The Fall of Najib and Aftermath

Audible subscribers can listen to all our episodes of sccamfluencers ad free right now Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app We'll be back soon with all new episodes of Scamlincers, but today, we're revisiting one of the wildest heists in modern history. The story of Joo, the Malaysian financier who allegedly stole four and a half billion dollars from his country's sovereign wealth fund and blew it on parties, Picasos, and Hollywood movies When When he first covered Joe a few years ago, he was already a fugitive wanted by Interpol hiding somewhere overseas while governments around the world try to claw back the stolen funds Well, he is still a fugitive, but now he wants clemency According to the Wall Street Journal, Joolo has formally asked President Trump for a pardon. The DOJ website lists a pending request for a pardon after completion of sentence filed under Joe's legal name If granted, it would wipe out all U. S. criminal charges against him even though he's never stood trial or served a single day in prison You know what? he's going to be okay Something tells me he's gonna be just fine Well, in his pardon request, Joe reportedly told U. S. authorities that he can help make deals happen. They even tried to take credit for a recent prisoner transfer between Malaysia and the US, even though Malaysian officials say Joe wasn't involved The White House said that the request isn't on their radar Trump has already pardoned other white collar criminals this term, so nothing's off the table. If anyone can get pardon, it will be Joo He's very powerful Well, meanwhile, Malaysian officials said that their investigation is still ongoing and that Joe should not be pardoned So with this brazen new chapter in mind, we're revisiting the story of Joo, the billion dollar whale who stole a fortune, vanished and is now asking the president to make it all go away Sarah, what is the nicest gift a man has ever bought you to express his romantic interest Thank you for asking. I'm gonna take you all the way back to grade five. Wow. It was Secret Santa and a guy gave me some used markers and I thought that was really sweet. He definitely had a huge crush on me. Oh, that is nice Did it work? Yeah, obviously. Oh Okay, well, I only ask because today, I have a story that made me rethink what it means to splurge on a crush It's january twenty fourteen in New York City, an Australian supermodel, Miranda Kerr is walking through midtown Manhattan With her piercing blue eyes and high cheekbones, Miranda sticks out anywhere. But tonight, she's especially striking. It's just after midnight and she's wearing a full on ball gown She's just come from a formal event, but she's now headed to a restaurant to meet a friend It's an old school Korean barbecue spot, the kind with laminated menus in the window. She scans the room and spots her friends sitting at a table with a group of other people. They just came from a long night singing karaoke, and they are feasting Miranda takes a seat next to someone she's never met before He's a Malaysian born businessman with a round face and rimless glasses He goes by the name Joolo. Miranda and Joe get to talking, and she learns that he's a multim million dollar investor in companies like EMI Music Publishing and the Park Lane Hotel She's intrigued Miranda's thirty years old and she's getting tired of photo shoots and runways She wants to make the shift into being an entrepreneur. Starting with her skincare line, Cora organics Joe seems impressed by Miranda's business savvy He keeps complimenting her, and they spark an unlikely connection. They talk all night, and the next morning, Miranda sends products from her skincare line over to Joe's apartment She's convinced that she's just met her angel investor Joe is no angel. Thisis forortune comes from a scam that takes billions of dollars from Malaysian citizens Miranda has no idea that the kind, soft spoken man sneaking his way into her life will soon be facing serious charges in multiple countries for a brazen international embezzlement scheme Whether you are exploring your fascinations or discovering new ones, Otawa has stories that will introduce you to your most fascinating self. Tap into a whole new world of heated conversations with a saucy romantasy series. Know how true the latest blockbuster movie stayed to the sci fi story it was based on, or find unexpected reveals through an exclusive trrue crime podcast However you listen, Audible keeps you fascinated so you can be just as fascinating. Select any audioobook every month, plus exclusive podcasts. pllans now start at eight doll ninety nineents Audible. be fascinated, be fascinating I'm Leon Nafok What happens when onlyly fans becomes more than just a side hustle Only fantasy is an in depth look at the world's newest professionals how the rules of human intimacy are being rewritten Listen wherever you get your podcasts, or binge all episodes of Only Fantasy, A free, onlynly on Audible. From Wondery, I'm Sachi Cole And I'm Sarah Hagy, and this is Scamluencers It. Joo presented himself as an over the top party boy, but behind