[gentle music plays]
[woman shouting in market]
[gentle music continues]
Sexual servitude,
modern sl*very.
[Nick] There's debt bondage.
They've been kidnapped
in once case.
Cash, cash, cash.
She was
a very disciplined individual.
And, as we went in, we went
straight into the bedroom
where the girl was,
and there was sex taking place.
- Hi. [laughs]
- [man] How you doing?
Oh, wow.
[inspector] It is exploitation
of the individual
at their most intimate level.
[Nick] Why don't you care?
These women are being mistreated
by organised crime.
You're making money
out of these people's misery,
aren't you?
[Nick] It's not a small problem
is what you're saying.
It's not...
It's not a small problem, no.
[Nick] This is all top secret.
- They had an undercover.
- [woman] Yes.
I've been an investigative
journalist in Melbourne
for, uh, don't know,
a long time, 20 years.
Human trafficking, it's come up
again and again and again.
And what does that say
about our law enforcement,
our regulation?
I don't know how to answer that, Nick.
Just when I say,
"Put that down",
put it down. Um...
That guy totally just...
just clocked us.
Just bear with me.
Just put that camera down
for one sec.
Let me get the park.
Like, I appreciate why we need
the doco camera here,
but, the minute they see me
with this or you with that,
it's all for nothing.
You might want to put it down.
[disquieting music plays]
The last few days,
I've got two separate tip-offs
from different sources.
I can't really say
where they work
but they keep an eye
on human trafficking,
and both said the same thing.
There's this notorious brothel
that I've looked at before
in respect
of human trafficking,
sex sl*very, things like that,
and it's trafficking women again.
That's the strong intelligence.
So, to get two different people
from two different areas,
without saying
which areas they are,
maybe it's law enforcement,
maybe it's organised crime,
but separately saying,
"This brothel in Melbourne
is at the centre of
some trafficking as we speak,"
is extremely rare.
And what do I do?
What's the next step
journalistically?
As crude as it sounds,
it's to go and look
at the brothel
to see who's coming and going,
see if there's vans
pulling up with women.
If there is trafficking,
often there's red flags.
[device beeps]
Because I've looked
at trafficking
at this place before,
it's not very glamorous
but you sit in your car
and mostly you just
see blokes going to the brothel.
You sit here for hours
and hopefully you don't need
to go to the bathroom.
There's a van pulling up.
[device beeps]
[engine starts]
It's very hit and miss, obviously.
It could be the management
going to open.
Just put the camera down.
I'm just going to swing past
just to get a closer look
at this.
G'day. I'm good, thanks.
How you going?
No, I have not seen it.
Can I give you a hint today,
and sit and just work
on the piece,
then publish it Wednesday?
You know,
I'm giving you my word,
it's just me and him.
I could even do it tonight,
you know, it's just...
[Nick]
So, they're a few small clues
in all these hours of vision
which could be really important
and could link us back
to this notorious
sex trafficking syndicate
that the police tried
to shut down years ago.
And there's a numberplate
which my team has linked
to this guy called Kevin
He's a ruthless standover man.
And, it's fair to say,
I know his story
all too well.
I've written about this guy
time and time again
ten years ago.
It was him that put me
on the path,
or the investigation,
into the question of -
is human trafficking
happening in Australia?
f*ck...
Trafficking research.
It's years,
years worth of research.
I mean, been looking
at trafficking since 2009.
And these are the accounts
of South Korean women
who were working as sex workers
for a trafficking syndicate,
and they talk about Kevin.
"Kevin was the one responsible
for watching over the girls.
Kevin told me
he wished to be called...
'Laoda', big boss.
I began speaking to Kevin,
pleading with him to let me go.
He did not even show that
he heard what I was saying.
Over the two months
that I worked as a sex worker
in Melbourne against my will,
I believe that I had sex
with over 400 men.
These people
are controlling my body,
but I should have control
over the destiny of my mind,
at least."
There's heaps I can't tell you
about the leaked information
I've got from a whole range
of different sources
to protect those sources,
but the links to this syndicate
operating again at Number 39
and possibly to Kevin,
is an early breakthrough.
It's big, it's a big deal.
This is my old
human trafficking file.
Years ago,
I wrote about this young
Melbourne guy.
His name is Abraham Papo.
Fell in love
with a South Korean.
She was a sex worker.
He thought that
she'd been trafficked,
and he went to save her life.
He ran into Kevin [bleep].
There was an altercation
and, ultimately,
Kevin k*lled him,
bashed him to death.
And, from that,
everything else fell out,
the whole seedy picture.
But, you gotta understand,
back then I wasn't
investigating human trafficking.
The Kevin [bleep] story
was about a m*rder.
[4 Corners theme music plays]
[female tv host]
Abraham Papo's death
occurred against
a sordid backdrop,
the world of human trafficking,
debt bondage
and sexual servitude.
His girlfriend had been working
at this brothel.
She had rung him to say
she'd been moved to Sydney
and was being physically abused.
She had begged him to help her.
[tv host] Do you think Abraham
was going to try to save her?
Definitely.
[female tv host] Abraham Papo
walked into the brothel
to confront the owner.
Someone grabbed a tyre lever.
There was a fight,
and the 27-year-old
was bashed to death.
Abraham Papo died in his car
trying to get away.
Abraham Papo's k*ller,
known as Kevin [bleep],
a convicted criminal
and veteran of the sex trade,
who worked at the brothel,
claimed it was self-defence.
Papo's family
doesn't believe it.
He was silenced,
he was m*rder*d.
