I’ve waited almost three years to get a copy of this unedited 60 Minutes Australia ambush interview. I won a defamation lawsuit against 60 Minutes, The Age and Nick Mckenzie, the journalist who interviewed me. It was only through compelled discovery that I was finally able to obtain the raw video. Mckenzie never intended for the pubic to see the actual interview, only his deceptively edited version that was fraudulently designed to make me look guilty. After he lost the defamation lawsuit his lawyer went back to court seeking an emergency injunction restraining me from publishing this video, based on the argument that the public should not be allowed to see “the inner workings of a broadcaster.”
At the time of this interview was recorded I didn’t believe my bank was the target of an investigation, as the government officials who visited my house told me that my bank was merely a custodian of records that pertained to an investigation which they ask me to keep confidential.
But Nick Mckenzie must have been in possession of confidential Grand Jury information that was likely illegally leaked to him by an anonymous, corrupt government source. An ethical journalist would have refused to published the information knowing that the investigation was still in its early stages. In fact, the head of the Australian Tax Authority repeated told Mckenzie it was too early to reveal the target of the investigation. But Mckenzie did so anyway.
The investigated ended without any charges being filed against the bank, or anyone running it. But the mere fact that Mckenzie exposed that regulators were investigating their unsubstantiated suspicious was enough to cripple the bank financially. So even though the investigation itself completely exonerated the bank, the media’s decision to publicly expose the investigation led to the complete destruction of my bank.
The organized crime figure Simon Anquetil, who McKenzie claimed had an account at my bank, did in fact have an account in the past, but it was in the name of a company completely unrelated to Plutus Payroll, the company that committed the $100 million tax fraud in Australia. That corporate account was opened and subsequently closed several years before Anquetil’s criminal record was established. So at the time of this interview Simon Anquetil did not bank with my bank, as repeatedly alleged by McKenzie.
More relevant, Anquetil actually tired to open an account at my bank on behalf Plutus Payroll, but my bank rejected that application. When authorities finally convicted Mr. Anquitel and a cadre of conspirators, it was found that Plutus Payroll laundered money using accounts at over 100 bank. My bank was not one of those banks, and ironically my bank may have been the only bank that refused to do business with Plutus.
Also, discovery did not reveal that Mckenzie did any research that evidenced any organized crime figures using my bank, and neither the organized crime syndicate he mentioned nor Simon Anquetil were referenced in any of his notes or emails. All of that information was likely given to him illegally by a corrupt government official involved in the investigation, who Mckenzie is now protecting. It was unethical for McKenzie to have even used information about a confidential criminal investigation that he knew was illegally obtained.
Finally, discovery revealed no attempt on the part of Mckenzie or anyone else to open an account at my bank, or even contact anyone still employed by the bank. They only spoke to anonymous former bank employees, all of whom verified the strength of the bank’s robust AML compliance. Even the independent referral agents they spoke to told them how difficult it was to open and account at my bank, how long it took, and how strict ongoing compliance was.
McKenzie lied when it said told me that the referral agents they spoke with recommended my bank for secrecy and tax evasion. Plus all the former bank customers they spoke with also confirmed how difficult it was to open an account at my bank due to its extensive onboarding protocols, and how rigorous my bank vetted each individual transaction after an account was activated.
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