the scenes, he was an economic genius who's been accused of manipulating the complex world of international banking to steal billions He used the money to buy friends and power, but ultimately he couldn't buy loyalty In its inevitable and absurd demise, Joe's scheme led to the largest asset seizure in US history, forced Leonardo DiCaprio to return an Oscar, and even brought down the Malaysian Prime Mister. I'm calling this episode Joo How to buy friends and influence people. Before he becomes buddies with Leo DiCaprio, Joe is just another awkward teenager trying to get into a nightclub It's the late nineties, and he and his wealthy boarding school buddies pushed their way to the front of the line outside Chinaway. It's one of London's hottest clubs, and the VIP lounge is always packed with celebrities, models, and footballers It's almost impossible to get in. Joe is eager to impress his friends And he's come up with a plan to get them inside One of Joe's classmates is a member of the Brunei rooyal family So Joe sent the nightclub a forged note with Letterhead from the Brunei emmbassy, asking to reserve a table When Joe shows up, it's probably not what the club was expecting. He's a short, dorky teenager the plan works, and Joe and his friends are welcomed inside the club Joe's family is well off by most standards A lot of his classmates are the sons of literal billionaires Joe's father is a mere millionaire. He made his fortune in the garment industry. always dreamed of launching his family into the billionaire class He's a relentless social climber who's been known to fly Swedish models to parties And he's been training Joe to ingratiate himself with the Uber wealthy by offering a good time show is super awkward but he still manages to make friends with the well connected Nppo babies at his London boarding school. It really does suck when you're like the millionaire and everyone else is a billionaire and you're just like so hard. I have to work so hard to get to where I am. I know. and it's like nobody appreciates it because they have a literal billion dollars After high school, Joe enrolls at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Business School He wants to learn how to be a proper businessman But Joe still doesn't have charisma and he really doesn't know how to talk to women He quickly discovers that when his social skills fall short Money can talk for him He's always been obsessed with America and its wild parties and celebrities, especially Paris Hilton He actually spends a lot of time watching her movie, House of Wax, over and over again Which annoys the hell out of his roommates Luckily for Joe, his father wires him tens of thousands of dollars just to play around and party with. He takes rich friends to Atlantic City's Trump Plaza hotel and casino to gamble He even invites his classmate, Ivanka Trump to join him, but she reportedly refuses. Over his twentieth birthday, Joe decides to go big He rents out one of Philadelphia's hottest clubs And he calls up a bunch of sororities to invite them to the party of the year People eat sushi off nearly naked models, and a Marilyn Monroe impersonator sings Happy birthday to Joe There's just one thing Party costs forty thousand dollars And Joe's already spent his dad's party with Hottie's money So Joe negotiates with the club And months later, he finally wears them down and gets away with paying just a fraction of what he owes He's learning that it's better to ask for forgiveness than for permission Joe's fellow students don't know that he's a fraud He becomes known as the Asian Great Gatsby Rumors swirl that he's a Malaysian prince and Joe doesn't deny them As graduation looms, he starts planning for how he can take his college party connections into the real world and make good on his father's investment During his last semester, Joe sets up his first company. He calls it the Winton Group. which Joe says is short for win tons of money And that's exactly what he set on doing by any means necessary After graduation, Joe returns to Malaysia, where he was born and raised He sets up an office for the Winton Group in the Patronus toowers in Kuala Lumpur. It's the most expensive office building in the entire country Joe's goal is to have a thriving investment firm But he's learned that perception is everything. So he convinces a local bank to give him a loan to renovate his office He installs a waiting pool, toilet seats that automatically adjusts to the height of the user and whiteboards that print out what you write on them Unfortunately, it takes more than a fancy office to be successful The Winton group does not take off, and Joe spent all of his money on the office Plus, he's in a ton of debt from the bank loan He stops paying rent on the office and after a few months, he's evicted But Joe still has connections He's very persuasive So he decides to start connecting wealthy Middle Eastern investors with Malaysian businesses He'll serve as a broker and collect fees after the deals are done. At one point Joe facilitates a real estate deal with the Malaysian government that's worth a half a billion dollars. But when Joe