Brutally, brutally k*lled.
[Nick] Right now, we're driving
off to meet David Papo.
Now, David is the brother
of Abraham.
[David] Hey, mate.
G'day, just letting you know
we're on time.
We'll be there
three minutes early.
Oh, for f*ck's sake.
Alright, I'll start
cleaning the house.
[Nick] David, in fact,
the whole Papo family,
are obviously massively
traumatised from the k*lling.
But Kevin would never
have been charged with m*rder
if it wasn't for what I dug up
ten years ago.
That was massive at the time
but he was found not guilty.
Um...
It's our system,
you respect the system,
but there's bad sh*t
went on back then.
A man lost his life,
a woman
was probably human trafficked,
but the crooks got away with it.
It's one of the blessings
of this job.
You get to meet
really good people
and brave people.
I mean, we're asking him
to speak out
about an organised crime g*ng.
He's a bloke
who lives in the suburbs
with wife and a kid.
It's no small thing for him.
I've got the backing
of a big company behind me
to keep me safe.
So, for him to speak up
and be willing to go on camera
and confront this stuff,
that's absolutely gutsy.
- Long time no see.
- It's been a long time.
- How are you?
- Good, good.
- That's the way.
- Where should we plonk down?
Um, wherever you want to sit.
It's really up to you.
Hi!
How you going?
What a nice surprise!
[Deanna chuckles]
- I wasn't expecting you.
- Of course I'd come.
[Nick] Alright, um...
- [Deanna] So good to see you.
- [Nick] Likewise.
My journey, while there's been,
you know,
stings happening recently,
really starts
with Abraham's death.
That's the only reason
I got interested
in human trafficking.
Doing this has made me think
about Abraham a lot.
I've re-read the stories,
I've watched the 4 Corners,
and just thought about him.
Even though I never met him,
I feel like I know him.
What do you miss most about him?
Probably his laughter.
Um... yeah.
[Nick] It's alright...
You're making me
tear up now.
Grab a glass of water
or something if you need.
I'm all good. Its...
It's good to remember
but it's hard.
[Nick] Yeah, I can imagine. Um...
Someone called me,
one of Abraham's mates,
and said, "This is bullshit.
You know, he's been k*lled
but no-one's been charged."
And there's this
trafficking thing.
He had a girlfriend
and she's probably trafficked.
And putting that all together
and publishing that story
and finally getting
the coroner to say,
"No, there's something
more here".
And then the relief
of someone being...
Kevin being charged,
but then...
what's your feeling
these years later
about the fact that Kevin
got away with it all?
[David] You could see the way
the trial was panning out.
If you can't find him
100% guilty of m*rder,
then he's innocent.
And that was the massive
turning point
where I'm sitting there going,
"This guy's gonna...
he's gonna walk away."
Did you ever lock eyes
on Kevin?
I did.
What did you see in him
when you looked... looked at him?
- Nothing.
- Mm.
- No emotion, no nothing.
- Mm.
The last few weeks,
weird as my job sometimes is,
I've been sitting
outside some brothels,
the brothels that
the same syndicate run,
trying to find evidence
of human trafficking.
Let me show you something.
- Do you recognise him?
- Yeah.
Like, I was shocked.
He's running a legal,
licensed brothel.
I find it inexplicable.
Um...
I mean, for me,
it says nothing changes.
He's driving an expensive Audi.
His life goes on, and he's doing
exactly the same thing
and the state,
the powers that be
don't seem to be able
to stop it.
Don't seem to be able to
or don't want to
or not interested?
Mm.
I've got nothing wrong
with a guy going to a brothel,
but to know that
there's women out there
that aren't doing this
of their own free will is...
It's really sad.
Abraham, the night that he died,
he was...
Like, why did he care so much
about Sun-ju?
Why did he care so much
about this woman?
He was in love with her.
I mean, he'd spent his last,
you know,
two years of his life with her.
Um, you know, got her completely
out of that environment,
helping support her, you know,
teaching her English.
Still got some DVDs...
Sorta can't bring myself
to watch, but yeah. Um...
I can't tell you how much, like,
Abraham's face, that photo,
is just burnt into my brain.
Obviously, I look
a lot like him,
but a bit, obviously,
larger and fatter.
But I find it hard
to look at myself in the mirror.
Yeah.
Oh, Jesus Christ, mate.
Um...
[Nick chuckles]
That's probably why
I've let myself go a bit.
Let's have a cup of tea.
Life is [bleep] up sometimes,
isn't it?
That's the thing
about being a journalist,
you can be let
into people's lives,
not just, like, a little bit.
They let you fully
into their lives,
and they share their pain
and their suffering,
and that's...
How can you not be fired up
to push on
when that's happening?
It would be easy to be cynical.
I reported on human trafficking
in great detail
12 years ago, ten years ago.
There was big headlines.
There was promises of reform
and change.
We've got to keep the spotlight
on this.
We've got to keep telling
the public what's going on.
If we start
with the Melbourne syndicate.
The story
of the Melbourne syndicate
is pretty simple.
It's a syndicate
that's been running
for over ten years.
We know their modus operandi
is to bring in hundreds
of women,
largely from South Korea,
and they use often
debt bondage to trap them
and, to pay it off,
they have to have sex
with man after man after man.
One of the key leaders
is Mae Ja Kim.
She's the boss.
She works with a guy
called Simon Pan,
an alleged crime figure.
It's his brothel, Number 39.
And then there's Kevin [bleep],
the muscle.
