Original subtitles

[gentle music plays]

[woman shouting in market]

[gentle music continues]

Sexual servitude, modern slavery.

[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 slavery, 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?

Fuck...

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 killed 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 murder.

[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 killer, 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 murdered.

Brutally, brutally killed.

[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 fuck's sake.

Alright, I'll start cleaning the house.

[Nick] David, in fact, the whole Papo family,

are obviously massively traumatised from the killing.

But Kevin would never have been charged with murder

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 shit 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 gang.

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 killed 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 murder,

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 illegal 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 illegal 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 cum.

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 illegal 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 anal.

[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.