asks for his broker fee, he's turned down And this pisses him off He feels like he's spent his life catering to wealthy people, and now he's being boxed out Common broke struggles. This is what happens to people like us, us millionaires amongst the billionaires. Yeah Well, Joe may have been stiffed on a fee, but the Malaysian deevelopment project is ripe with opportunity Joe switches gears and comes up with another get rich quick scheme. But first, you'll need to raise a lot of money So he sets up a bogus investment group He calls it the Abu Dhabi Kuwait Malaysia investment Comany very official. and he gives free shares to his rich friends to make it look like the group has important investors Then he creates a bunch of shell companies in the see Sheells to mask his ownership Eventually, he's able to convince a bank to loan him tens of millions of dollars uses this money to buy a construction company, which he immediately sells to a Malaysian businessman at a huge markup He later brags to friends that the deal was worth more than one hundred million dollars Josee' finally found his way into the stratosphere of extreme wealth And he did it by using other people's money Now, he's got his eye on an even bigger payday And he's gonna to use the coffers of an entire country to make it happen Nearly a year later, in August of two thousand nine, the new Prime Minister of Malaysia is sailing on a yacht on the French Riviera His name is Najib Rzk. He has bright white hair, a matching mustache, and a seemingly permanent frown. Najib is on the yacht with an up and coming Malaysian businessman, Joe. Najib's stepson, Reiza Aziz, went to boarding school with Joe, and their two families grew close in the years since Nijib has been impressed with Joe's supposed economic prowess, and he's recently started managing a fund that he thinks Joe can help him with. It contains more than a billion dollars. Technically, the fund does not belong to Nijib. It belongs to the Malaysian government And the goal of it is to create jobs and boost economic development in that country mostly by investing taxpayer money into things like green energy and tourism. And Ajib, as the prrime Minister, essentially has full control over it He gets to sign off on investments and have final say on its board members. He decides to rename it one Malaysia development Burdad or one MDB for short And even though this money doesn't belong to them, Nejib and Joe already have some big ideas about how to invest it and how to spend it which is why they've set up a meeting today with two Saudi businessmen One of them is a literal prince He's actually the owner of the yacht that they're on. It's got a swimming pool, a movie theater, and a helipad These two men run an oil extraction company called Petro Saudi International, and because one of them is a Saudi prince, they are extremely well connected to the royal family. It seems like they've got access to loads of cash and Najib and Joe decide they want in on it. We can't know exactly what was said during that meeting on the Yacht, but it does seem like some plans were hatched while these men were lounging off the coast of Monaco Because about a month later in September, The two companies, Petrooti and One MDB, announced a two point five billion dollars deal together According to a press release, the deal would strengthen the relationship between Saudi Arabia and Malaysia, and quote, make strategic investments in high impact projects None of that actually happens It's very bold to put out a statement announcing this whole thing, knowing very well you will not be going through with it and not even thinking about the consequences of people finding that out It's almost impressive And after all is said and done, one MDB uses this deal as a guise to transfer more than a billion dollars of Malaysian government money into a Swiss bank account Njib and Joe lie and tell the banks that this account is owned by Petro Sudi for use in their joint venture. You know, to work on high impact projects. Whatever that means? The truth is, the owner of the account is just one person Joe He and Najib are planning to use the money not to enrich the people of Malaysia. but to paintbird themselves And now that he's got the cash in hand, Joe wants to live out the dream of every formerly uncool teenager partartying with hot celebrities It's twenty ten, about six months after the Petro Saudi deal goes through Kim Kardashian is in Vegas to party with Joe and a bunch of his friends Kim originally met Jo when he paid her fifty thousand dollars to go to his birthday party for two hours And since then The two have been Blackberry messaging Kim doesn't know how Joe has all this money, and neither do the tabloids who call him the whale They describe him as a mysterious playboy known for dropping insane amounts of money at New York City clubs like Pink Elephant and O O He's been flying Parisultan around the world and paying her to party with him. There are rumors that Joe owns the five star Lerm Mitage hotel in Beverly Hills has several multimillion dollar properties, owns a Bombardier jet, and is close friends with Leonardo