The AFP do a big investigation
and, in 2014,
they finally crack Mae Ja Kim.
They don't get her
for human trafficking, though,
they get her for lesser
organised crime offences.
Still, she goes to jail
for four years.
But even while she's in jail
and the word
in the underworld
is that she's still running
the business.
The information we have today
is the syndicate
is still running,
and running red hot.
The AFP
has agreed to give me access
to some of the investigators
to get the inside story
as to how they took on
the syndicate.
But, in talking to them,
you've gotta understand,
as well, they're police.
The AFP is a guarded,
secretive institution.
So, we'll see what we get.
[clapperboard snaps]
[man] Nick's camera.
[clapperboard snaps]
We'd heard things
about a syndicate
that, you know, was bringing in
Korean women.
And we'd heard things
about Mae Ja Kim.
We wanted to find out
who she was,
and that's when we realised
it was really difficult
to find out who she was
and where she was.
No credit cards. I don't think
she had any bank accounts.
She had no property in her name.
Cash, cash, cash.
She was
a very disciplined individual.
At the time,
she had ten managers
and each of those
basically had ten women,
so she had 100 sex workers
working for her
at any given time.
She needs Korean sex workers
because the demand in Melbourne
at the time was for Korean.
She had a couple of facilitators
in South Korea.
Anyone that was working
in the sex industry there,
they'd find out
if they had a debt
and then they'd offer them
a trip to Australia
to pay off their debt.
[James] They would be charged
exorbitant amounts
for the flight to come out.
[camera clicks]
For transport to and from
the brothels.
[camera clicks]
If they fail to turn up
to work, they would be fined.
[camera clicks]
Botox and hair and clothing
would probably
be about $10,000 worth.
And this would all be added
onto their debt,
and it would just
compound and compound.
There was one
particular individual
who let us know
that her original debt
of somewhere
around $40,000
ended up being in the vicinity
of $80,000,
and this is all cash money.
[Danielle] I remember
being really shocked.
You walk into the back rooms
and, you know, the girls are all
sitting there and along the wall
is Listerine and antibiotics.
When people
are turning clients over
eight, 12, 15 a night,
that does a lot of damage,
and it's really hard to fathom
that any individual
could do this to someone
over and over and over again
'cause it's a commodity
that keeps giving.
You know,
it's an endless resource.
[James] It is exploitation
of the individual
at their most intimate level.
[Nick] Of this 100 women,
how many of them would
have faced fear, coercion,
debt bondage, intimidation?
[Danielle] I think
pretty much all of them.
We're talking about no choice,
no control,
no safety and no way
of getting out.
[James] The nature
of the business model
that she had
was that people would be able
to work their way up
in the syndicate,
and then control people themselves,
and make profit
from exploiting those
that were themselves
having been exploited.
There's a phone call
that is quite significant for us
in the investigation,
which we refer to as
the 10-year phone call
where Mae Ja
is berating her sister
about how bad things are going,
and that these are
the worst figures that we've had
in ten years,
this particular week.
And that week,
Mae Ja made $82,500.
This is a tape record
of the interview between
Detective Leading Senior
Constable James Cheshire
and Mae Ja Kim.
We believe that you have
organised for females
from Korea...
[translator speaks
foreign language]
to come to work in brothels
in Melbourne...
[translator speaks
foreign language]
that you control
who works at which brothel
and when they work.
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator]
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator speaks
foreign language]
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator]
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator]
[translator]
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator]
Hannah, I spoke before
about the fact
that we've intercepted
a large number of...
Sorry, we've intercepted
a number of phone calls
about the operations
of what we will allege in court
is your syndicate.
[translator speaks
foreign language]
[James] We decided that
we would put the 10-year
phone call to her,
and we started
playing that call.
[phone ringing]
[women speaking
foreign language on phone]
[James] It was less than
about 30 seconds in
before she asked me
to stop playing it
and asked for the interview
to be ended.
[women speaking
foreign language on phone]
What would you like to tell me,
Hannah?
[translator speaks
foreign language]
[translator]
You want to tell me, "No"?
[Mae Ja speaks foreign language]
[translator]
[James] It was a moment there
where it was clear
between her and I
that she knew that we had her.
[Nick] What do these photos
show?
So, these are photos taken
from the commencement
of the warrants within
Mae Ja Kim's apartment
on Southbank.
[James] We knew that Mae Ja
was quite the big spender
at high-end boutiques.
One wall, a dressing table there
full of designer label perfumes.
[Danielle]
And that's a wall of shoes.
And when you look at those,
I mean,
you're talking about shoes
that are, you know,
$500 a pair and up.
[Nick] It's insane.
[James] Several hundred
thousand dollars worth of bags.
[Danielle] Easily.
[Nick] It's actually
quite a striking image.
Each bag is the exploitation
of many dozens of women.
[Nick] What does that say
about her psychology? Is it...?
Are we looking
at the former sex worker
turned manager turned big boss, saying,
"I've made it,
I've left the past behind,
I'm now in charge"?
Greed and power, I think,
being known.
There's something
really striking
about seeing ordinary names here.
Like, it's a reminder
these are people.
Jessica, Nadia, Jay, Sasha, Eva.
- [James] And young people.
- Young people, yeah.
How soon after Mae Ja Kim
left jail did the intel start
trickling in that she might be
back up to her old ways?
Very quickly.
[Nick] How many times
have you made this trip
on the trail of Mae Ja Kim
and that crime syndicate?
[James] Countless.
There's 39 there. Does that
bring back memories?
Mm.
