> 00:48:19,685
Speaker 1: and it was so clearly her. Anyway, we engage with

786
00:48:19,725 --> 00:48:21,365
Speaker 1: her for a little while and then she sort of

787
00:48:21,965 --> 00:48:25,485
Speaker 1: disappeared again. But she's been in the news this last

788
00:48:25,565 --> 00:48:29,285
Speaker 1: couple of weeks because the serial scam artist, who is

789
00:48:29,325 --> 00:48:33,085
Speaker 1: now thirty five years old, she's been busted again. Despite

790
00:48:33,365 --> 00:48:38,045
Speaker 1: these multiple jail terms, the deportations, and the long list

791
00:48:38,165 --> 00:48:40,845
Speaker 1: of victims, some of which you just heard about then,

792
00:48:41,085 --> 00:48:44,245
Speaker 1: many of whom have probably never come forward because they're

793
00:48:44,285 --> 00:48:48,805
Speaker 1: too traumatized or too embarrassed. Yet again, Samantha as a

794
00:48:48,845 --> 00:48:51,525
Speaker 1: party has been caught out in an elaborate fairy tale

795
00:48:52,005 --> 00:48:55,045
Speaker 1: of her own making. Except it wasn't a fairy tale,

796
00:48:55,045 --> 00:48:57,645
Speaker 1: it was actually a nightmare. So just a few weeks

797
00:48:57,645 --> 00:49:01,645
Speaker 1: after she was discussed on No Filter, Samantha, apart from

798
00:49:01,805 --> 00:49:04,525
Speaker 1: reaching out to us, we think she did reach out

799
00:49:04,805 --> 00:49:09,125
Speaker 1: to family violence support services in Melbourne Southeast and Northern

800
00:49:09,165 --> 00:49:12,165
Speaker 1: s Burbs, claiming to be a seventeen year old victim

801
00:49:12,565 --> 00:49:16,765
Speaker 1: of domestic violence at the hands of her abusive stepfather.

802
00:49:17,645 --> 00:49:20,085
Speaker 1: Now she said she was from Belgium and that she

803
00:49:20,165 --> 00:49:24,725
Speaker 1: needed housing and transport and clothing and the services because

804
00:49:24,725 --> 00:49:27,805
Speaker 1: this is what they do legitimate victims. They jumped in

805
00:49:27,845 --> 00:49:32,365
Speaker 1: to support her. They gave her gift cards, public transport cards,

806
00:49:32,765 --> 00:49:36,805
Speaker 1: and other financial and physical support to the tune of

807
00:49:36,845 --> 00:49:42,125
Speaker 1: twenty thousand dollars. She then faked a pregnancy test, explaining

808
00:49:42,205 --> 00:49:46,005
Speaker 1: to the workers in broken English because she was from Belgium. Remember,

809
00:49:46,765 --> 00:49:48,885
Speaker 1: she told them that she was also the victim of

810
00:49:49,005 --> 00:49:52,325
Speaker 1: sex trafficking. And this would actually turn out to be

811
00:49:52,365 --> 00:49:54,925
Speaker 1: the combination of several other scams that she had on

812
00:49:54,925 --> 00:49:58,005
Speaker 1: the go at the same time. Because while she was

813
00:49:58,005 --> 00:50:03,325
Speaker 1: faking her life to these incredible support services, who honestly

814
00:50:03,725 --> 00:50:07,965
Speaker 1: it's just shocking that they were taken advantage of, she

815
00:50:08,085 --> 00:50:12,085
Speaker 1: was not just pretending to be a Belgian sex trafficking victim.

816
00:50:12,445 --> 00:50:15,565
Speaker 1: She was also posing as an eighteen year old Norwegian

817
00:50:15,605 --> 00:50:20,565
Speaker 1: backpacker called Asta Hansen. And it was as Asta in

818
00:50:20,645 --> 00:50:25,165
Speaker 1: this persona that she made up. She convinced an unnamed

819
00:50:25,285 --> 00:50:28,845
Speaker 1: Danish backpacker, a young woman, that she was working for

820
00:50:29,125 --> 00:50:32,565
Speaker 1: the Hollywood Studio Village road Show and that she was

821
00:50:32,605 --> 00:50:36,085
Speaker 1: being paid to record her travel diaries, and she would

822
00:50:36,205 --> 00:50:39,445
Speaker 1: use yet another alias to pose as an employee from

823
00:50:39,445 --> 00:50:42,205
Speaker 1: that company to convince the backpacker to join her on

824
00:50:42,245 --> 00:50:44,725
Speaker 1: the road. This is how she does it. She creates

825
00:50:44,765 --> 00:50:48,245
Speaker 1: these webs and all of these different personas to back

826
00:50:48,325 --> 00:50:52,005
Speaker 1: up the stories that she's invented. So she made the

827
00:50:52,085 --> 00:50:54,925
Speaker 1: Danish woman sign a non disclosure form and as a

828
00:50:54,925 --> 00:50:59,805
Speaker 1: condition of her employment of this Danish woman, she told