DiCaprio And Sarah, I am devastated to say that all of those rumors are completely true I know they're true because I remember him being mentioned in tabloids, but I had no idea it was this, you know Yeah. It's very common that billionaires buy celebrity time. Yeah. but fake billionaires, That's good. I mean, what a breach of trust. Well, after the party in Vegas, Kim and Joe go to dinner and then out clubbing. Joe gets them into a private bocker out room. He hands Kim a stack of chips and tells her to go have fun. Joe loves to gamble, and he isn't afraid to throw around huge stacks of cash Like a Paris Hilson's twentyinth birth party earlier that year Joe lost two million dollars in under ten minutes without breaking a sweat Cool. Kim uses the chips Joe gave her to play some games, but she's been partying all night and she's fading Around five AM, she's ready to call it But someone at the party reportedly persuades her to just grab a cup of coffee and stick around Joe is known for gifting people cash at the end of the night And when Joe finally decides it's time to turn in, he tells Kim to keep her chips. Kim later tells the FBI that the chips are worth three hundred fifty thousand dollars She flies home on Southwest with a trash bag full of hundred dollars bills It's so great when you hear stories about Kim Kardashian pre him as we know her, you know what I mean? It's like she was just a girl, like us like we all. Who wouldn't do this Well, Joe is spending so much, so fast that his pot of one MDB cash is already drying up He may have invested some of the money into hotels and real estate, but it's not enough to make up for the jet setting, partying, and gambling So Joe convinces Prime Minister Najim to give him eight hundred million dollars through one MDB Is Joe going to use this money to invest in the people of Malaysia No. Instead, he's going to find an even more over the top way to attract famous friends by helping them make a movie Whether you're exploring your current fascinations or discovering new ones, Audaible has all the stories that'll introduce you to your most fascinating self. Tap into a whole new world of heated conversations with a saucy romantasy series. beccome your friend group's sci fi expert on the latest blockbuster book to screen adaptation Or find unexpected reveals through the exclusive episodes of a viral true crime podcast. However you choose to listen, Audible keeps you fascinated so you can be just as fascinating. All in one easy app, with plans now starting at eight doll ninety nine cents, you'll get access to over one million audioobooks and podcasts, including trending bestsellers Hottest new releases and exclusive podcasts you won't find anywhere else. Sign up now to become a member and get any audio book every month plus exclusive podcasts. Plans now start at eightll ninety nine cents. Audible Be fascinated, be fascinating Whether you're exploring your current fascinations or discovering new ones, Audible has all the stories that'll introduce you to your most fascinating self. Tap into a whole new world of heated conversations with a Sucy romantasy series. Become your friend group's sci fi expert on the latest blockbuster book to screen adaptation Or find unexpected reveals through the exclusive episodes of a viral true crime podcast. However you choose to listen, Audible keeps you fascinated, so you can be just as fascinating. All in one easy app with plans now starting at five pounds ninety nine cents, you'll get access to over nine hundred thousand audioobooks and podcasts, including trending bestestsellers, the hottest new releases, and exclusive podcasts you won't find anywhere else Sign up now to become a member and get any audiobook every month plus exclusive podcasts plans now start at five pounds ninety nine Be fascinated, be fascinating feel like a let It's twenty eleven at the Cannes Film Festival in France, and Jolo is at a star studded party with his good friend, Leonardo DiCaprio The two have grown close over the last few years. Joe even affectionately calls Leo LDog The two bros spend long nights partying and hatching plans. They want to start a billion dollar fund to produce movies, develop an eco friendly resort in Belize, and even create a theme park in Asia based on Leo's films It's so great that they want to do all this stuff that will ruin the world and environment by creating a theme park and know jet setting around the world and partying on yachts. But at least they will open an eco friendly resort in Bize. Leonardo DiCaprio is an environmentalist, okay? That's true. he is Well at the canned party, the drinks are flowing, Kanye West is performing, fireworks are exploding. And it's all to announce the financing of Leo's Passion project with director Martin Scorsese, a new film called The Wolf of Wall Street In the movie, Leo will play Jordan Belford, a stock fraudster known for his lavish parties and outrageous spending This event is estimated to cost around three million dollars, and the movie hasn't even started filming yet financiers want to make a splash And one of them is Najib's stepson, Reiza Aziz. He's the co founder