This is certainly
open and running.
Absolutely.
[James] You know, it's crime
hiding in plain sight.
You don't actually
see the impact.
You know, if you drive along
one of these streets
and see a shop
with a broken window,
you see that there's crime
going on there
or you see ambulances
and police cars parked
at someone who's been beaten up.
You can actually see that.
But, you know,
behind closed doors
in a brothel,
what's actually going on?
You said before
you'd like to think that
there wasn't still the same
tale of misery happening
behind the four walls of 39,
yet you suspect it probably is.
Is that just
the cynical detective in you
or is that just,
that's organised crime?
I'd like to think it wasn't
just the cynical detective.
But I think, if you have a look
at what's been going on,
you have a look at the people
that are still
around the environment,
that it seems more than likely
that that's still occurring.
So, we're gonna meet
our undercover,
our potential undercover.
This is our first time
we're gonna have a chat
with this guy,
and see if he's prepared to go
and start helping us explore
this Asian underground
sex industry
and the organised criminals
behind it.
[Nick] The idea is we send you
to target the sites
where we think
this is happening,
ask, "Can I have a service?"
See how far you go.
So, will you be comfortable
doing that, number one?
Do you have a feel
for Chinese organised crime?
Like, are you quick
on your feet?
Are you good to...
If something hairy jumps up,
do you feel comfortable
about dealing with it?
'Cause one real basic thing
is we can't have you having sex
with anybody.
Nah, nah.
- Let's put that on the table.
- Yeah.
So, how do you then...? How do
you talk your way out of that?
Is it, "I've got a sore back,
I'm impotent,
I just want to talk,
I'm just lonely"?
And, I guess,
one thing to think about,
if we are successful,
and maybe we don't...
maybe we're not,
but, if we are,
there's every chance that...
And we hope there's
a royal commission
into human trafficking.
All this vision, one day,
you might be called
to the stand,
I might be called to the stand.
Mindful, at every step,
we are lawful...
- Yeah, yeah.
- ethical and the rest of it.
[Nick] I mean,
it's a good test, I think.
Then we can look at the vision
you've got,
see how you are on your feet
and get a sense
of what it's gonna look like
and how you can do it.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
[James] So, this is Tope St
we're turning into now.
And then we're
a couple of blocks up.
[man] Yeah. Alright.
Is it here?
Here, you reckon?
Hey, mate.
Hey, mate. Ta.
[man] Bit cold?
- Oh yeah.
- Freezing.
Yeah.
Hello.
- Tegan.
- How you going?
Hey, how you going?
What's your name? Vicky?
I see a world
that's very hard to look into
by just going undercover
and walking into a brothel.
You know, we're only going
undercover out of desperation
because we don't have any way
of glimpsing into this world.
But, ultimately,
the heart of this story is
what is the experience
of those women
who are on the inside?
But it's bloody hard
to find anyone
who's willing to talk to us.
Why? Of course, they're scared.
You know, we've been trying
for weeks and weeks now
to get victims to talk to us,
and it's extremely difficult.
Hi, Jiyoon.
We know some of the victims are
back in Seoul or in South Korea.
Even if I succeed
in finding one,
it'd be really, really difficult
for her to come on camera and...
- Yeah, I'll try my best.
- OK.
- Nice meeting you.
- Be in touch.
See ya, take care.
I've just been given a call
from a source.
That brothel we've been
targeting, number 39,
the AFP have just raided that,
like, literally just raided it,
and it's something to do with
some women from Asia
who've come to Australia
and been taken to the brothel,
and then have fled or left there
and told the police
that they've allegedly
been coerced
or held against their will
or threatened
or something like that.
So, our undercover guys
were there 24 hours ago.
I think we've stumbled
right into the middle
of a human traffic
investigation, which is good,
it shows that our intel
is right.
So, a bit of a breakthrough.
We're just heading
to the airport now.
Our South Korean collaborator,
a female journalist, Jiyoon,
has found a victim who might
be willing to go on camera.
If we can convince her
to talk to us,
it's gonna be
exactly what we need
to keep getting to the bottom
of what's been going on.
Thanks very much.
[male announcer]
Late customers in line,
to proceed urgently...
[phone beeps]
[phone rings]
[Jiyoon] Hello?
- Hi, Jiyoon?
- Yes.
We've just arrived in Seoul,
but I've got some bad news.
OK?
I've tested positive to COVID.
- Oh, no.
- Yeah. Oh, no.
I have to go in quarantine now
for seven days.
[Jiyoon] My goodness.
Yeah. Well, I'm hoping
you can really help us out here.
Is the victim still
willing to talk to you,
and is that all
going ahead smoothly?
[Jiyoon] Oh...
Actually, I heard
that she's still...
She feels still sceptical
about media.
I'm sort of desperate.
We need your help.
I'm stuck in my hotel quarantine
with COVID in South Korea.
It's pretty tense for me here
because I'm just waiting for
news from our crew,
which has travelled down
to the safe house, to see
if this human trafficking victim
has shown up to tell her story.
This victim actually was
trafficked by the very syndicate
that we're tracking
in Melbourne, Australia.
So, to hear from her
to hear about
how vulnerable women
are treated is just vital.
[greets in Korean]
Hi!
- Hello.
- Hi.
- Nice meeting you.
- You, too.
As a reporter, it's my first
time doing a story like this.
So, for me, yeah,
it's new and difficult.
It's really important
not to approach
this kind of issue
with some kind of judgment.