829
00:50:59,805 --> 00:51:02,485
Speaker 1: her that she was required to pose as a party's

830
00:51:02,485 --> 00:51:05,845
Speaker 1: sister as they stayed in low budget accommodation all around

831
00:51:05,885 --> 00:51:09,725
Speaker 1: the country that was supposedly for this TV show. Now

832
00:51:09,805 --> 00:51:13,565
Speaker 1: the low budget accommodation turned out to be women's refuges, again,

833
00:51:13,805 --> 00:51:18,285
Speaker 1: taking beds and accommodation and resources from women who really

834
00:51:18,325 --> 00:51:22,885
Speaker 1: really needed it. And when the Danish backpacker became suspicious

835
00:51:22,925 --> 00:51:26,565
Speaker 1: and raised her concerns, this woman was contacted by the

836
00:51:26,645 --> 00:51:29,885
Speaker 1: village road show employee who was actually as we know

837
00:51:30,285 --> 00:51:33,005
Speaker 1: Samantha as a party who said to the backpacker, you

838
00:51:33,085 --> 00:51:37,405
Speaker 1: have to stay there to continue your employment. And it

839
00:51:37,605 --> 00:51:40,765
Speaker 1: just got more and more complicated while they traveled around Queensland.

840
00:51:41,205 --> 00:51:44,685
Speaker 1: The victim, this Danish woman, tried to get away from

841
00:51:44,685 --> 00:51:48,085
Speaker 1: her employment contract and her fake sister who was Samantha,

842
00:51:48,525 --> 00:51:51,045
Speaker 1: but Samantha told her that the police were after them

843
00:51:51,405 --> 00:51:53,925
Speaker 1: and they needed to travel to Melbourne where they would

844
00:51:54,005 --> 00:51:58,165
Speaker 1: hide again. Doesn't this all sound familiar? And that's when

845
00:51:58,845 --> 00:52:02,045
Speaker 1: the backpacker realized that her phone and her passport had

846
00:52:02,085 --> 00:52:06,285
Speaker 1: gone missing, so she was completely vulnerable. When they were

847
00:52:06,325 --> 00:52:10,125
Speaker 1: in Melbourne, Samantha created a new identity and attempted to

848
00:52:10,245 --> 00:52:14,205
Speaker 1: change her appearance, and this time she called herself Ocean

849
00:52:14,285 --> 00:52:17,445
Speaker 1: Jones and she used a credit card that she'd taken

850
00:52:17,485 --> 00:52:21,325
Speaker 1: out in another woman's name to get freckles tattooed on

851
00:52:21,405 --> 00:52:25,565
Speaker 1: her face to also her appearance. This is where in

852
00:52:25,605 --> 00:52:28,925
Speaker 1: Melbourne she contacted the Family Violent Support Services, telling them

853
00:52:28,925 --> 00:52:31,485
Speaker 1: that she and her sister were being abused, and they

854
00:52:31,605 --> 00:52:35,045
Speaker 1: put them up in this emergency housing. Now, the teams

855
00:52:35,045 --> 00:52:37,965
Speaker 1: of domestic violent staff, who are already working tirelessly to

856
00:52:38,005 --> 00:52:41,885
Speaker 1: protect women who are actually victims of family violence, then

857
00:52:41,925 --> 00:52:45,485
Speaker 1: got a phone call from police. They believed that the

858
00:52:45,525 --> 00:52:50,005
Speaker 1: girl in the care of this domestic violence refuge was

859
00:52:50,085 --> 00:52:52,605
Speaker 1: serial connard of Samantha as a party, and in fact

860
00:52:52,605 --> 00:52:55,165
Speaker 1: it was, and in court just a few weeks ago,

861
00:52:55,285 --> 00:52:59,325
Speaker 1: the magistrate could not believe the extraordinary lengths that Samantha

862
00:52:59,365 --> 00:53:02,885
Speaker 1: as a party went to to deceive the people around her,

863
00:53:03,565 --> 00:53:08,645
Speaker 1: and the magistrate said, she's organized, cunning, and a repetitive offender.

864
00:53:09,365 --> 00:53:12,645
Speaker 1: And look, this is me speaking now. She's an absolute

865
00:53:12,725 --> 00:53:15,005
Speaker 1: puzzle for the justice system to know what to do

866
00:53:15,085 --> 00:53:18,485
Speaker 1: with because on one hand, she clearly has massive mental

867
00:53:18,485 --> 00:53:22,005
Speaker 1: health issues, but on the other hand, she's able to

868
00:53:22,525 --> 00:53:30,965
Speaker 1: execute these plans where she really harms other people psychologically, financially, emotionally.

869
00:53:31,685 --> 00:53:35,365
Speaker 1: And we'll be watching this case and no doubt monitoring

870
00:53:35,405 --> 00:53:38,885
Speaker 1: our inbox for further developments, of which we will keep

871
00:53:38,965 --> 00:53:39,685
Speaker 1: you posted