of a new production company called Red Granite Pictures. Leo and Scorsese had been struggling to secure funding for the movie and Red Granite was looking to get into the business So, Joe offered to give Riza the money to cover the film's one hundred million dollars budget Joe's name is kept out of the press, but that doesn't stop people from speculating about where Red Granite got the money to bankroll the movie and thow such an outlandish event It's all feeling very suspicious The wolf of Wall Street himself, Jordan Belford, is at the party with his girlfriend And Sarah, will you read what he said to her about the party? Yeah, he says, This is a fucking scam. Anybody who does this has stolen money. You wouldn't spend money you worked for like that. Game recognized game. Listen, Ballers notice ballers in the club Well, meanwhile, Joe and Aejeib have been coming up with more and more schemes to take money from one MDB and deposit it into their own bank accounts they get away with it in part by paying off the bankers they work with When Goldman Sachs handles a bond transaction for one MDB that's worth almost two billion dollars, Joe gives the bankers one hundred ninety million dollars as a thank you evenven though the bank would normally only take home about a million dollars for a transaction like that With so much money rolling in, it's easy for the bankers to look the other way The people of Malaysia are starting to ask questions And no matter how many offshore accounts Joe creates, he won't be able to hide his identity forever It's an unusually hot November night in Las Vegas in twenty twelve The largest luxury suite at the Venetian hotel is packed. It's Joe's thirty first birthday, and the party is raging Actually, this is only the pre party Joe strolls through the Seeten's tuxedo, schmoozing up his celebrity friends. He waves to Alicia Keys and her music producer husband, Swiss Beats. He hugs former Fujis's rapper, Praz Michel before hurrying off to talk movie ideas with Benicio Del Toro and Elgog. For long, a security team escorts them all to the main event Joe has turned an airplane hanger into his dream venue One side is a circus with trampolines, a ferris wheel, and a carousel The other side is decked out like a nightclub cigar lounges and plush white couches for guests like Kim Kardashian and Kon Yest to cuddle on Oh my God, this is so like high school rich kid. and those popular kids are like, Yeahah, I mean, he throws great parties. Of course, we're gonna keep him around Well, there's also a stage where Jamie Fox is M seeing. He plays a video of Joe's friends from around the world dancing to the hit song, Gongnum style crowd erupts when Sidee takes the stage to perform it live Guests are then treated to an hour and a half of live performances from Frel, Busta Rhymes, and QTips. Ludacris and Chris Brown debuted the song Everyday Birthday. Everyday I hit the. hit the and Joo is pulled on stage as a giant faux wedding cake is wheeled towards him Top of the cake burs open and out pops fucking Brittney Spears She serenades Joe with her rendition of Happy Birthday. Joe stands on stage looking out over the sea of famous faces, the hundreds of so called friends he's bought with his millions But very few of these guests know Joe personally. doesn' seem to faze him. and actually, the money and power have started to go to his head In twenty thirteen, about four years into his scheme, he's allegedly stolen more than a billion dollars from the O MDB fund He's found that if he's footing the bill, he can basically do and say whatever he wants At one point, he reportedly tells British model Roxy Horner that she needs to lose weight And while recording his own vanity project in a music studio, he dares to call Buster Rhymes his bitch Bust's face For that alone, he deserves prison under the jail. To me, this is when he becomes a true villain. This is really when the harm happens. yes. You don't say that to Buster R. No But while Joe is partying, Malaysia's politics are changing Najib's political party has been in power ever since Malaysia gained independence in nineteen fifty seven. Now, the opposition partarty is gaining supporters, and Naejib's grip on power is slipping voters are starting to see how much he's spending And it doesn't help that Njeib's wife is famous for her diamond shopping sprees and collection of birken bags Sarah, will you please describe what Rusma looks like Okay So This is a woman who has the oddest hair I've seen in a very long time ink black helmet of hair. She looks like a Hay Arnold character. It's crazy. It's so Big And it's like, is that a wig she bought? Is that something people did for her? You know, she's definitely got that botoxy look respect. I hope I look like her when I grow up Well, Rusma needs to keep up appearances. and in order to do that, Nijib needs to stay in power Joe is also rooting for Najib to keep his elected position. since their scam relies on government funding Joe realizes he needs to step in And he decides the best way to help is to throw a huge party Joe flies to Penang, Malaysia to host a series of events to drum up political