These are people who experienced
very horrific situations,
so, um, I don't want
to become a reporter
who, um,
hurts their feeling again.
- [Nick] Good luck.
- Thank you.
[woman] Thank you.
- Talk to you later.
- [woman] OK.
- Hey, mate, how are ya?
- Take a seat.
[Jiyoon] How do you say it?
I kind of respected
her strongness, I guess.
In Korea, people's general
thinking about this industry
is that women go into
that industry voluntarily,
so it's... we don't have
to have pity on them.
[uplifting music plays]
- Jiyoon.
- Oh, hi, nice meeting you.
- Finally.
- Finally.
Nice to meet you, too, yeah.
Oop.
[lift door beeps]
It's, like, ten times better
than our office.
This is my... my filthy desk.
Let me show you
something before...
This might be, just,
slightly helpful.
Are we not filming?
Yeah, we just don't...
Just be careful what you say.
Oh.
We'll talk more off-camera
about that.
So, were you scared
when you were meeting him?
Not really because I was
at a coffee shop
and there were a lot of people,
so he wasn't very suspicious
about me.
And did he say
you have to go to school?
He said you don't have
to go to school.
He actually advertises
like that.
Yeah, yeah.
So, it's a total rort,
it's a scam.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
Excuse me, can I just interrupt?
I'm Nick McKenzie
from the Australian media.
We know you've been
helping women
come to Australia from Korea,
working for a sex syndicate.
They're being abused.
They're being trafficked.
Yeah, yeah, many many women.
Why do you do this?
We can talk outside,
we'll talk outside, yeah.
All these women, you bring
to Australia, you know...
You know
they're being exploited.
I am recording you. I'm asking
you some questions.
You've helped all these women
come to Australia,
working for an organised
crime syndicate.
How do you justify that?
Do you know what happens...?
Do you know what happens to the
women that you help come here?
I think I'm drawing him out.
She's ballsy.
I did think for a second he was
gonna punch me in the face.
God!
[Jiyoon laughs]
- What happened?
- Oh!
He keeps saying that he's not
involved with it anymore.
- Did he know Mae Ja Kim?
- Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
He said,
"Mimi Noona",
which means
'really close sister'.
'Noona' means
'close sister'.
As in she was his close sister?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- I'm gonna call Mae Ja Kim now.
- Oh, OK.
Ah, she's probably more likely
to talk to you, isn't she?
She'll feel more comfortable if
I talk to her in Korean, yeah.
So, I've been told, like,
from my policing sources
she's extremely dangerous...
extremely cunning, and just
be really, really careful.
[phone ringtone plays]
Mm.
- Yeah.
- No.
She's famous for changing
her number, so...
- All the time, right?
- Yeah.
So, these numbers could be dead.
[phone ringing]
- It's ringing.
- Mm.
Hello. It's Nick McKenzie.
You were wanting to talk to me?
I was the journalist yesterday.
I met...
I confronted you yesterday
with Jiyoon.
Ah, but, Doowon...
Doowon, no, no.
You know they're working
for Mae Ja Kim,
you know she's a criminal?
You know she exploits women?
Why don't you care?
These women...
These women are being mistreated
by organised crime.
Why don't you care?
No, I'm a journalist and, no, of
course, you don't have to answer
my questions, but you're the one
who wanted to talk to me.
That's... Sorry, don't get cute.
Jiyoon said you really
wanted to talk to me.
Perspectives like Doowon
is kind of problem.
Yeah.
You know, these people,
lawyers, the accountants,
the fixers,
the visa migration agents,
they're the handmaidens
of organised crime.
The gangster needs
the migration fixer,
who needs the accountant,
who needs the lawyer.
These people are,
"Oh, I'm just a guy in a suit.
I don't know where...
The girls end up in a brothel,
it's not my fault. I'm not..."
And it's like, "No, no,
you are the infrastructure
of organised crime.
Without you,
it doesn't function."
And I really hope we
get to expose them.
I hope Australian people care.
I'm scared that we'll do
all this work
and, uh, the audience
will see a blacked-out face
and they'll say,
"It's just an Asian sex worker.
Who cares?"
Demand, supply. Prostitution,
the world's oldest profession.
People have different views,
so some would and some wouldn't,
but I think, still,
it's our job to tell the story
that human trafficking is wrong
and it's more sophisticated
than you think,
and anybody can be victims.
Mm.
The same thing motivates me
that it did ten years ago,
is, ultimately, who's paying the
biggest price out of all this?
It's people.
This is real people
and they deserve
to have their rights protected.
- Nice to meet you.
- Nice to meet you.
- Shall we go grab a seat?
- Yeah, let's grab a seat.
You've been into brothels,
been a sex worker yourself.
How do we say to Johnny public,
"How do we humanise
and ensure
we care more about sex workers,
especially foreign sex workers?"
Essentially, we have
this big problem
where migrant sex workers
from Asia
are either seen, on one hand,
seen as a victim
but, on the other hand,
they're also seen as criminals.
On top of the existing
what we call whorephobia,
you have layers of kind of
racism and xenophobia
come into play.
People forget that
these are human beings,
that, regardless of what you
think of this person's choices,
they are entitled
to basic human rights.
If there is trafficking
happening in the workplace,
why are you not
looking after the workers?
Why are you not ensuring
that the workers
are receiving protection?
The response is shut it down,
get them out of here.
[Nick] Which is keeping people
who might think
they're being exploited silent.
If they go to the police,
they may not be believed
or arrested themselves
and deported.
What incentive is there
for somebody
to come forward
in that situation?
Do you think we have created
a second class of worker
in Australia?
Someone without the rights
of someone who may
have been born here?
As Australian citizens,
we are willing
to benefit off the labour
of migrant workers,
but unwilling to provide them
any rights,
and the Australian public,
Australian Government,
is complicit
in that exploitation.
Who are the crooks
in this scenario?
Well, you know,
I think that there's a...
There's a lot of crooks
in this scenario, really.
Over the road
is a massage centre in Hawthorn,
it's pretty wealthy
suburban Melbourne.
So, the story the source tells
is, basically, Mae Ja Kim
is still operating, and that's
where her operation is now.
Our source actually said
they knew that passports
had been taken away,
and they knew that women
had been assaulted
quite viciously, sometimes,
if they challenged Mae Ja Kim
about their conditions.
I'm gonna walk in
and ask to speak to her.
I'll be polite, respectful,
explain who I am,
and say, "You've never told
your story in your words.
Will you speak to me?"
I feel a little bit scared.
She's known to be dangerous.
It might sound odd
me saying that,
but she's an
organised crime figure.
To finally come
face to face with us...
It's been a long time coming.
[footsteps approach]
- Hello!
- Hi.
- My name is Nick McKenzie.
- Yes.
I'm the journalist.
I was hoping to talk to you.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Is that OK?
- Yeah.
- Yeah, can we...?
I don't want to be in a room.
Is it OK if we can
come out and sit out...?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- This is... This is my name.
- Oh, yeah.
I want to ask you about the
women coming from Korea.
You know, you're exploiting
the women coming from Korea.
Yeah, you take
the women's passports.
You exploit the sex workers
coming from Korea.
You know, the human trafficking,
you were charged
with trafficking women.
Yeah, you're Mae Ja Kim.
Remember, you went to prison.
- He's looking, looking.
- It's OK.
I want to talk to you.
Can you call me?
Yeah, OK.
We're from The Age.
You've got my name.
Can you please call me
or send me a message?
OK, thank you, thank you.
She denied being involved
in trafficking.
She started to cry at the end.
But I don't know
what to make of it. Um...
It was upsetting in some ways,
I don't know.
She put on
a very good performance.
I mean, to be honest,
I felt sorry for her.
Um, but I've been warned
that's what she does,
she's very manipulative,
master manipulator.
What we do know, though, is
she's running a massage parlour.
It looks a lot like a brothel
to me...
an ill*gal brothel, and...
Years go past
and nothing changes.
Some new sources
have come forward.
They've heard I'm looking
into human trafficking.
I've just got a call,
with a potentially
very juicy tip,
about an unknown
trafficking boss.
My gut tells me this could
open up this investigation
into a whole new direction.
[male voice slowed down,
indistinct]
So, my source has identified
one name that we should look at.
[under his breath]
Bin Jun Xie...
A really shadowy crime boss,
someone who I think
is very high up.
We think this crime boss
might be supplying the women
to syndicates
all over the country.
Investigative journalism
is not rocket science.
Sometimes, it's just a matter
of googling someone's email.
I just got a hit.
I've got an address
in Chinatown in Sydney.
Let's look.
There's an old article here,
ten years or so old
from the UK press,
saying a Bin Jun Xie,
about the same age,
is arrested in the UK
for human trafficking.
If this is the right
Bin Jun Xie, it's huge.
- Hello.
- Hi, is that Kevin?
Yes, yes.
Kevin, it's Nick McKenzie,
the journalist from Australia
who reached out on LinkedIn.
Let me send you a picture.
[tone chiming]
Is that the same Bin Jun Xie
that you arrested?
That's exactly him, yeah,
that's how I remember him, yeah.
Exactly. He's not a nice bloke.
I know we used to send
our criminals to you,
but, I mean, it's a serious
conviction he's got here.
Is he a human trafficker?
Oh, yeah, he's definitely
involved in that, yeah.
Bingo.
[clapperboard snaps]
I'd like to start
by showing you a photo.
- Do you recognise that person?
- Yeah, that's Bin Jun Xie.
Bin Jun Xie.
He's unforgettable.
Why is he unforgettable?
I sat across the table from him
for four hours interviewing him
about sex trafficking
and brothels in the UK.
[Kevin] 17 people
will be locked up for this
and at the top was Bin Jun Xie.
How would you describe
the scale of the operation?
Oh, it was enormous.
Absolutely enormous.
It was complex. We knew that
we were onto something big.
It's only when we started
to see the money come in
from different towns
that we realised, actually,
this is right
across the country.
[Kevin] Girls were coming from
China, Macau, places like that.
They were losing their passports
on the way.
They were losing
their identities,
and they were being picked up
at the airport
and taken straight
to the sex industry.
We would watch them arrive,
they would go in
and they wouldn't come out
again... ever.
They stayed naked
most of the time
or semi-naked most of the time.
They were there to perform
only one thing,
and that was all they did.
The girls were
effectively prisoners.
So, how did you actually
track down
the syndicate to here?
Yeah, this is it here.
So, downstairs
is where the punters went in,
down these steps here
onto the door down there,
and the girl was in the bedroom
up here.
Pretty grubby, very basic.
There was nothing much in there.
There was a bed, a sheet on it.
There was no real clothes
in there for the girl.
How many sites like this
were there
around the whole of the UK?
- Around the UK like this?
- Yeah.
- Hundreds.
- Yeah.
Hundreds and hundreds.
Every time they shut down
the brothel,
the girls performing
had no ID.
None of them were actually
legal here.
Not one, not one person.