support for Niji They offer free food and beer They have raffles and give away bicycles and other prizes Joe even pays Busta Rhymes and Ludicrs to come perform Sarah, can you describe this photo of Joe and Busta from the event? Well, if you ask me, he looks like Busta's bitch because he's pushing him around on a bike rickshaw, and Busta looks confused. He does. But unlike his celebrity friends, the people of Malaysia are not easily distracted by Joe's lavish spending and star studded events On election day, they make it clear that they want Njeib out. For the first time in forty four years, his party loses the popular vote. But they still end up winning more parliamentary seats, so Najib is able to remain in power Voters are not happy about it Within hours, they fill the city streets in protest Across the globe in the US, Joe is still spending like crazy One MDB is ten billion dollars in debt Joe has a playboy reputation to maintain And he's about to turn his sights on a new prize. the heart of a supermodel Even though one MDB is starting to fall apart in Malaysia, Joe is riding high in America. The Wolf of Wall Street opens in december twenty thirteen and becomes a smash hit Leo wins the Golden Gobe for Best Actor in a comedy He even thanks Joe in his speech. I want to thank Joey, Riz, and Joe. Thank you for being not only collaborators but taking a risk on this movie, truly. Shortly after this, Joe decides to start seriously quotting Miranda Kerr He invites her to join him for the Super Bowl in New Jersey, and then he starts wooing Miranda with expensive gifts. even though he has a longtime girlfriend in Malaysia So he has this long time girlfriend back home in Malaysia and he's publicly trying to court Miranda Ker and various hot women S someone tells me she's okay with this because of money Perhaps. Yeahah, maybe. To the world, Joe is presenting himself as a thriving businessman But behind the scenes, he's scrambling to keep everything afloat In Malaysia, the political blowback against one MDB is reaching a fever pitch There are suspicions that Najib has been using the government fund as his own personal piggy bank It doesn't help that Resma is always on outrageous shopping sprees. The former prime minister, who held office for more than two decades before Najib took his place, publicly denounces Najib. He calls for a full audit and investigation of O MDB The company's board discovers that two point three billion dollars have been moved out of the fund and into a Cayman Islands company. They demand that one MDB return the money immediately But Joe comes up with a new trick He uses shell companies to transfer money around and make it look like the fund has more money than it does And this actually works At least for now At this point, the public still has no idea that Joe is involved in the fund or that he's been using its money to do things like finance the Wolf of Wall Street But he must be feeling the pressure He tries to keep his cool in front of Miranda For Valentine's Day he gives her a heart shaped diamond necklace worth over a million dollars. He then invites her aboard his new super yacht, equanimity, which he bought with a two hundred fifty million dollars loan from Deutsche Bank. He also sends a very special gift to her house in Malibu notot a dozen roses or even a car with a bow on it Joe sends Birnda a grand piano worth more than one hundred seventy thousand dollars. It's made of clear acrylic so you can see the hardware through it Miranda showed it off in a video for Vogue My grandmother had a grand piano and so I've got a grand piano So at this point Is she actually his girlfriend? or is he still just buying her very expensive things so that people wonder? We don't really know for sure, but it is clear that he's like really courting her For Miranda's thirty first birthday, Joe throws her a nineties themed party. He flies salt and pepper, Mark Morrison, and vanilla ice to New York City to perform Jamie Fox MCs, and Swiss Beats, Leo and Miranda's ex, Orlando Bloom, are amongst the hundred or so attendees The weekend of birthday festivities concludes with a Miami style party on a yacht on the Hudson River and a helicopter ride to hit the Bakarat tables in Atlantic City But even with all that, Miranda and Joe's romance won't survive the year. and neither will the secret of Joe's involvement in one MDB As more banks and businesses get involved, it leaves room for someone to crack. And when they do, a scrappy British journalist is waiting to publish the whole story It's october twenty fourteen, and Claire Ruecastle Brown is sitting in the lobby of a hotel in Bangkok. C Claire is a London based journalist in her early fifties She has kind eyes and long hair with bangs She kind of reminds me of like a high school art teacher, like the cool one. She was born on an island off Malaysia when it was still part of the British Commonwealth And now she runs a website called the Surawalk Report It's dedicated to exposing corruption in Malaysia And Claire is good Malaysian politicians have even labeled her an enemy of the state bad she wears with pride She's here in this Bangkok