These girls are not willing
and they're not willing to talk, neither.
Why were they so reluctant
to talk,
to trust British police?
If you're part
of an organised crime group,
and you're the person who brings
the organised crime group down,
you can expect the repercussions
from that.
What do you think
people like Bin Jun Xie
had over these girls
to keep them so compliant,
to keep them prisoners?
Physically,
he's nothing physically.
It's mental, I think.
Fear, I think.
Bin Jun Xie had a nickname.
He was referred to as Hammer.
As Hammer?
He was referred to as Hammer, yeah.
Hundreds of thousands
of pounds went through
Bin Jun Xie's own personal
accounts in unidentified cash.
The money you saw
was the tip of the iceberg?
Definitely, yeah, definitely.
We only know what we know.
It's the thing
that we don't know is bigger.
[Kevin] Every line
that comes out of here
is a piece of evidence
that connects Bin Jun Xie
to a brothel or to a name
or to a bank account.
There was 68,000 pages
of evidence and, as I took him
through the charts, I could see
the penny dropping on his face.
- And he knew?
- He knew I had him, he knew.
Surely, someone in Australia
should've said,
"You're not allowed here, mate,
you just got out of jail
in Britain
for human trafficking."
Yeah, I... I thought
that might be the case.
I thought Australia
was hard to get into.
Bearing in mind
that he was jailed here
for I think it was five,
maybe six years
with a condition that he was
deported back to China
upon his release,
and it seems that
he's gone straight back to China
and then straight into Australia
and started again.
It's... It's unbelievable.
What would your message be
to Australian authorities
about the need
to catch up with this guy?
If he's doing it again, then,
if you keep letting it go,
he's only gonna get bigger.
[footsteps clop]
You coming out?
So, we have a target.
Name's Bin Jun Xie.
He's a likely human trafficking
senior boss.
But we don't know whether
the Bin Jun Xie we suspect
is the trafficking boss
is the same Bin Jun Xie
as we found.
More than anything else, we need
to get a photo of the guy.
If we can match this person,
it opens up
a whole can of worms.
[tense music plays]
There's no doubt...
I've got his face frozen
on the computer.
There's no doubt
that's Bin Jun Xie.
There's fresh intelligence
we've uncovered,
which is very credible,
that shows people with a deep
involvement in organised crime,
in violence,
in human trafficking.
So, Bin Jun Xie looks like
he's running girls
all across the country
across state borders.
We're talking hundreds of girls.
We're talking
dozens of bank accounts.
We're talking dozens
of mid-level managers.
We're talking
fake mobile phones,
fake bank accounts
or bank accounts
in dummies names.
Grab a seat there.
So, since the last time
I spoke to you,
I've probably spent six weeks
building the best
intelligence picture I can
of the syndicate in Queensland,
which has actually been busted
a few times by police.
And it's fascinating because
what the syndicate is doing
is using the motels
as ill*gal brothels,
places to house the Asian women
who are working as sex workers.
What we want you to see
if we can confirm is,
are these motels
still being used
to house Asian sex workers
by the syndicate?
You've got a very few chances
to get the evidence on camera
that we need.
If the motels are all connected,
you go to two...
"Hang on, this bloke
keeps showing up at motels."
You can't pay for a sex act,
so that's going to be suspicious
in and of itself.
So, are you gonna film
as you go?
I suppose that's an option.
It's a pretty... I suppose,
pretty risky.
There we go, Zoe, age 21. Townsville.
This number is linked
to the suspected
trafficking syndicate.
We call this number now,
we want to be taken to ideally
the site of their operation,
which we think might be
the motel.
[phone ringing]
[operator voice] The person
you've called is not available.
So, they've just texted you
just now.
"Hello. My full G fee E service
is 15 minutes, $120.
60 minutes, $250.
Two times c*m.
Address is the [bleep] Motel."
Boom, motel.
Let me just call the contact.
It's Nick here.
I was wondering if any
of your people would know
if the [bleep] Motel rings
a bell linked to this syndicate.
Yeah, terrific, OK,
we'll get cracking.
Thanks so much, appreciate it.
Let's be very careful
about that, guys.
That's a human source.
Our thesis was they're running
possibly trafficked
but certainly exploited
Asian women
across all these motels
down the east coast,
they're making tens of millions
of dollars,
and the very first phone call
we've made
has directed us to a motel which
they probably own or control.
So, you guys hit the road
and good luck.
So, all we needed our undercover
to do
was to go inside the motel,
and be directed to a room,
maybe meet a girl,
maybe meet two
and then get the hell
out of there.
[knocking]
Hello.
[man] Just walking into
what was the Hume.
[knocking]
Good, I'm good.
[both laugh]
Yeah.
Um...
- Alright.
- OK.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Yeah.
Ah, Lisa.
Alright.
[Nick] It's good.
It's really useful.
No, no, I think it's perfect.
I thought it'd be a lot harder
to do
what you guys have just done.
[Nick] You seem
extremely passionate about
combatting this crime type
but why are you so passionate?
[Brad] I detest people
that make financial gain
through the suffering of others.
[clapperboard snaps]
How did your detectives stumble
across the motel syndicate?
Where did you get the first hint
that someone like this
was up and running?
So, the Major and
Organised Crimes Squad
started looking at complaints
of ill*gal prostitution
activities in North Queensland.
As a result of investigating
those complaints,
we were able to quickly
establish that there was
a much more sinister and bigger
picture behind this offending.
We had to reach the point
where we stopped
looking at the sex workers
themselves as offenders
but as victims, as pawns
in a much bigger picture
of organised crime.
These organised crime syndicates
arrange for vulnerable women
to be brought into the country.
They don't speak the language,
so they're put into a motel
in a town where they have
no contact, no support.
They stay in that room,
they live in that room,
they work out of that room
until they are moved like cattle
across the country
into different motels
to perform the same functions.
They're put in the back corner,
out of the way,
and, you know, if you were to
sit here for a period of time,
you'd see the people
coming and going.
[Nick] The money the syndicate
makes through motels like this
is then pumped into buying
fresh motels, fresh properties?
You're talking hundreds
of millions of dollars,
and that's why they've set up across...
up and down the east coast
of Queensland.
I'm really quite confident
it's all over Australia.
What you're saying is
it's a hell of a lot bigger
than has been
publicly revealed to date?
It's certainly, in my
estimation, much, much bigger.
Why isn't more being done
to stop this trade?
[sighs] That's a really
difficult question.
I think it's not an easy
piece of work.
It's an issue the community
aren't really aware of.
It's an issue that's really
difficult to investigate.
We need to target the wealth
and the profit being generated.
That's where, as investigators
or law enforcement,
I see our opportunities.
[phone chimes]
[man] Here it is.
There's full service.
Body rub, a BJ.
No natural sex, no a**l.
[Nick] Boom, the [bleep] Hotel
is one of the syndicate hotels.
Interestingly,
owned out of China.
[man] Can be there soon
if it's OK?
Room 220?
OK, just go up these stairs
here, turn left.
[knocking]
- Hello.
- Hi, hello.
Is this Level 3?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
Right place?
It's dark.
I can't see you.
Can't see you properly.
You?
Little English.
I understand you.
Me show you some more.
It depends
on what the prices are.
Yeah, is?
$150.
And what do I get for that?
I was thinking someone younger.
Yeah.
[Nick] I think people
have a misconception
that police and law enforcement
is everywhere.
But the truth is there's
extremely limited resources.
Yeah, often, they're doing
a tremendous job
with those limited resources,
but politics and other pressures
come to bear.
And I always think of
what a detective said to me.
He said there is the crime
we accept
and the crime we don't,
and the crime we accept
is the crime the police forces
say, "Well, it's too hard,"
or it's not
a political priority.
[indistinct chatter]
And human trafficking, unfortunately,
is one of those crime types,
and that's because
it's too hard, too expensive,
and too difficult
to investigate.
[woman] You can just go there
and knock on the door.
- Hi.
- Hey. How you going?
[she laughs]
[man] Oh, wow.
[phone ringing]
[phone ringing]
Hello, Bin Jun Xie.
My name is Nick McKenzie.
I'm an Australian journalist,
and I'm calling you
about your business.
Your business running Asian
sex workers across Australia.
Your business running Asian
sex workers across Australia.
And I want to ask you...
You got into Australia,
even though you went to jail
in the United Kingdom
for running a big network
of underground sex
linked to human trafficking.
Did you tell the Australians
that you'd been to jail?
No, no, is this Bin Jun Xie?
What's your name?
What's your name?
[phone beeps]
That was Bin Jun Xie.
And he's probably absolutely
packing himself now
because he's thinking,
"What the F?
What's just happened?"
"Binjun Xie, I need to ask you
questions about your business.
My name is Nick McKenzie,
Australian journalist.
Will you speak with me?"
The Queensland Police told us
that there were women subjected
to potential trafficking,
certainly coercive
and imposing conditions,
being moved like cattle
around the country.
Does that accord
with your knowledge?
Yes, we are hearing
those sorts of claims,
and one of the challenges
that we have from a law
enforcement perspective
is that we actually need
those victims to come forward.
In the absence of
those victims themselves
coming forward, and there's
a whole range of reasons
why they might not,
then we are largely in the dark
when it comes to
this crime type.
What do the latest stats tell us
about the incidence of human
trafficking in Australia?
So, we are really upfront
about the fact
that it is a largely
hidden crime.
We believe that trafficking
will continue,
and it'll continue to rise, so
we are seeing, you know, that,
post February when
the borders did open,
we are definitely seeing
an uptick
in trafficking into Australia.
If the incidence of
trafficking's on the rise,
if it's happening, why is
the AFP's rate of prosecution
of human traffickers so miserly?
That's a complex question.
It's...
[sighs]
Let me just
gather my thoughts.
We have to meet
a fairly high threshold,
so that we have to ensure
that our briefs of evidence
contain enough evidence to
have a successful prosecution.
So, there are some challenges in
getting enough of that evidence.
Some of it might be that we
don't actually have a victim
that's on board,
so that's a genuine challenge.
Would it concern you
if there was a trafficking boss
known to various agencies
with criminal records,
up to his old tricks, sitting
here doing the same old thing?
Yeah, we'd probably
want to know about that
and see what action
we can take as a result.
What do you say
to those Australian men
who turn a blind eye,
use services
where there's lots of
indicators of trafficking,
of misery, of exploitation?
It certainly worries us
how much appetite there is
for using these sorts of
services of exploited women.
That's problematic
for all of Australia.
What does it say about us?
[exhales]
I don't want to say that, sorry.
Yeah.
Hey, guys.
How are you?
[man] I think we're good
to go now.
How're you feeling, Nick, ready?
Standby. In three...
When I received a tip-off
about this story last year,
I couldn't believe
what I was being told.
12 months of investigating, though,
has not only confirmed it
but also established
it's much worse
than first thought.
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