hotel to meet a source He's a Swiss banker and a former employee of Petro Saudi, the company one MDB did their first billion dollar deal with. She's expecting someone with Swiss banker vibes Ball glasses shrimpy But the man who approaches her is six foot six with black hair and a very nineties goatee Claire later says that her first instinct was to run She thinks she's been tricked, and he's here to rough her up It turns out he's actually her source Javier Husto. Javier tells Claire he was hired as the director of Petro Sudi after they signed the one MDB deal Petraadi promised him a big salary they only ever paid him about half of it ped any he quit On his way out the door, he copied one of their servers full of damning evidence He tried to blackmail the company to get the money he was owed they refused to pay, and he figured he'd leverage the server another way by giving it to a journalist like Claire for a price Javier promises Claire that the information on the server can bring down one MDB. And it's hers. for two million dollars I mean, that is a lot of money and obviously is not very ethical, but yeah, at the same time, it's either she pays or someone else does and gets the story Someone will pay for it. Claire needs reinforcements So she decides to contact Tong Giong the owner of a Malaysian media outlet called The Edge Unlike most Malaysian media companies, the edge isn't afraid of political blowbacks The site posts frequently about one MDP. Claire convinces Tong to meet with Javier And three months later, they sit down with him at the Fullerton Hotel in Singapore Jave explains that the server can prove that one MDB was putting hundreds of millions of government dollars directly into Jolo's personal bank account Tong thinks a bombshell like this is worth the price, so he agrees to pay the two million dollars And one month later, Claire runs an article with the headline, Heist of the Century It's picked up by news outlets around the world. Word of Joe and Nejib's rampant corruption is out. And now their scheme is about to come crashing down I'm Leon Nefox best known as the co creator of Slowburn and Fiasco I had of course heard of On fans, but always with a distant and quiet skepticism. A silent judgment, you might say Who is actually using this platform? I am Hi. I'm Oly Fans creator and comedian Gracie Kanan. I work from home now I'm on Oly Fans and In case you guys don't know what an O fans is, ask your husband. My journalistic curiosity got the best of me when I found out that my own sister had started an only family. I'm not a sister, just to clarify. It turns out a lot of what I thought I knew about Only fans was wrong I felt like I wasted three point five years for something that wasn't real what happens when connection comes with a price tag? Listen to Only Fantasy wherever you get your podcasts, or binge all episodes of Only Fantasy ad free right now, only on Audible. Start your Audible subscription in the Audible app or on Apple podcasts Hello, I'm Matt Ford. And I'm Alice Levine. And we're the hosts of British Scandal. Yes we are, and our new series starts with a loud, lovable woman from Bermondsey who becomes one of the most famous people in Britain. This is the story of Jade Goody, the reality TV star who built a fortune just by being herself. and then lost everything in one of the most public racism scandals Britain has ever seen. It's a story of fame? And a change of the conversation around cervical cancer forever Follow British sccandal wherever you get your podcasts or listen early and ad free on Audible feel like I I don't know where Njeib is when he reads Claire's article, but Id like to imagine him with his wife, Fresma on one of her legendary shopping spreays at Arermiz She's trying on silk scarves, but Nejib suddenly can't stop staring at his phone. His world is being rocked by a blog post Najib's been in power for six years, and behind the scenes, his one MDB scheme has floundered The fund is eleven billion dollars in debt And now, Claire's article has completely exposed the scam There's nowhere to hide. Najib still has the power of his office and he's desperate to keep it He cracks down on the press and issues harsh penalties on free speech, especially on social media. He arrests five executives from the edge and threatens to hold them indefinitely under a new law that was created for terrorists way to make things so much worse for yourself, buddy. He's proving everybody's point Well, three months later, Niji bans the edge from publishing altogether But it doesn't stop Claire from reporting from London Four months after her first explosive article, she teams up with reporters at the Wall Street Journal. They reveal that Najib put six hundred eighty one million dollars of oneMDB funds into several of his personal accounts. Against Nigiv's best efforts, the news still reaches Malaysia and people call for his arrest. He denies the claims as Malaysian investigators raid the oneMDB offices Najib is not going to go down without a fight. When he gets word that the Malaysian attorney general is looking to press charges Nejeib fires him and puts out a statement that the AG is sick and cannot continue serving He then promotes government investigators into positions where they can't continue the probe, effectively shutting down the investigation. The next day, a fire breaks out on the police headquarters, and tons of important documents go up in smoke Nijib has managed to build a wall around himself in Malaysia But a scam this massive and this international quickly gets the attention of authorities all over the world and he can't stop them all. After Claire cracked open Joe's money trail, hungry investigators all over the world start coming for him Through Interpol, Singapore puts out a red notice for Joe and his associates The U. S. government also files a civil suit in California It accuses Reiza's company, Red Granite, of using the movie The Wolf of Wall Street to launder money. Joe swears he's innocent He flees the U S. in hopes of escaping extradition And he eventually makes his way to China with his wife and two month old baby Joe has a baby. It's crazy to think that while this was all happening, he ended up marrying that woman and having a two month old baby. Yeah. men get away with the craziest shit As Joe's scheme starts to crumble, many of his famous friends abandon him like rats from a sinking ship They turn his lavish gifts over to the US government to avoid being implicated in his crimes Leo returns a Picasso, a collage by Basquiat and Marlon Brando's nineteen fifty four Oscar for on the waterfront Miranda returns eight million dollars in jewelry and offers to give back the piano But when the government examines her house, they realize they'd need to knock down walls to retrieve it They decide it's just cheaper to leave it. I mean, does that just mean that If something's big enough and it's stolen, you might not have to give it back m I'm liking this loophole Well not everyone turns their back on Joe. Alicia Kees and Swiz Beads decide to keep traveling and partying with him. Swiz even attends a birthday party that Joe throws in Thailand for his older brother Joe manages to pay Nelly, Neo, and Nicole Scherzinger to perform And even still, it's a modest affair by Joe's standards That is so crazy that these people see what's happening and they're like, you know what? let's just milk him. Like let's see how far we can go with using this billionaire's money Knowing that he's a thief. Well here's the natural progression of that. also allegedly pours the money into Donald Trump's reelection campaign, hoping that he will drop the investigation against him It goes nowhere. The evidence and the global outrage continue to mount. In may twenty eighteen, Najib loses his bid for reelection The news comes in around two AM as he sits in his mansion, surrounded by family He's shocked He actually thought he couldn't lose after he spent millions bribing government officials For the first time since Malaysia became a democracy, the opposition partarty is in power Njib and his wife, Resma try to flee the country on a private jet But others in the government leaked their plans and protesters mobb the airport Days later, Najib is resting at home after a trip to his mosque when over a dozen cop cars surround the property Police storm the house looking for evidence And that night, they raided six of Najeib's other houses They seizize thirty five bags of cash in twenty six currencies. totaling about thirty million US dollars. They find twenty five bags of gold, hundreds of Hermes handbags, and even more watches Two months later, Najib is arrested is insane. This man is leading a country and he not anymore. No, but it's so crazy that a world leader was so brazen. Like that's just what you could see. Forget the stuff that's hidden away. That's in the floorboards, yeah Two years after the arrest, Najib is convicted in Malaysia He's fined forty six million dollars and sentenced to twelve years in jail. His stepson, Reza, reaches a settlement to pay the US sixty million dollars in assets. He also agrees to testify against Ajep Goldman Sachs is ordered to pay nearly three billion dollars for conspiring in the one MDB scandal Individual bankers are also charged, and one gets a ten year prison sentence At this point, this is the largest international kleptocracy case the U.S. has ever pursued And since Joe fled the United States, the government has seized about nine hundred million dollars worth of his assets That includes houses, a hotel, a private jet, and a mega yacht But Joe still has cash hidden in accounts all over the world. He's wanted in Malaysia, Kuwait, the U.S., and Singapore And even after being the center of a nearly five billion dollar global fund Joe remains at large Possibly at a Bakarat table near you Okay, so based on Malaysian intelligence, it seems like Joe is in Macau in China But he is very much free, Sarah. How does that make you feel As a millionaire How that make you feel? That is so crazy. This guy who is so visible. He has been in so many photos, been so many places. This is such a high profile thing that happened. It involved some of the most famous people in the world and a world leader. and this guy is just maybe nearby in Macau